Direct TV vs DISH vs ATT?

We switched from DirecTV to Veriosn FiOS for both TV and internet and are very happy. The TV picture is much clearer and doesn't go own in bad weather. Internet is like a million times faster and also does not go down in bad weather.

 

I had Dish w/ the multi-room DVR service at my previous home, and DirectTV w/ Tivo before that.

Dish - HORRID! The service was crap, the connection would drop in a light breeze, and the DVR software was about as intuitive as a rubiks cube! I would sell my TV before I went back to Dish... and that is being dead serious.

DirectTV - service was much better, and the Tivo DVR interface was certainly more effective, but I'm not sure if DirectTV still uses the Tivo or not.

Can't comment on the ATT service

 

I had directv at my old house and have Dish now. Although customer service is nonexistent and you can't get Speed in HD yet, I found dish the better of the two. More HD channels and the newer model DVR is great. I also feel Dish has more channels in HD that I watch as opposed to Directv.

 

DirecTV works on a "hearts" system - meaning that each customer is assigned a heart number, and the more hearts you have on your account, the more "valuable" a customer you are. Hearts are given based on how long you've been a customer, how good you are about paying (i.e. do you "forget" to pay the bill often), and how often you cost them $$$ (i.e. if you are constantly calling about problems, that could reduce your heart level). The scale is, IIRC, 1 to 5 hearts. The more you have, the more they can do for you - TO KEEP YOU AS A CUSTOMER (i.e. they have to believe you are considering leaving in order to offer you something to make you stay).

The grunt CS rep will do nothing for you... especially now when companies are trimming costs. They will just read from a list of preselected choices. You want to talk to customer retention. The baseline CS rep will probably say "I can help you with that" but you *must* insist on talking to someone in the retention department. If you ask "is this the retention department?" and they hem and haw then it's not - you've got a CS grunt. Hang up and call back if need be, you must get to retention (because they are the ones who have the power to sweeten the deal far beyond the bottom line CS grunts do).

Once you get them, just lay out the facts. Tell them you've been a loyal customer for X years, and have always paid on time (assuming you have), and rarely call about problems, and have never asked for anything from DirecTV. Then tell them that you want HD but you find their cost to be much higher than Dish or AT&T. Make sure you have the actual cost numbers from AT&T... don't say "they told me it would be cheaper". Say "they are offering 30 HD channels for $20/mo less than you are". DirecTV has more HD channels, but don't take that as an excuse - tell them AT&T is coming out with more, and they have content on demand and internet service that's much faster than DirecTV. Tell them you prefer to stay with DirecTV because you've already got it installed, but that AT&T is offering free install and you will get a "new customer deal" with AT&T. At a minimum they should give you the same deals that new customers get, but if you ask for more you will probably get it.

At a minimum you could probably get the high-def package free for a year, as well as maybe a premium channel or two free for 6 months (like HBO and Cinemax if you don't already have them). You can probably also get the HD receiver boxes for free.


FYI, I have been a customer for about 13 years or something like that... bill gets paid on my CC so never late. I got 2 free H20 HD receiver boxes, $200 off a HR-20 HD receiver/recorder box, free HD for a year, $180 credit ($20/mo), and then I decided to upgrade one of the H20's to a HR-20 (PVR recorder) and they took $200 off that one as well and I got it for $99.

So in total, I got about $900 worth of 'stuff' for being a great customer. however, that was about 1.5 years ago... they have trimmed way back, so you probably can't get that sort of deal, but you should at *least* get free HD for a year + free receivers, IMO.

 

I know my uncle switched over to ATT's new service where you have one box, but can watch the DVR recorded shows all over the house. I'm pretty sure he likes it though, otherwise I would have heard something about it by now.

 

I tried to order Dish HD last month. They are a wreched company that will never get my business.

 

Went from DirecTV to Dish, solely for the Globo.

Pros: Dish is a better value and they don't try to screw you on your bill every single month like DTV, rather every three months or so...

Con: DirecTV DVR is more user friendly on the remote.

 

Went from Comcast to Uverse last month, was with comcast since '93 but they could not fix my internet service....I had an intermittant connection for 14 months and after 100+ service calls it was still not fixed. I had several weeks where the service tech would come 4 days a week with no improvement in service....So far the uverse has been great! The dvr service is much better than cable, only complaint is you can't record HBO on uverse but I could with cable.

I would recommend ATT Uverse to anyone interested, the service also cost $40 a month less than cable.

 

We switched from Comcast cable to ATT Uverse about 6 months ago. Best move we've ever made. We had both cable modem and cable tv, and the modem went out constantly. We'd be down for an hour, a day, a week. They couldn't figure out why. We'd have to wait 2 days for them to send somebody, and my wife works at home. No cable modem=no work.

For only a few $ more per month, I now have 300 channels and 0 internet service issues. Uverse rules.