I am not surprised to have found the many many other unfair business practice complaints online, regarding DirecTV, including poor customer service, poor quality product services, billing disputes, and more. I have NEVER submitted or even researched complaining about something online, until today. I pride myself on being polite and respectful in order to get things resolved, which works almost all the time. Unless you are dealing with DirecTV.
My situation with DirecTV is unique, because I am not, and never have been a customer of theirs, however they recently charged $851.88 to my debit card. Apparently since I had at one point made a payment on behalf of a friend, 7-8 months ago, that person cancelled service, and DirecTV continued to bill him. Since his card on their files had expired, DirecTV elected to bill my card for the months of service that had long been cancelled, late fees, and cancellations fees.
I contacted DirecTV immediately, actually the charges were still pending. I monitor my bank account closely being on a very tight budget. I spent almost 2 hours, being put on hold, disconnected, transferred from one representative to the next and having to tell each person the scenario over again, being told they cant pull up my account information unless I have an account which I dont. Eventually I asked to speak with the highest supervisor there after again getting transferred by a representative to an out of service DirecTV number.
Finally, after additional attempts I made it to the claims department explaining that I wasnt a customer, and had been charged and believed it was not legal to keep my credit card on file, let alone charge it (which it is not). The claims person apologized profusely, acknowledging the mistake and said it would be submitted to claims immediately, which wont be processed for 8-12 business days... 8-12 Business days?! I explained my account is going to be overdrawn, that I am pregnant and very sick needing to make co-payments for upcoming dr. Appts and get my medication. She said I am very sorry about your situation, there is nothing I can do. But once the claim is processed you can fax us your bank statements and submit another claim for the overdraft charges, I find this absurd. The claims person said there was nothing they could do to expedite the matter either and suggested that I contact my bank, which I did.
I spoke with my branch manager, he said the bank requires that I contact the party that charged my card to give them the opportunity to reverse the charges. I told him I had, and they wouldnt be doing so for 8-12 business days and I would be negative in my account if the bank didnt stop it while it was still pending. He said well if its pending they cant do anything anyways, and since DirecTV agreed to reverse the charges even though an undesirable amount of time, that the bank cannot do anything for 30 days. He even called legal, corporate, everyone he could to try and help me since I have a good relationship with my bank. Laws prevent the banks from doing anything once a claim has been filed for 30 days, that was a dead end. He suggested I contact an attorney because what they did is not legal. I spent about an hour in the bank, and another 30 minutes on the phone with the bank at home. Thats now 3.5 hours of my time.
I again contacted DirecTV, the customer service agents if thats what you want to call it... Seemed as though they had been trained to read from a script, located in a foreign country. Each time you call their phone number, it takes 10-15 minutes going through the voice prompts and wait times. Again, I was disconnected time after time in the process of being transferred to the department that handles 'that'. Finally I got to an agent after asking for a supervisor who said she was not a supervisor, and she will not transfer me to one, because I am going to get the same answer no matter who I talk to. She stated that there is NO way to expedite the reversal of the charge fraudulent or not, because it is done electronically and their agents do not have the ability to over ride 'the system'. The agents were very snide, and had been trained to make no attempt to help, and to read a scripted 'it will take 8-12 business days'. That process was another 1.5 hours of my time, adding up to 5 hours of my time now.
I contacted DirecTV today, 1 week from the start of this (5th business day). I called to confirm the claim is being processed, how far along in the claim process it is, when I can expect it to be done, is it 8 or 12 business days? After explaining the situation to the representative, she said she if a claim was filed its in process and she doesnt have a way to pull it up and see how far out or when it will be done. I said okay, can you just pull it up to confirm its happening though? She said no, she would not because I already filed a claim and she doesnt have time to confirm something that is already being done. She is very sorry for my inconvenience, and to contact them if it hasnt gone through in 12 business days. That took me another 30 minutes, and 3 separate calls. 5.5 hours of my time so far.
I consulted an attorney who stated what they did is not legal, but the cost of litigating the matter would likely outweigh the winnings. Unless the course of their actions did result in affecting my pregnancy or compromising my babies health. Are you kidding me? I dont even want money from DirecTV, I just want MY money back in my account today... I want a super aggressive attorney that wants to get rich suing the pants off DirecTV. Thats right DirecTV is so awful, that it would bring me vindication knowing that they had to pay a large sum of money fighting a legal battle and paying the attorney off. I just want justice. So, Mr. Or Ms. Attorney of my dreams, boy do I have the case for you!
If you are thinking about signing up for service with DirecTV - DONT! And if you are reading this because you are also fuming mad, contact me on this complaint forum... Maybe I will have found my attorney by then and you can jump in on the action!
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