I tried to set up Dish service thru embarq (it's a promotion where you sign up for phone, internet, & satellite and get a year of tv for free).
The first available date they had to install the dish (I already have a dish on the house... So "install" isn't really accurate) was two weeks later, on a Saturday.
On the Thursday before my appointment they called to confirm the time and tell me that if I rented my place I would need to have my landlord fill out a permission form and fax it to them by 3:00 the next day (that gave me about 18 hours to get it done).
Of course my landlord couldn't do that on such short notice, so they called Saturday morning to tell me that my appointment had been cancelled.
I told them that if they could send a guy out I could go to my landlord and get a letter to physically hand to the installer. The operator told me that would be fine, as that's what he did when his satellite was installed.
I ran out, tracked down my landlord, and got him to write a letter to let me use the already-installed satellite. Went back home, called Dish and they said that wouldn't be acceptable because A) they needed to have a fax of the letter, not the actual letter, and B) they were already booked up for the day.
The next available appointment they had was on a Sunday in two weeks (one month after I originally tried to set up service). The scheduled time was noon-5:00.
On Sunday, I made sure to be home. Like a prisoner trapped in my own house I didn't go anywhere, for fear that the guy would show up while I was gone. At 3:30 I called the 800 number and asked if they were still coming. They said yes. I asked what would happen if they didn't show up, and the CSR said that they would.
Guess what.
At 4:40 they called me and said that they were backed up and wouldn't show up until 5:30 at the earliest. I was livid after having already gone thru so much with them already. I told them that I had an appointment to get to and couldn't wait that long (which was true). The guy acted like I was being unreasonable since sometimes they just fall behind.
At 5:00 I left for my appointment. When I got home that night there was a message on my machine from 6:30 from the installers telling me that their guy got backed up in a neighboring town and wouldn't be able to make it that day. The next available appointment wasn't for another week.
Screw them. After treating me like this there is no way that I'm going to enter into a two-year "service" contract with them.
I have trouble believing that it could really be true... But I actually think that Dish may have worse customer service than Comcast.
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