Being charged for returned equipment!

Call DirecTV and when you get the voice system say "cancel". Normally their retention agents are more experienced. You can also request one of their supervisors. If unable to resolve through them, the next step would be a FCC or BBB complaint as that goes to corporate.

Either way if you still choose to cancel, you are not required to have balance paid off to do so. Agents are required to try to get payment first, but if you have a billing dispute then of course that takes priority. However they can collect outstanding balances that are left unpaid after an account is disconnected if you don't clear your final bill.

Why would you get 2 boxes sent to you, one 2 weeks later? 

What exactly was the $300.40 charge for?

@TrollGod69 We don't know why we received a second box after sending the first box back. They never had an answer besides "sorry about that".

The $300.40 charge was "change of service" and the new DVR box apparently. 

I take it "change of service" is what the agent said? What is the exact line item on the bill that is not part of your normal monthly service?

Like Juniper said, what does it say on your bill next to the charge? The cost of a Genie is $299. Do you have the protection plan? 

@TrollGod69 @Juniper this is exactly what it says and looks like:

Activity since last bill Feb 04 - Mar 03
1. Genie Feb 28 $299.00 < One-time charge
2. TV Access Fee Feb 28 - Mar 03 $1.40 < Service changed on Feb 28 - partial month charge

and yes we pay $8.99 additional for the "DIRECTV Protection Plan".

If your Genie just needed replaced with another Genie, and since you have the protection plan, then there shouldn’t have even be a charge for it in the first place since the protection plan covers that. Did they inform you of the $299 charge when you called in when it wasn’t working? You said one of your Genie boxes wasn’t working, and you got charged for a Genie... so it was the main big box that wasn’t working? Do you actually have a Genie and Genie minis? Or just HD DVRs? Or a combination? What equipment do you have? It sounds like they put the order in as an upgrade and now it probably shows that you started a new contract too, which you wouldn’t have with just a replacement so make sure you find that out and have them document that in the notes that it’s not valid. At any rate you didn’t get any new equipment since you returned both boxes and they need to manually credit that.

Ok so $300.40 is not simply "change in service".

The $299 is a one-time lease cost of a Genie when you don't qualify for a free one. As this is an upgrade, that comes with a 24 month agreement starting day new box would be activated.

The partial month charge $1.40 was counting a new box activated. If there was a credit for the same days, then this was swapping a box. If there is no credit then that is counting one more TV total.

As long as you didn't try using either of the new boxes, the partial $1.40 shouldn't have happened at all. The $299 would be reversed within 48hrs of the order being closed. So I suspect the upgrade order (which was placed in error in the first place as should have only been a warranty replacement), was not closed and so is still pending (as box has not been activated).

So call and speak to a retention specialist, or one of their supervisors, like I suggested. They need to verify the upgrade is closed and the account does not reflect any change in equipment.

@TrollGod69 We have a combination of genie and HD DVR in our home. We called to inform them that our HD DVR was not working. They sent us a new box and they did not inform us that they would be charging us for a new genie. We didn't want an upgrade we just wanted our HD DVR to work. And awaiting a new box that they were sending us (without knowing any charges) our box started to work again. Naturally, we did not use or need the new box that came. And even more-so when we saw the outrageous bill.

@Juniper we had never asked for an upgrade just for the box either to be fixed or replaced with a working box and somehow this prompted them to upgrade us to a new Genie? The rough part is reiterating that this is wrong, having them "document" this and it never getting fixed, only to do the same routine the following month until they decide to shut off the service all together. The charges are unnecessary since it's an "upgrade" that we did not ask for or request.

Now we are cancelling the service and additionally being charged a termination fee. 

A retention specialist, or one of their supervisors, would be the ones to try and resolve this. If they cannot, then a FCC or BBB complaint is the next step as that sends to corporate.

Prior agents took a simple warranty replacement and messed it up with doing an upgrade in error. Really wish I could have a sit down with those agents as this is ridiculous.

Well if you already had a Genie, how would they have upgraded your HD DVR to ANOTHER Genie? You can only have 1 Genie per account. I  just find it hard to believe that they didn’t tell you there would be a $299 one time charge. And first you said you called to tell them one of your genie dvr boxes wasn’t working so was there possibly a miscommunication there? Also you said you got two boxes sent to you, two weeks apart, but only one charge. Were they both Genies, or was one an HD DVR and the other one a Genie, or do you know? It seems like they did do a replacement for one, since you only got charged one time, and an upgrade for the other, maybe you called back at some point, maybe cause your box stopped working again? and they did another order, whether that was the upgrade or the initial call was.. not saying that’s what happened since I’m not looking at your account, but it doesn’t add up. But yep talk to retention. You said you’re being charged an early termination fee.. how much? were you already in a contract or did a new one start when you got the new box? Also did a tech ever come out? 

I don't find it hard to believe. Agents (outsourced and/or new) don't know how to properly place the equipment order, as well as high pressure to get upgrades causing some agents to do this on purpose to pad their stats. Order in system probably had main Genie as being swapped out for the "upgrade". And in either scenario then of course customer would not have been informed the $299. This is where it is important to read any order confirmation to protect against a situation like this.

The only problem with that is the system won’t let you upgrade a Genie to another Genie, it will make you pick a Genie 2

That would be a nice change. Used to be you could upgrade anything, not just Genie to Genie but HDDVR to HDDVR, or anything else of the same line.

Of course there is both the new and the legacy system. So which one they are on could make a difference.

@TrollGod69 in my parlor I have an HD DVR and in a totally separate room is a genie. I may have replaced the wording in my initial statement, my apologies. A tech came out to look at it once however it was before February so it doesn't pertain to this. I think it was acting funky so we called. The next call we said it still was not working properly, that is when they sent out a box. And no they did not state it was an upgrade not was there a charge, we would have said "no" if there was a charge that we were aware of. So in the process of sending us the box (one box) and our HD DVR starts working. The box arrive and we call them to tell them it's not needed and they tell us to send it back, so we do.

We get the SAME box (not a different box but the same box) re delivered to our door step. Not sure why and not sure how. That was after two weeks.

We also get our monthly bill with the genie listed on there. 

For one we did not request a genie. Two we sent it back and it's on our bill. A rep said it will be reversed once they receive the box. This box has been had delivered to UPS where they told us to go TWICE. We received TWO confirmations from UPS that its in there hands to deliver. No tracking number. 

It is now in UPS corporate apparently. 

I filed with both BBB and FCC.

They want to charge $200 to terminate and additionally still pay the $300 for the box.

If we pay for protection I would also assume this would assist with something. Especially where we have supplied them proof that it is no longer in our hands and with UPS? 

Does this clarify a little better?