I signed up online for Direct TV last Fall as they were advertising a great deal: $61.50 a month for the first year (then the regular price of $82.50 for the remainder of the 2-year contract) for HD tv mid-level programing with Showtime. Considering my local cable company wanted $80.00 for that, I went with Direct TV knowing I would save some money (to the tune of $252.00 for that one year of savings). Little did I know that they would NEVER send me anything in the mail and would only contact me through my email address I signed up with, which is one I don't check often because I use it only for internet ordering (in other words, it fills up with SPAM quickly). I only check it when I've ordered something to check on the status of the order. Well... Somewhere in their little scheme of signing up online there is supposedly some notice on there that in order to get in on this special discounted price, I need to fill out a rebate. That NEVER came up when I called them to verify my order and schedule my installation as the original installer told me he couldn't install at my location as it was too high up and we have a brick house - he would need his supervisor to come. So his supervisor comes out a day later and we talk about it - he didn't mention the rebate either. I called the last time before they installed it to go over the package I ordered - NO mention of this supposed rebate was talked of. Then a month goes by - no bill. I know I paid the first month in advance, so I wait and see if it comes in the mail. No. Another month goes by - no bill. I get online to my account and voila - I'm past due two months. Then I notice the price they charged me - NOT the $61.50, but the $82.50!!! I call them to have them correct it. They refuse, saying I have to submit my rebate. WHAT REBATE? No one mentioned rebate until this call. Not the installer, not the installer's supervisor, not the installer who eventually came out and where I signed on the dotted line. Oh yeah - NO mention of rebate in my contract either! I tell them, look I didn't know about any rebate, but if that's what you want - fine, I'll do it. They lead me to a link on their website. I fill it out. Denied. Apparently I was a couple of days past the 90-day period of time, so they would not honor the rebate now. I called them to try and work it out, they gave me the runaround. I had my husband call - same thing. Always passing the blame to the fact that WE didn't fill out the rebate I knew NOTHING about until after the 90-day grace period. I called them one last time, today. I spoke to three different people in a period of 35 minutes. I thought I was making some progress as the two underlings I spoke with agreed that I was right (yes - they actually said that!!!) and it should be easy enough to take care of. Wrong. They put me through to a supervisor named Paul who was dead set against anything to help me. Look, right now I'm out about $126 from these overcharges, and this is clearly a REAL problem for DirectTv from looking at all the complaints on this website they have involving rebates. Would it kill them to say "yes m'amm, sorry for any confusion, it's fixed and we will credit your account" - keep me a happy customer and let me spread the joy about their great company? Yes, apparently it would kill them because here I am typing this! I did file a complaint with the BBB as I saw that helped someone so I'm hoping it will help me too. Look - I like the picture quality of DirectTV, and even living in a VERY windy area that gets really bad rain storms (New Orleans on lake Pontchartrain), I have never lost my signal despite my fears of such. My only problem with them is their DECEPTIVE advertising and their HORRIBLE customer service.
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