@Rudy1 and @Jacknife
I've felt your same pain.
I may post my own recent story of my quest to become a customer and all the aggravation and wasted time (my time, installers time and DISH CRS's time)
These are my observations:
- DISH CSR's (even the Cust Loyalty ones) Have a very poor understanding of all the many, and constantly changing, promotion offers that are in effect. They don't know how to fulfill the offers. They don't know what the offers are. They offer incorrect and contradictory information about the offers.
- DISH's process of writing up a customer order takes WAY too long. The customer can't see what they are being asked to agree to (on the phone) and if anything in the order is noticed as incorrect when it is read back to teh costumer near the end of the process then often the entire order needs to be thrown away and started over from scratch. It literally seems as though the goal is to make it so difficult and complex that the customers resistance is worn down and eventually they say OK, Whatever! . Or in my case. "No. If you can't fix it then we are done. Good - Bye."
- Once an order is placed, either online or via phone the customer does not get any type of written confirmation of exactly what was ordered. You have to call (again) to get someone to read back to you what hardware you are getting and what package you are getting.
- CSR training is highly variable. I had one "Highly trained Senior Costumer loyalty Rep" insist that I if I ordered a 4K Joey that I would only be able connect it to a 4K TV. She insisted that it would not work with a 1080i HDTV. She said that if I persited in my demand to order 4K Joey's that she would make a note in my account that I was refusing to follow her recommendation and DISH would not be responsible when that configuration would not work. Of course, she was wrong and I knew that she was wrong. Some know the packages and hardware and some don't. Different CSR's call different pieces of hardware by different names. A new customer should not be expected to know all the different names the same piece of hardware might be called. Hopper = Hopper with sling = Hopper2 . Joey was originally the 1st gen Joey, now Joey = Joey 2.0. BTW, Hopper3 has Sling also so is it fair to call the Hopper3 Hopper w/ Sling ?
When I called to ask what hardware I was getting the CSR says Hopper and Joey. I said: "Can you be more specific please. Exactly which model? "
I agree with your sentiments about the advertising of the Hopper3 . You are presented with a web page all about the Hopper3. You click on order and you wind up getting signed up for an old Hopper w/ Sling. It doesn't even clearly say what model hardware you are getting, just Hopper (unless you hover over a very small low contrast grey (i) in a circle. It seems incredulous to me that a new customer would not get the latest new hardware. Can you imagine signing up for new cell phone service with Verizon or AT&T, clicking on a picture of an Apple iPhone 7 and what you get shipped to you is a used iPhone 5s !!
Enough for now.