h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I am so furious right now I don't even know where to begin. I know my journal has a relatively small readership in the big picture, but it's currently the widest audience I have (although you can be assured I'll be searching for a larger one with this).

I've just cancelled my Sirius Satellite radio service. We've had our radio for just over a year. The radio itself is factory installed in the car, and came with 6 months free service, which we extended by another 6 months last summer.

Last May Sirius sent us a letter explaining that our contract was nearly up and that we should contact them to discuss subscription options, which we did. I was expecting the same at the end of the current contract, which would have expired sometime in January.

Instead what I got was a $142 draft from my checking account without my authorization. So I called to get the matter straightened out. The Customer Service Rep (CSR#1) told me the account was noted that I had authorized a one-year subscription; I informed them that I had not, nor had anyone even contacted me about the account. I requested an immediate and full refund. Instead I settled for a six-month subscription at $51 (... 51 + 51 = 142??), and requested two months of free service for my trouble. After ensuring me that it was no fault of Sirius' and that my account had been justifiably charged, I asked to speak to a supervisor, which was at first denied, then CSR#1 decided it was easier to just offer me two months of free service (which I had, indeed, just specifically requested).

Two days later the service was interrupted. Again I called Sirius and spoke with CSR#2, who verified my ESN and assured me that the signal was being sent and that there should be no problems with the service. I insisted that I still was not receiving a signal, it was then suggested that I was just in a bad reception area. I assured CSR#2 that this was not the case, and that the display clearly said "Call Sirius", not "Aquiring Signal". In the end I was told it could take up to 15 minutes for the signal to get through (although by this time it had been more than 20) and that if I didn't have a signal in 15 minutes I should call back. Mr B tried calling back about an hour later, and spoke to CSR#3 who had no knowledge at all of CSR#2. Between it being cold, snowy and my being busy, I didn't call them back until today, and by this time we've decided just to cancel the service.

Today my bank account shows a credit of $65, which should have been $91. I called and asked CSR#4 if I could speak with a supervisor. In regards to what? Cancelling my account, and I don't want to have to go through all this twice so just get a supervisor. Five minutes later CSR#5 was on the line, who, surprisingly (not), was also not a supervisor. Ten minutes later I hung up and called back and spoke with CSR#6. I detailed everything that had transpired up to this date and asked for a full refund of all drafts from my account and an immediate cancellation of service. I gave them all the information, was put on hold, then transferred to another department to complete the cancellation of service. CSR#7 (in the cancellation department) came on the line and began to summarize the transaction for me with what the previous CSR had noted on the account. CSR#7 began with "You are cancelling your service due to FINANCIAL DIFFICULTIES..."

WHAT???!

You know, at first I would have been happy to cancel my service and be rid of them. But that's insulting, rude, and *completely untrue*!!

I apologise for the length of this journal, but I thank you if you've read all of it. If you subscribe to Sirius, I would urge you to consider whether you feel you are getting good service for your money, and if you think they have done anything to deserve your business. If you do not subscribe to Sirius, I would ask you not to. Buy an HD radio, get an iPod and a car kit. Install a 6-disc changer. I'm not sure how global Sirius' business is. But I'm mad enough to want to get this message as far and wide as I can.

My, how extremely annoying.
I've never heard of Sirius, I thought this was either about Harry Potter, or one of GB's star gazing journals.
I nearly unsubbed without having a look first.

Yeah, I prefer the iPod car hookup thinger. I've never been one to trust radios to play the right kind of stuff, though. These big companies can be quite annoying.

We might be a small audience broe, but we're an attentive one

It's really hard these days to get certain things without dealing with a big corporation, which inevitably leads to dealing with customer service departments. If you want internet, and particularly if you want high speed (high speed ) internet, you've got to deal with people like Time Warner, Comcast, Verizon, Tele Britishcom and the like. Want electricity coming out of your sockets? Customer service. Want a phone? Customer service. Want a mobile phone? Customer service. Want a PC? I think you're ahead of me aren't you. All but the smallest businesses have customer service departments, and the people who operate them and answer the phone usually seem to have no idea about the actual business they're working for. They don't have anything to do with the actual business - their job is to placate customers.

I had been thinking about satellite radio - I like the idea of all those channels and a surprisingly large number them being something I might want to listen to, and no ads. I probably wouldn't have gone for it anyway - just another monthly expense. But I certainly won't be now.

Not only are the Customer Service departments out of touch with the business they're supposed to be supporting, increasingly these days they're not even on the same soil. That just adds irritation to aggravation.

I'm gratified to know that I've denied them even one customer, Gosho. Thanks.

The service was enjoyable, but in the end it really wasn't worth the price. Many of the channels were so samey, you really have to dance the dial to get any variety unless you have very narrow tastes. And the no advertising claim isn't that straightforward, either. There's plenty of advertising, but it's not paid. Much of it is for other satellite channels or for different programs on the same channel. My favorite thing about it was when we heard a song and wanted to know who it was by we could just scroll the display, but since I've discovered how to enable the text feature on the regular stereo in my car I don't even miss that so much.

I would imagine that a lot of what you might like to listen to is available free on the internet, anyway, Gosho. My favorite internet radio is free of charge and totally commercial-free. If I could get that in the car, I'd never touch the dial (and probably wouldn't play many CDs, either). As it is, we're going to buy Mr B an iPod. His car has an auxiliary jack he can just plug it into.

Could you not just take it up with your bank? Tell them it was an unauthorised payment, have it bounce back to Sirius and sort it out from there?

The worst of it with Call Centres is that you eventually end up angry and frustrated and being very rude to the poor person at the other end of the line. I always feel guilty when this happens...it's not *their* fault that their company has crappy procedures. Plus - it doesn't get you anywhere.

What really gets me looking like this: is when you're told 'It's against company policy' or 'Our procedures don't allow us to do that.' Those are non-answers. They should *change* their ****** procedures. The most egregious example of this was when, recently, SAS made me take a flight from Gothenburg to Copenhagen to catch an onward flight, rather than taking a more convenient train - ie simply chjeck in at Copenhagen instead of Gothenburg and let them keep the money for the unused flight - because 'It's not possible.' What? The universe would have imploded in a logical paradox if I hadn't sat on an aircraft that I didn't want to sit on?

While I'm here...Props to two organisations who I've experienced exemplary call centre service from:
- The Inland Revenuue (in USAnian, the IRS). Yup! Strange but true.
- 3 (cell phone company) who use polite, friendly, intelligent and *competent* (!!!) people in India.

The problem with simply calling your bank and telling them not to allow any more payments is that the company in question might suddenly consider you to be delinquent and start reporting same to the credit agencies. A certain telephone started taking money from my account each month as if I had one of their cellphones. I told my bank to stop the payments. Next thing I knew the company were calling me and sending me letters asking when I was going to pay the arrears on my account. It took me several time-consuming phone calls to convince them that I didn't have one and to work out what happened (which I won't bore you with and I'd really rather prefer not too - I can already feel myself getting wound up again just thinking about it). As long as they think you owe them money, regardless of whether you do or not, they'll keep on after you for it and be trashing your credit rating in the process. Nice.

Most of what I like to listen *is* on the radio broe - streaming BBC and NPR What I'd really like to have is an internet radio that's just like an ordinary radio. In other words, something I can just switch on like a normal radio and not have to boot up like a PC and then fire up a web browser and a media player. Presumably it would have to be wi-fi otherwise you'd have to plug it into a cable outlet as well as an electrical outlet, and that would mean you couldn't operate it off batteries (or maybe a wind-up radio like the Freeplay) and carry it around. Presumably it wouldn't be too far removed from the digital radios that around right now, except you'd be able to stream any radio station that webcasts as well as DAB broadcasts. Couldn't be too difficult could it? There's got to be a profitable niche in the market there.

I have XM in my car and haven't had any trouble with it. Sorry to hear that Sirius is such a mess. Don't back down.

Ah, let me rephrase something from my previous post.

'Most of what I like to listen *is* on the internet broe'



So far this morning (since waking up at about 7.45) I've listened to Morning Edition on my radio, until KUT ended its broadcast at 9am and went over to local programmes. Then I continued listening to it by streaming KLCC in San Francisico and now I'm streaming BBC Radio 4, which I'll continue until 7pm UK time. Can't abide The Archers.

Internet radio is fantastic! Two of my favourites are B92 Belgrade and Radio Super-Etoile (Dakar, Senegal). The world is your lobster!

Now, if they could just make it more portable, as Gosho suggests.

The other thing with contacting the bank is that they usually want to charge you for things like that, and I have a strong aversion to giving my bank any more of my money than is strictly necessary.

I do like the iPod option, because I can customise and change the variety of what I can listen to. The downside is that it severely limits my exposure to new music.

Isn't that why god invented P2P filesharing?

There was another $97 credit to my account last week, so I ended up getting a refund of $162 which, I guess, included my two months' free service. Either that, or it's that Sirius Math again ($142 - $65 = $97).

I also realised that my parents had gotten free service with the new car they just bought. I related my whole story to Mom and convinced them to cancel at the end of their contract.

On the related subject, if they can make internet-capable cell phones that fit in your pocket, logically they should be able to make a portable internet radio. One that docks like an iPod would be awesome. I'm sure that, caught at the right time of year (like tax time, for instance), I might even be willing to spend entirely too much money on one.

Any potetial inventors lurking in my journal???

It wouldn't sell, I'm afraid. Anyone who has a use for it might as well go the whole hog and buy an internet-capable phone that they can use to stream radio. Mobile devices are 'converging' so that increasingly we no longer need different devices for different things. Your phone is also your camera, mp3 player, GPS, address book, diary...etc. And it's a long time since I bought a watch.

(OK - so it might sell as a cheap alternative for a couple of years, until the same functionality starts to be included for free in entry-level phones).

One piece of technology I'd pay good money for is something that would remind me of the name of the person I'm speaking to. I didn't realise that senility set in this early.

I don't think that's going to work either until the price of accessing the internet by phone comes down in large amounts. I don't have a mobile phone, internet-enabled or not, so my only point of reference here is the stories I've seen in the news lately about people buying mobiles, using them as a modem and then finding themselves with a £3,000 phone bill because they didn't realise how expensive it is.

Now, if the phone was something like a DAB radio, in other words, like a normal radio but receiving digital broadcasts, and if every radio station that webcasts (whether it be an internet radio station or a broadcast station which also happens to stream its output) could somehow be received on it, the way you can with a PC and browser and and media player and a broadband connection, then I think we'd be onto something

I'm sure it'll be the norm some day this century, to be able to switch on your radio, or whatever it happens to be, and receive any radio station from anywhere in the world in this fashion. I don't know if it'll happen in my lifetime but I think it'll happen.

>>I don't know if it'll happen in my lifetime but I think it'll happen.

Think what the technology was like at the start of your lidfetime. Hell - think where it was ten years ago!

Yes, internet by phone is expensive, for now. The last three phones I've had have been internet capable, and I've never been tempted to give it a try. You have to subscribe to the internet service in addition to the phone service, internet time goes against your overall airtime, and then there's the life of your battery to consider.

I'd like something more like an mp3 player that plays internet radio or streaming radio instead of downloads, with a reasonable battery life (6+ or 8+ hours continuous play), dockable for ac power and external speakers so I could use it at work or in my car.

I can see where Apple might not share my opinion that this would be a Good Idea, but really all they have to do is come out with iRadio to make the whole thing work in their favor.

But...wouldn't it pick up the internet in the same way that a phone does - hence chances are it would cost the same?

Never mind. We're all going to find mobile internet so useful that the price will come crashing down as telecoms companies vie for our custom. Give it a couple of years.

Incidentally - I connect my iPod to my car with a $10 casette adapter.

I haven't had a cassette player in a car in years. The last couple I did have had tapes stuck in them as well.

I think my sister paid somewhere between $50 and $80 for an FM transmitter for her iPod. The newer cars may be mp3 compatible, I'll have to read up. My car has an "Aux" button on the stereo, Mr B's has a "Media" button.