Does anyone on here work for Direct TV?

I am a bit pissed off. I have a simple question about the routing of the cable from the dish to the house entrance. When it was installed, frankly, I think it was sort of half-assed but I accepted it. Now, I need to rearrange cable routing, an actually simple job, physically a matter of unscrewing some screws, cutting some cable ties, moving a few feet and replacing screws and ties.

However, I think there might be a possibility of causing some problems. Problems I don't feel like getting into on here. I want a technician to stop by and look at this setup and just say "Yep, you can do it" or "No, not a good plan, can cause --------".

I need this done fairly soon. I am having an addition added onto my house, my contractor is presently working and I need to make decisions ASAP.

The reason for this rant, plea for help and query here is because after yet again losing another hour of my life on hold, DirectTV providing NO email, on line help service and being bounced around to several departments before getting a crazy response I am forced to go this route.

The crazy response being "Yessir, we can schedule a tech to come out and look at it, however there will be a $49 service charge". Yep, I'm pissed off. I haven't called them since original installation for one single problem. What irks me even more is I see the damned DirecTV vans drive right by my house a minimum of 3 times a day, and I'm not even home or outside much during the weekdays.

A simple roll up my driveway, you can probably even see everything from the comfort of the air conditioned drivers seat of the service truck and SNAP! Question answered.

If any techs working for this company reads this please PM me. If you can call me you may be able to answer this. If you swing by I will give you $10.00 for less than 60 seconds of your time but I WILL NOT give this company 5 times that amount for the privilege of sitting home between 8-12 in anticipation of your arrival. You actually don't need me here, you can tell the contractor and I'll have him hand you the 10 spot.

If I don't get a response within the next few days I have a pair of quality Kline brand cable cutters. I will set all of the boxes and the dish that I'm tired of mowing around out by the curb for pickup. Truly, I could better spend that money on ammo and tell my wife she can watch her 3 locals shows back on the antenna.:frusty:

Edit: I can even text a self explanatory photo.

Got the answer

And you're not going to share? I imagine it was ok to move yourself, it's really no different then moving a cable TV line around.

It will be a very cold day in Hell before I ever consider doing business with DirecTV again. I signed up with them, had it installed, paid the installation fee and two days later one of the boxes died. After 2 hours on hold I was told to ship the box back to them and they would have a replacement sent to me in 6-8 WEEKS. I told them to come pick their crap up and forget I even signed up. Ended up having to pay a $300 termination fee to boot.

Never again.

Hope my problem ends OK. Stopped getting signals which tell my "box" what programs are on what channel (prevents recording them too). Tech said "I can't tell you what to do, but those 2 trees are blocking the signal." I just spent $1200 having trees removed Wednesday and even had the 3 trees behind those 2 trees removed just to make sure for the future that they don't grow up and block signal. Well, that satellite signal is still at zero (should be in the 90-100 range). Called Direct..."reset box and call back if problem persists"...gonna call this morning, as signal is still zero.

Bonus: My goats are happily eating the downed pine and oak leaves and bark, so I don't have to give them goat food for several days.

If you get into the DirecTV menu you can go to Satellite setup and align the Satellite yourself if it's just an alignment problem. I'm betting there's a lot of videos on YouTube on how to do this that would help you get back online faster if it indeed is just an alignment problem. I've done this when camping with a friend and it's pretty easy but best done with two people, one to adjust the dish and one to monitor signal strength on the TV.

Well, I have plenty of stories to make even the strong not sleep well at night. DirecTV, Verizon, Sprint, Magellan and Brighthouse. So far DirecTV has been OK compared to the others. I just get frustrated that it takes forever on hold to fix a 2 second problem with them.

Customer service sucks everywhere. I still need to chronicle my Home Depot appliance purchase odyssey. Plus, I have a new enemy in the nether world: Telecheck. I opened a new account two weeks ago at Gulf Winds. I deposited a quite substantial amount of money. So far I can't write an effing check anywhere due to "Insufficient funds"??????? and "Suspicious activity". My debit card finally arrives a week late. Won't activate because GWFCU had my SS number wrong, then it was my birth date (Hell yes I wish I had been born in 1992) then it auto keyed into a totally sperate joint account I have with my dad and scrambled our SS numbers together and came up with two new ones.

But, that's another story.

Essentially, my satellite TV issue was that when they ran the feed cables to the house they bundled it all up into a bag of snakes against my laundry room wall. I need it out of there as the contractor is going to tie into that exact spot with a heavily reinforced gate support/post setup so I can mount my security gate between the house and garage. Only way I can move the cables is tight up against my power panel/meter and mast.

A: interference problems?
B: I have the tools and materials to cut those cables and swedge new connectors but will that be a problem or will they decide the reason my wife can't watch the Food Network without snow is my fault and charge me the price of an AR to fix it?

Screw it, I'm doing it anyway. My garage is more important than the Bachelorette.

Works great, unless there's a cloud in the sky.

Spent an hour or so with them today via Chat (so I have a record of the conversation). Had me do all the setup stuff and read them the various error msgs (all of which say alignment problem). Finally told me if the error code 920 (alignment) comes again to contact them again. Wife's assignment today: watch TV shows and report if error code 920 shows up.

Did they have you adjust the alignment? I pretty much guarantee you if you had an alignment problem that magically went away without an alignment adjustments it's most likely going to come back!

Dan1612 said:

Works great, unless there's a cloud in the sky.

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Actually that is something I haven't had issue with. I had Dish 10 years ago and if a bird flew over we lost reception. Since this system has been in I haven't had a single problem and that was even in the worst of these monsoons.

Daezee said:

Spent an hour or so with them today via Chat (so I have a record of the conversation). Had me do all the setup stuff and read them the various error msgs (all of which say alignment problem). Finally told me if the error code 920 (alignment) comes again to contact them again. Wife's assignment today: watch TV shows and report if error code 920 shows up.

Click to expand...

There are a couple of free apps for iPhones that will point the direction and Azimuth of the correct satellite to speed the alignment. Like Viking said best with two folks - one to watch the signal strength on the TV and one to do the alignment - be sure to move the dish very slowly and wait between the small moves. I set up a dish at my camp and I was ready to kick everything to the curb until another Direct sat person there explained the need to make small moves slowly. Got my signal strength to 96 and that's better than what the tech got at the house.

Error code 920 - missing guide info - has repeatedly come back. Talked to Direct just now. Tech will be here this afternoon. Phone person said, well you say can see the Guide now. I said it comes and goes and if it's gone, programs do not record. He, like others I've talked to there, cannot explain how the tech's hand held "equipment" can see the satellite signal, yet the dish cannot when the tech is beside the dish. I realize they are probably following a script. I said I will not go through all the disconnect and setup stuff for the umpteenth time only to get various error codes and messages and have another phone person say "well you can see it now; let us know if the error messages come back."


Hmmm Switch to DISH, but have them confirm their equipment can see the satellites from my house?

DISH just said they would do survey of signal strength before doing anything, and I have it in writing.

When he get's there make sure he uses your TV to verify your signal strength and show you where to look if you don't already know and not just look from the dish...might be a signal loss in your cable from the dish to your receiver. If he says 95 at the dish and it is 85 at the receiver - might just need new connectors or checking to see if one is lose....just some thoughts.