At&T Sub Contractors

If your dad didn’t call for issues then it was definitely a scam. Directv doesn’t just show up and say we’re here to fix your service

AT&T contractors don’t use AT&T in their name. AT&T does not allow it 

Yea it was free, I asked for his id credentials albeit a blurry one. He was taking to someone over Bluetooth in Spanish. I don’t know.

There appears to be a authorized retailer of AT&T called "Sky Satellite". Regardless if actually employed or not by that authorized retailer, that individual showing up unannounced to service and issue was absolutely scamming something. At best they were fishing for additional things to sell you, but more likely at worst this was setting up for something worse later.

I would run this by the authorized retailer. If those actually were their employees, submit a complaint with them and the BBB. However if not, absolutely get in touch with law enforcement. Either way, search for anything missing or something out of place. I would go as far as checking for any mini cams or the like, as a concern in this day and age.

Hopefully whatever sales trick or full scam attempted failed and nothing else was set in motion. Good luck.

I had an install scheduled and I also had someone from "Sky" show up. He was rude, wouldn't even look at our dish (we were supposed to be upgrading dish and receivers, haven't in over a decade) and wanted to come in the house. I let him into the living room to see where one would be hooked up but then he insisted he had to see the rest of the house and all the cables and wires before he'd even look at our dish or do anything. Really pushy about seeing the house. When I asked questions, he went to call his supervisor. Then he just drove off. Never answered anything, never did the work. Made me really uncomfortable. 

@thebrink 

That does sound a bit concerning. Though perhaps there was a legitimate reason and tech went about it very poorly. Either way submit a complaint on the appointment.

What are the models of each box you currently have?

What upgrade were you expecting?

With a decade since your last upgrade want to make sure you weren't provided a sub-optimal option from agents who don't understand older setups.

He didn’t even try to look at what we had and there was a language barrier as well. I had SD receivers. I was doing the most basic HD receivers upgrade and needed a new dish installed the most. He wouldn’t even look at the dish or anything. His immediate and only thing was wanting to look at the entire house when I had an HD receiver ready to install in one room and asked repeatedly couldn’t he look at the dish first, or at least install dish and set up the living room. But he didn’t even look at the cables in our living room. Just glanced at the receiver and demanded to see the rest. 

You need the free MPEG2 swap not an upgrade that comes with the 2 year contract.

If you had multiple SD receivers, then it wouldn't be an order for a single HD receiver as the entire setup would need replacing, including any cabling updates. There is the chance he was preparing to try and make an on site upgrade (bigger than you needed) or there may have been a concern the order wasn't done correctly so wouldn't be able to be completed if the reset of the setup didn't match. But we don't know what was going through his head.

What are the specific models of each box you have?

How was the new equipment listed on the order confirmation?

@shannon02 that's what I was doing, because I called about the letter we received telling us we needed to get new equipment, not the 2 year (which someone added the 2 year to my account without my knowledge or consent so loyalty and billing have added notes that the contract is invalid and incorrect, but can't turn it off because it wasn't my request, it was their determination we needed it).  

@Juniper yeah, i know we'd need it in the rest of the house, but I have a disabled mother who was asleep in her bedroom and I didn't want him in there. I'd had other techs I talked to tell me they didn't see any problems using the current coax set-up and that we could at least try and then see if it would require more work, because no one would really know until it tried to connect. My real concern was he didn't even try to look at anything in one room before demanding to see the rest of the rooms. Didn't ask to see where the lines were in the attic, didn't even try to look at how we had it hooked up in the living room where he could easily have looked at our wall, our cables, etc... he just glanced at the receiver and then wanted to go into the bedrooms "because I need to see the cables". But if he won't look at the cables where he is, what meant he was actually going to look at the cables in the others? I also just really do not like subcontractors. Best Buy subcontracted my TV repair to a local company where the owner was beyond rude and unprofessional and his tech guy broke my TV, which another local shop had to then repair his damage plus the original problems. And the last time we let a DirecTV tech in our attic, he got into our internet cables and our satellite and disconnected our internet which we had to go back up and fix the cables we'd already had clearly marked as being something else. So they're really not giving me confidence. 

Just to let y’all know from above, the same guy was sent on from AT&T and was able to fix the problem he messed.

Up* ^

@Zackthompson good. your story made me worry after the experience i had, so sorry I sorta hijacked your post. 

@thebrink 

If everything is SD, then prepare that tech must have access to all rooms that have DirecTV and that each box gets replaced. They will not replace some as it is an all or nothing order, and will not leave equipment for customer to install themselves.

Was starting to sound more like an improper order and a tech who did not handle the situation well. Even seemed that if that order wasn't done correctly that tech not only annoyed had to fix it may have tried to push you into the update at additional cost, but perhaps I am thinking too deep on that.

I would still verify your exact model numbers. Too often an order is placed that is not the optimal option or is not explained correctly, especially if said "upgrade" might have some key things that make it actually a downgrade. Seen it too often since AT&T took over and even more so with the required MPEG swap days.

I can look at a wall all day. Still my x-ray vision won’t show me what’s inside the walls. We had equipment to test the cables at each end. Hd requires more than sd  so we had to make sure at each location that there was sufficient signal.