DirecTV Satellite Television Nationwide

This report involves two companies: DirecTV and U.S. Direct Express.

 I initially had an account with DirecTV, but I was continuouslly being charged the wrong amount each month and could not afford what they would say that I owed, so I decided to end my account and deal with the early termination fees. I had the account for maybe 5 or 6 months and my bill was never the same. I would always call their customer service and always found a very helpful and what I thought was knowledgeable person that would help me figure out how much my bill was and either take a payment from me or tell me when it was due. Numerous times my bill kept changing even if I hadn't changed my service. Several times representatives told me to ignore what the website said I owed and they would give me the actual amount they said I did in fact owe. The last month I had service with them I was told that my bill was in the $50 range and also told that I had overpaid the previous month by so much that my next bill would be around $5. I paid what I was told I owed online and ignored the messages as instructed saying I owed more. The very last month I paid the amount that the online service said I owed was about $180 more than what the representative told me I owed, so as instructed I disregarded it and waited for the next months bill to come due. Instead my service was interrupted and I was tired of having to deal with the inconsistency so decided it was time to get rid of the bad service, the billing service, not the television service which was just fine.

I called one last time to work out a payment arrangement for the early termination fees and to get the equipment returned to DirecTV. They sent me out a box for the equipment with a prepaid label. I packed up their equipment and returned it promptly and waited to begin paying off whatever my termination fees were going to be, but never heard from them again. Several months passed and I never received any emails, telephone calls, or letters asking me to pay anything and eventually forgot about it. Having Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as a disabled veteran and former Police Officer, one of my disabilities is my memory. If it isn't in front of me I have trouble remembering it. Kind of, out of sight, out of mind thing.

On May 3rd, 2014 DirecTV charged my account $0.75, which was all that was remaining in it for the rest of the month. I don't get very much disability money to live off of. I contacted my "bank", U.S. Direct Express and spoke to a representative about the charge. The rep assured me that they would not allow DirecTV to charge my account without my permission again. My monthly direct deposit was coming in 9 days and it worried me that DirecTV would take more money from me than I could afford and would not be able to pay for my Doctor's visits, medications, food, rent, and gas needed to get to my appointments. Although I have had one bad experience with U.S. Direct Express over a year ago I trusted what the rep told me, that DirecTV would not be allowed to take any more money from my account without my permission. This should have forced DirecTV to contact me so that we could make the initial payment arrangement that was supposed to be setup a couple months prior, however, something worse happened.

On May 14th, 2014, only 2 days after receiving my monthly deposit, DirecTV once again charged my account, but this time for everything left in it, $383.99. I contacted U.S. Direct Express and was mistreated as usual, you can read my other report on them filed this same day. Eventually, I got someone from DirecTV on the phone that seemed to know what they were doing and was able to direct me on the only possible way to get DirecTV to return my funds back in to my account. I had to write a letter and mail it to their Billing Dispute office explaining who, what, when, where and why in hopes that DirecTV would return the money that I need to continue paying my bills, pay for Doctor visits, medication, fuel to get me to my appointments, food for myself and my service animal, etc.

I sent the letter immediately the following morning and a friend of mine helping me even filed the same report online with DirecTV, even though the representative told me the ONLY way they would help me is if it were in writing, to the address she gave me, etc.

 It's not so much DirecTV's fault that my money in my account was unsecure so much as it is U.S. Direct Express' fault for not protecting my deposits after expressly telling me that they would not allow another unauthorized deduction from my account. I don't claim to NOT owe early termination fees to DirecTV and only wanted to be able to pay off the fees monthly because I don't receive enough money each month for a multi-billion dollar business like DirecTV to take everything I have whenever they feel the need to add to their own bank accounts.

My hope in filing this separate, but similar report is that someone in the Billing Dispute department of DirecTV actually reads this and helps me get my money back and will work with me on paying off the fees I owe. I also hope that someone in charge of their billing services gets this so they know there is a problem and that their customers are not being billed correctly causing them to lose customers and hurt honest people by just taking whatever they want when they want it. I also hope that others will read this and be wary when dealing with DirecTV as even a company as large as they are don't always get everything right and need to be held accountable just as they hold us accountable for our agreements we make with them.

If I can be held accountable for an agreement I make with DirecTV, shouldn't they also be held accountable for the agreements they make with me be it in writing or verbally?