The Dish Blackouts: The Customers Speak Out!
Dish is now involved in six different programming disputes that has forced the satcaster to remove dozens of channels including such high-profile favorites as HBO, the NFL Network, the Fox regional sports channels and local network affiliates (ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC) in select markets.
The satcaster’s latest scraps with local broadcasters Scripps and Apollo Global, which triggered the removal of 74 different network affiliates, has intensified the debate among Dish’s subscribers over the company’s strategy.
Dish Chairman Charlie Ergen has long said he’s willing to allow certain channels to be blacked out if it means paying their owners less money when they return. (That is, if they return. Dish has been missing HBO now for nearly two years.) The Dish chief argues that playing tough at the negotiating table saves money and allows his company to provide lower prices than the competition.
The satellite TV service does offer lower prices than many pay TV operators, including longtime rival, DIRECTV.
For instance, Dish’s base plan, called America’s Top 120, features 190 channels and is available for $59.99 a month for two years. DIRECTV’s base plan, called Select, has 155 channels and is also available for $59.99. But that’s only for the first year. Unlike Dish, which offers the $59.99 a month rate for two years guaranteed, DIRECTV’s base price goes to at least $87 a month in year two.
That’s a significant difference. But is the price break worth the anguish of seeing your favorite channel blacked out for a period of time, or perhaps forever?
The Apollo and Scripps fee fights has triggered an outpouring of comments from Dish subscribers on social media sites with some backing Dish while others threatening to cancel their service.
Here are some of the more interesting viewpoints that have been posted in the last few days on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/GBattreal/status/1286975278791745538
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So does Dish really think their subscribers believe they are still negotiating with HBO after two years, the RSNs after one year?
At what point do the negotiations stop and the honesty begins…your programming is cancelled…gone forever!
Come on Dish…be honest! Your bottom line is improved and you’ve got subscribers locked into ironclad contracts for up to two years. Where’s the incentive to return to the bargaining table? Oh I forgot…Charlie Ergen doesn’t negotiate. It’s winner take all with the customers getting dealt the losing hand!
DirecTV does not have as many disputes if any as Dish Network does. This is why I am against Dish Network owning DirecTV.
No baseball for another year. It’s crap. All the blackout stations. Where is my refund on my dish service then. Not seeing one.
Go to DTV and enjoy understanding their broken English speaking customer service with no follow through.
Dish says it’s Scripps fault and they say it’s Dish’s fault. I’ve never seen fights go for so long. A week at the mos and that’s too long. Come on! Hurry up!
This is ridiculous. Abc off air. I pay for it. Can’t evan watch on Abc.com because you have to sign in with your provider which is Dish so they block it.
Why should Scripps charge more money for a channel they provide over the air for free..?
GREED!!! Get over it and put the channels back!!
I am under contract with Dish and because of the RSN’s not being available I just stripped my Dish service to the bare minimum so as not to void my contract. Then I turned around and got HULU to watch the Atlanta Braves. The minute my Dish contract is over…I’m done with Dish! Already done with DirecTV.
I have been a Dish customer for 10 yrs, I am really tired of their blackouts , I haven’t had ABC for a month, I already pay a lot for the stations I do get, this is unacceptable!
If dish is no longer paying scripps, shouldn’t we get a refund?
Dish is the worst.. Price goes up lock into a contract. Dish is breaching my contract by not delivering the number of choices they gave when the contract was signed. Price did not go down..but it will when we drop them. Look out dish only a few more months that we have to live with you.. Here we come Direct TV. My advice to Dish is get this fixed. If everyone would give you the boot I bet results would come quick. I would never never give your company a referral.
My contact expires in March and I will kick Dish out – no David Muir new for over a month
Dish is a horrid plus no signal when it rains which is often
It is all of them, Scripps, Dish, Direct TV, etc. At this time of the pandemic, all of them do not care that so many people are not working at this time and having severe financial crisis, it is all about them making as much money as they can for themselves. Forget YOU working Americans and YOUR PROBLEMS, this is the time for these companies to price gouge the American public, and no wonder the government has to control certain industries, TO PROTECT THE PUBLIC, from being gouged. These prices are alreadt to high with their contracts that protects them, NOT THE AMERICAN PUBLIC. YOU ARE THE WORST PART OF CAPITALISM!!!!!!!
I agree with all of the comments listed, this is unacceptable, I’ve tried to call the 800 number to request a refund but there is no answer but I bet Direct Tv will answer when I call them tomorrow
Could not agree more with comments above. Get ABC back on the air. I signed up for Dish with certain channels, only to continue to pay same rate with these channels removed. If Dish isn’t careful, they will lose a substantial amount of their customer base and have no one but themselves to blame. Disgusted.
Sick of Dish network. Too many lost channels and no refunds. Have had dish for 20 years. Dish needs to negotiate the contract and let us make a decision whether or not we want to pay the price or not. If you call dish you will talk to people that speak the worst English. Get yourself together dish network. I will make sure I tell everyone I know to never go
With dish network. FIX THESE ISSUES AND GIVE US OUR STATIONS BACK. Or GIVE US REFUNDS
All my programs are on ABC, I’m paying for them. I want them back.
I have had Dish for 8 months now. I pay $12.00 extra to have local channels. Now the ceo is in notation with Scripts and ABC. Which is local that I pay for every month. Guess what I am still paying $12.00 a month and they have no problem excepting that. I called to see if I could get out of my contract. They said yes for and extra $340. Are you freaking kidding me. Once my contact is over I am done with dish and will never recommending them to anyone
Dish is a big bunch of bs they are cutting off local networks for pennies while their customers pay $$ for service that use to be free what a scam
I am so tired of not having my local channels, I am ready to get another service. I would also pay the extra money to have local channels. Yes, direct nay cost more but you have all your channels. Get a deal ASAP or we are changing services.
I’ve been a Directv customer for 26 years same thing here. Directv is the same every couple of months they’re having a dispute with the local channels.
Customer service is terrible at directv since AT@T took over. I’m thinking of switching to Dish a lot better prices.
I have been with Dish for 19 years. Lost the channel with my soap operas. Can’t get out of my contract for another year but really have no other service where I live. Can’t stream and am not using a separate antenna since I pay Dish over !100 a month. First it was HBO when Game of Thrones was in its final season now this. Give us back our dam channels and stop making our lives miserable. Isn’t it bad enough that we’re locked up for months because of the Covid now you take away our channels. It’s all about controling the public and keeping us down.!!!
We have been a customer for a number of years and were asked to renew in order to fix problems. First we lost fox sports, then HBO now local programming. We intend to cancel our agreement with Dish this week because they are inn breach of contract for not delivering on the agreement
Bring ABC back!!!! It has been too long. I am giving them one more week, then I’m changing. I’ve had enough!!!!!!
Dish or it’s CEO don’t care about anything except the money in his pocket. Don’t even check the Dish promise site because it’s really Dish lies.
We just got a hopper and renewed our Dish contract. Can we cancel this if ABC is not in the package? We are unable to attend the Clemson ballgames, but wewere looking forward to seeing them on ABC.
Can not cancel without a penalty.
Maybe if we all banded together and protested they might reconsider. I’m tired of paying for things I’m not getting! How about you??
I’m done with Dish
I just want Dish network to know that I regret ever leaving Comcast thinking Dish network would be so great. I pay way more money and constantly lose channels. Do they not realize that people are going to leave their company. What then? So damn dissatisfied with dish
DISH is in breach of contract by removing ABC from channels I agreed to & paid for when forced to switch to DISH by my local CenturyLink provider. Return ABC to DISH subscribers while you iron out your greed! It will be worth the expense to cancel my DISH subscription.
Don’t do it: DISH SUCKS
I’m giving Dish till it interrupts my college football on ABC, then I’m cancelling. Been a customer for many years
One thing would really shake up these companies like Dish, DirectTV and many more companies and that being “why can’t the subscribers form a UNION of VIEWERS” to protect ourselves from all this crap that goes on with them. There attitude has and is and will be,”you will get what we want you to have at the price we want to charge and we will change it anytime we choose to do so and you will still pay the same dam price or you will have nothing” That includes your money.That attitude has been around since the day these business’s started long ago and it has kept festering more and more everyday since and it will not subsist until they are FORCED to change it. I BELIEVE A “VIEWERS UNION WOULD DO JUST THAT” AND THERE SURE WOULD NOT BE A HARDSHIP IN GETTING THE PUBLIC TO SIGN UP, PROBABLY THE WHOLE WORLD WOULD DO IT IS A HEARTBEAT!! Then who would be in control, they would serve at our becon call without hesitation. Charles
I have been with DISH since 2007 and have seen my rates go up up UP all the time. Then I have to call and “negotiate” for a better price and see what “discounts” they have now. Most of the time I go to the Philippines and generally they can’t do much. My lowest bill was around $60 back in 2007 and then up to almost $150 recently. I did negotiate a better price but am locked into a 2 year contract. Local channel 7 KIRO has been off air since July 22, over 2 months! Doesn’t seem like it’s coming back. The problem with DISH is their “tiers”. You can’t choose the channels you want. Out of the Top 250 that I buy, there’s 2 in one tier, 1 in another, and maybe a few in the other, so have to pay for all the tiers for 250 channels, of which I only watch less than 25. It’s a racket for sure. In this time of COVID, we need our local channels for information. I have heard that DirecTV and Comcast are just as bad so there really is no place to go. I’m thinking of getting out of my contract at the end of it and just going with regular TV and an antenna. I do enjoy some shows I would miss, but for $1200 a year, is it really worth it? I don’t think so. I can find most of my news and shows online FOR FREE. Boo on DISH and Cox Media. You guys suck.
When the loan stations want a new 3 year contract, they want double the price of the last contract price. A 100%. I DON’T BLAME DISH FOR NOT PAYING THAT INCREASE. THAT IS WHY DISHPRICES ARE CHEAPER THANDTV.
YOU AREN’T GOING TO GET A BETTER SERVICE ANYWHERE ELSE.
I DON’T THINK YOU UNERSTAND. ABC IS DEMANDING THAT DISH DOULE THE PRICE THAT THEY PAY ABC. IF THEY PAY THAT PRICE, YOU CAN COUNT ON DISH RAISING YOUR PRICE THE EQUIVELENT OR MORE. PRICE INCREASES MUST BE PASSED ON TO THE END CUSTOMER.
Dish seems to always be in a dispute with someone and leaving their paying customers with less than they’re paying for every month. In the Atlanta area we haven’t had ABC for months but same problem in past couple years with NBC and CBS. Have never had that problem on Comcast so am going to switch. Tired of paying more for less than supposed to receive, and being a repetitive ANNUAL victim of large corporate greed.
Ask for a discount if channel is blocked
$5 taken off our monthly bill
As more customers get discount they will be losing more money and hopefully their bottom line will be effected as will sette
When you call DTV, I really hope you can understand their customer service representatives. With the broken English spoken, the hours that my wife has been on the line with them in the past, and the lack of follow thru by their employees, you will wish you had Dish Network back.
Do you think dish didn’t want a contract. Or maybe it’s because the company that now owns HBO (AT&T) has their own streaming service DirectTV and they don’t want dishNetwork to have it anymore. And that’s why AT&T keep shoving DirectTV in their clients’s faces all the time.
Really. Do you think dishNetwork wanted to lose customers like myself when they couldn’t watch the last season of GoT? Not that we don’t want to forget that season!! It wasn’t their choice!
I have been reading the comments. We should really do a huge lawsuit against DISH and Apollo and whomever else is involved!! A multi-million dollar lawsuit might wake up some of these bastards!!
Well, so what. We’re having to pay more anyway to get an additional streaming service for all the channels you’ve taken away. You are already costing us more money.
Don Smith
Nov. 09, 2020
I would have never signed with DISH if I had know there would be a blackout on some of the channels I want to watch. DISH you are getting payment for lesser programming than we all signed up for. It your responsibility to get this corrected at once. If not, you should be discounting our bills until your disputes are resolved. Quit screwing us aroung!
Happy to see the sports channels go. It’s all rigged anyway. A bunch of overpaid prima donnas. So boring. I’d rather watch someone paint a barn.Keep fighting for us DISH!
Dish is always canceling tv channels but we never see a decrease in our bill. Just about ready to give up tv altogether.
Dish Network needs to get CBS back and het through the negotiations with NBC to keep that network also. I pay for Dish Network to get certain channels and I can’t even watch them. Very Disappointing!