On Saturday our satellite lost its signal. It said "Complete Signal Loss", gave the list of idiotic things to check, and then said to give them a call if your problem does not go away. The dumb part is that it wasn't storming, it wasn't windy, and nothing was going on when this happened. Jarrod was watching the TV as it happened; he said it started to get fuzzy, and then it just went out.
After seeing this "Complete Signal Loss" screen for more than an hour, I knew exactly what this meant: we would have to call a service tech to come out here to fix it, which we would also have to pay for, which is stupid.
I knew this because exactly one year ago to the day, we had this exact same problem. At the time, there was a storm, and our TV went out during the storm, which is par for the course; I don't care how many times they tell you, when they're installing your setup, 'No, you have a perfect signal, no obstructions, it should hardly ever go out', they are lying, it always goes out during rain. I remembered it went out on Saturday, we called the company on Sunday, and they sent a guy out on Monday, Labor Day last year, to fix it.
Jarrod called the company today and was aggravated and stern with the service reps on the phone. He didn't yell at them, but he was firm and stayed the course with his point that: No, I'm not paying for a service call for you guys to come fix your equipment that we pay to lease when we did absolutely nothing to it. All of the error codes coming back were saying it was something with cables, and they kept asking if we had moved the equipment or whatnot. Again, Jarrod was sitting in the living room while he watched the signal go out, so no, we did not move anything around.
The first person he talked with wouldn't budge on the price. They kept insisting he either pay for the service call, which is $95, or buy the protection plan for a year, which at $8 a month works out to be $96, how convenient. Once he mentioned he'd have to talk it over with me and that we were thinking of switching anyways, they told him to hold on and they put him through to another person. No surprise there, as soon as you say you'll switch they usually try to work with you, but he wasn't lying. He talked at length with a guy from Charter yesterday about what their TV packages offered and would cost. Long story short, they finally agreed to send someone out tomorrow at no charge! Thank goodness.
Jarrod barbecued steak tonight, which on a normal day would be cool, but tonight it was really cool because he has not grilled anything in for-ev-er. He's been so busy with the basement that he has not had time for it; I seriously think this is the first time he's grilled all summer. After we were done eating dinner, he sat down in the recliner and joked "Let's see what's on the tube tonight."
He turned the TV on and funny story: we had channels again. We were both so aghast. I think I stood there with my mouth hanging open for ten seconds. Lo and behold, our satellite magically works again. No joke.
This entire thing is just so odd. And it's hard not to think up theories and suspicions about it.
- How weird is it that exactly one year ago TO THE DAY this happened, it happens again?
- And for no reason?
- And then after complaining and complaining on the phone, getting them to agree to eat the dumb cost of the service call, hours later, it just magically works again?
- Really?
- It's almost like, if you put up with it for long enough, it'll fix itself. They just want you to have to pay for a service call.
Clearly they didn't need to send someone out, because I have a hard time understanding how this went on for two full days with it never fixing itself. But once we called, and complained, and threatened to leave, and they would have to send someone out, for no charge, it fixes itself? Yeah, they had to have done something on their end, otherwise I'd really like them to explain this one to me.
I cancelled our service call. I thought about leaving it where it was and then letting the guy get here and then say "Oh, well, it works again." but I nixed that idea. I didn't want to waste his time. Who knows if we'll still have Dish by this time next year, or if we'll have "cut the cord" by then, but if we still do, I'll know to be prepared for my TV to go out Labor Day weekend.
I cancelled our service call. I thought about leaving it where it was and then letting the guy get here and then say "Oh, well, it works again." but I nixed that idea. I didn't want to waste his time. Who knows if we'll still have Dish by this time next year, or if we'll have "cut the cord" by then, but if we still do, I'll know to be prepared for my TV to go out Labor Day weekend.
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