"But We're Not Going To Tell You In Time..."

 Just finished another fruitless call with another company goosing up its charges. This time is was Dish, our satellite TV company.

We'd switched over from Direct TV six months ago. Direct's charges were going up, and Dish came in with a lower offer, guaranteed to be the same for two years. During install, there was already an issue. We were given a "hopper", their term for their DVR, which only recorded one thing at a time. Steve and I have different choices in TV and like to be able to watch all of them, which means recording several at once during certain times of the day, and watching at our convenience. It's what a DVR is for, just in case you've been living without one for the last decade or so. We immediately contacted Dish and agreed to pay the extra for them to bring around, next day, their top capacity model.

Sigh.

At least we did get the $300 credit card for making the switch. We weren't that unhappy.

Fast forward 6 months. I get emails announcing the charge upcoming to be taken out of my checking account. Many of my regular bills  come with that advance notice. I pay attention to those so I can be sure the  money is where it needs to be when it needs to be there, especially with variable charges. I learned many many years ago about bouncing checks. This time there was an increase in the monthly withdrawal, around $10.00. I immediately called them up, willing to fight through trying to understand the accents of their offshore phone staff. I'm usually about 90% successful, unless they start to talk over me and I have to back them up to repeat what they said or have them let me finish what I'm saying. Annoying!

That time there was a "protection package" which had been free for the first 6 months, and now was being charged for. The upshot is it covers the charges when/if they need to come out to repair their equipment. Upon being questioned, they insisted it didn't mean their equipment is only good for 6 months and we should expect to need the program. (Maybe I should have recorded that part - after all they record the calls on their end.) I declined the service and the need to pay a monthly charge. They agreed to drop the charges.

But of course I'm going to keep track to see that they have dropped the charge when the next bill comes through to make sure they followed through. They kinda did. Just not all of the charges. Admittedly it wasn't much, but my bank keeps records of everything and I double checked the current charge against what I thought I remembered was the regular charge. I was correct. So again I called them.

This time the person I got ahold of insisted they had dropped the charges. Oh wait - but it had been in place for a day or two before I called them, so I had to be charged for those two days during which I had not used the declined service and hadn't called yet because I hadn't been notified yet. Dont'cha see?

Nope. I don't see. They were late in notifying me their price had changed. I responded immediately to cancel. But... but... but.... 

Getting absolutely nowhere, I decided my blood pressure was better served by blowing off steam in the back yard chopping out trees instead. I signed off with letting him know that I fully understood that after they pulled that on 100,000 customers, I bet they made quite a bundle on that scam.

I wonder what they'll think of next. We're locked in for another 18 months.

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Lest you think I'm unhappy with all the companies I do business with, since I blow off a lot of steam here, let me tell you about one I never have issues with, not even once, SunRun Solar. For this one we're locked in for 20 years, and I'm very happy about it. I'd wanted solar for several years, but it was priced beyond my budget. Until, that is, a knock on the door.

The deal was, after checking my roof layout and condition, making sure I shouldn't need to re-roof and had plenty of sun access, they would put solar panels on the roof for free. Yep, $zero. How they made money, because you know they had to, was in putting up more panels than needed to meet our needs. Those extra panels were to collect power for SunRun. Their profit. Our panels would meet our needs based on the previous year's usage. We then would owe SunRun a straight $45 a month, and APS, the local power company, their monthly administrative costs only, usually under $15 a month. The total matched our previous year's bill. Billing didn't have those big ups and downs, easy to budget for. Win-win. During these 20 years, SunRun takes care of any maintenance if needed, free to us. No issues, no extra charges, not once.

Of course, should our electric usage increase, say during a pandemic when staying home and running the AC ( set at 85!) during a record breaking hot summer rather than shutting everything down and heading north, then we'd pay the local power company for the extra. If we used less, there would be a refund at year's end. I still find that perfectly reasonable, despite paying APS nearly $300 dollars extra for each of those summer months last year. Still cheaper than covid. Should we sell the house within those 20 years, the solar deal follows the house so the new owner gets the deal. We bought in 2012, so if we move out by 2032....

Hmmm, I wonder if I will need to disclose to a buyer that there are two dead pigeons that had gotten trapped and died under the panels where they couldn't be removed last year. They are currently enclosed by the wire mesh we hired a contractor to surround all the panels with to keep any more pigeons out. Can't even see them. Heck, already they should be nothing but bones and feathers, pigeon mummies. No poop, no bugs, no spooky rising from the dead.....