Strike One.....You're OUT!!!

We have been discussing how ridiculous our cable bill is for a while now, and thinking about other options, mainly satellite.  The Sky TV satellite in our flat in York (UK) was particularly good by the way.  So when Bruce was approached in Best Buy earlier this week by a Direct TV salesperson, he jumped on the bandwagon.  It was one of the options we were considering, so....why not?  He paid a nominal sign up fee and scheduled installation for this afternoon.  Let me preface this by saying I am not a huge TV kind of person.  There are a very few things that I absolutely will NOT miss....well, ok, since House, MD has ended there is really nothing that I won't miss, or have to tape or whatever.  When I'm bored, or just chillin' I can watch endless hours of HGTV, but if I had to live without it, I absolutely could.  We have Netflix (instant view) and a Blockbuster subscription, so we see all the movies we can handle.  But if Direct TV is cheaper, then yes, whatever.

Anyway, after the appointment was scheduled, meaning AFTER the fact, I did a little research on the company.  And while most people agreed that the picture quality was fantastic, the channel selection some of the best, and only minimal signal interferance during storms.....the customer service and billing complaints were in the thousands.  Maybe more.  Hidden fees, unexplained charges....and they do this autopay billing which allows them to take any arbitrary amount out of your bank account once a month.  Apparently if they take too much for whatever reason, good luck ever getting it back.  There were complaints with the Better Business Bureau, lawsuits, you name it.  I was getting a little apprehensive about the whole thing.  I mean yeah, I felt like we were paying too much for cable, but it was a known evil.  We have never had any problems dealing with Suddenlink. 

Bruce was researching too.  He was not happy about what we were reading online, but decided that we could at least try this and see.  Nothing ventured, nothing gained, right?  But then today, the appointment was cancelled with no real explanation.  Great way to start off with new customers.  They tried to reschedule, but Bruce told them, "No thanks....not gonna happen."  And so our satellite tv adventures were over before they began.  And I am ok with that.  With the accessibility of information on the internet, bad customer service just doesn't cut it.  There are too many other options, and other companies who actually DO try to keep things straight forward and their customers satisfied. 

Anyway, Bruce talked to our cable company and negotiated a better deal.  Apparently, they will do this for you if you are a longstanding customer who might be thinking about going to another service.  They offer continual "deals" for new customers, but regular customers can get the same deals if you suggest you are shopping around.   Our monthly fees were cut by a third, and we did lose some of the channels that we actually didn't even know we had....LOL.  Seriously, we never even watched some of the stuff we were paying for.  It was fine to cut our channel package back to the things we actually watch. And home phone service was included.  So there you have it.  We are letting them install a home phone line because the package was cheaper WITH it than without it.  Go figure.  They will be here on Tuesday and we will have a home number again.  This is after NOT having a landline since the kids were in high school.  We are going to shop for a phone, I guess.  I mean honestly, if I forget and leave my cell phone in my purse, I don't hear it, so there is probably some benefit to having a landline, I suppose.  I will email you all (family members, I mean) our new number after the line is activated. 

Oh and tomorrow our temp is going to be a balmy 103 degrees.  And humid.  And I figure you can guess what I think about that!!!  LOL.  And about British TV (the Sky TV satellite that I mentioned earlier) the thing that amused me most was the commercials.  There were TONS of the very same advertisements that we have here in the states.  Pantene hair products, cleaning products...etc....LOTS of the same stuff.  But all of them were dubbed over in British accents, like just having them speak English in an American accent was unacceptable.  It made me laugh.  Like, if they were dubbed over because the language was completely different, I could understand.  But dubbed just to rid it of that nasty American accent, even though the actual words were the same????  Hilarious.