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Leaving BTV or got a Rant then post it here!

644K views 3K replies 541 participants last post by  jdevlin 
#1 · (Edited)
I closed this thread because it frankly became a flame war with people being banned.

It seems I asked people to post both good and bad in one thread which I've learned is not the thing to do.

Therefore we now have a ExpressVu is Good thread and a I got an ExpressVu rant thread.

So if've got a problem with ExpressVu, then this is the thread to tell us about it so feel free to post away and rant!

Go ahead and get it out of your system, rest assured we've all been there.

My story..

I have had 6 Faulty ExpressVu receivers replaced, a multiswitch replaced, been hung up on, spent countless hours on hold, been called an idiot, and told that it was my power bar so many times that it makes me ill just thinking about so rest assured I sympathize!

The only reasons I have stayed with Bell is the 5100 (replaced 3 times) which Rogers did not have. I now have a Rogers HD PVR and will be switching soon.

Warning to All Bell ExpressVu CSR's. - Don't even bother.

Warning to all the posters: No Profanity, No posting of email from Bell CSR's with names and/or phone numbers.

Finally, before you rant on some poor CSR, lets remember that they are people. People who for the most part want to help but often times Bell doesn't tell them things or tells them to say the things they do so please cut them some slack before you post.
 
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#3 ·
"I have had 6 Faulty ExpressVu receivers replaced, a multiswitch replaced, been hung up on, spent countless hours on hold, been called an idiot, and told that it was my power bar so many times that it makes me ill just thinking about so rest assured I sympathize!"

That's pretty sad especially being called an idiot. I would be all over Bell and get the hell out.
 
#5 ·
I hate the newer themes. To keep the majority of my channels would cost me $10 more a month. To keep all of my existing channels would be $15 more a month (and get a lot of channels I will never watch). BEV PLEASE change your themes in your next lineup juggling and put music with music and Animal Planet with either TLC etc or with Teletoon. You could also take a page out of Roger's book and offer the possibility of picking individual channels with pricing for 5, 10, 15, 20, 25 channels etc with a price break on the channels with the more you order. While you're at it take off the ridiculous $1.00 fee for Leaf's TV. If you have Sports Pack 2 then Leaf's TV should be included in the pack for no extra charge.

My little rant!

Zoo
 
#6 · (Edited)
I would be all over Bell and get the hell out.
Truthfully, I toyed between creating a site called youknowwhosucks.com or digitalhomecanada.com.

I decided to try and be positive and help others rather than be venomous.
 
#7 ·
switch to BEV

Hello everyone.
It's nice to see a canadian forum dealing with our issues.
Now to start, I was a *C subscriber for close to 7 years, (401 reciever), never had any major problems and was happy with the service.
I started to get the bug to upgrade to HD but with money being what it is I had to think about doing this piecemeal. Early last year I got interested with the 500 reciever but the local *C guy said I should wait as they are having lots of problems with the unit. So I decided to get the HD dish first, I could not tune that thing in for the life of me and finally had to have the installation guy do it for me, so I'm up to about 150.00 total now.
Everything was back to normal, late in the fall my man on the inside said the reciever(the 500) had most of the problems worked out so I should think about the upgrade. In early Nov. the reciever, no dish, went on sale for 399.00 so I picked it up. So now I was up to close to 600.00 with taxes.
Well from that point on our T.V. life became a major hassle, days of phone calls could not resolve the issues of channels changing by themselves, horrible motion artifacts on the HD stations and some audio troubles, plus the fact that although *C says they offer 9 HD stations only 7 are accessable unless you but into some movie package and no TSNHD, now I know that Bell owns TSN and it has been said that they wouldn't sell programing to *C, I rather believe that *C wouldn't buy it because they don't seen to me to be that into HD programing period.
With all of this going on I decided to switch to BEV, found the 6100 set online at futureshop for 299.00 (up over 900.00) now, it was very easy to tune in and get going. Everything was fine but the picture was extremely dark! Back to the phones, over a week of calls with hours on the the phone = no change!
We are just living with it now until we figure how to deal with this. Maybe we'll just watch CBC OTA and be done with it.
mightymike
 
#8 ·
the only rant i have about expressvu is the lack of channels. compared to rogers a lot of channels are missing, some (i.e. MSNBC, discovery wings, TMN on demand) were never even added despite the obvious demand for them. all i hear from BEV are excuses instead of solutions. i'm seriously considering switching to rogers digital cable. it may cost a little bit more every month but at least i'll get more programming and more choice, especially since rogers is already carrying fox news for 6 months. fox news, MSNBC, discovery wings, TMN on demand are not even on the horizon with BEV.
 
#14 ·
Well lets see is there anything I could really rant about with BEV :rolleyes:

1) Simsubbing HD channels with Toronto channels that we could care less about east/west of Toronto, especially with the subbing happening with networks that don't supply OTA HD anywhere but T.O. and Vancouver later.

2) No firmware upgrades for the 6100 HD receiver that fixes DD audio receivers even though Dish Network has posted a few of them since the 6100 graced my home.

3) The guide information is only 44 hours even though current recievers can have upto 9 days of guide information. It seems they want you to sub to their VU magazine, as when I wrote asking for a bigger guide, they spent a good portion of their response on the VU Magazine.

4) No 24 hr HD movie channel at least in the west. There is talk that the reason for this is that they want *C to carry TSN-HD and Discovery HD on dedicated channels even though they provide nothing in HD programming.

5) Forcing a $3 rate increase if you have the old programming packages, which translates into about a 6.5% increase in cost for me. This seems to be a way to try and force old package subs to buy into their increased cost new packages.

6) Trying to get ppl to buy PPV for sports programming (Boxing) at $50 when the same programming is available south of the border and is included in the programming packages.

7) They do nothing to getting programming into Canada, but are one of the biggest fighters to keep Canadians from getting American channels though the grey market. This probably has more to do with the fact that they have crap networks they own and they do not want any type of competition where they may have to actually spend some money (also see #6).

8) BGM is just to big in this country, allowing them to control too much!

Alt
 
#15 ·
"6) Trying to get ppl to buy PPV for sports programming (Boxing) at $50 when the same programming is available south of the border and is included in the programming packages."

Only time HBO Boxing for example appears on PPV is when NO CANADIAN station will purchase the rights to it. It is the promoter/owner of the TV rights that decides to put it on PPV.
 
#16 ·
Dean W said:
"6) Trying to get ppl to buy PPV for sports programming (Boxing) at $50 when the same programming is available south of the border and is included in the programming packages."

Only time HBO Boxing for example appears on PPV is when NO CANADIAN station will purchase the rights to it. It is the promoter/owner of the TV rights that decides to put it on PPV.
Right:

So give me HBO and that will be cured :rolleyes:

Alt
 
#18 ·
Bell ExpressVu, Wadda Rip!!

My wife called Bell ExpressVu to cancel my service due to a rate increase and a better deal with another carrier. At first they did the Retention song and dance of "why are you cancelling", and "We can give you 2 free months".

After my wife declined and advised the rep that we are not interested in that and would like to cancel, she placed her on hold for 10 minutes. Only to come back and state that there is a 30-day cancellation notice required. I quickly reviewed my manual and found no such thing. On top of that, it states that they will discontinue service within 2 business days of the request (Page A-8 in the 3100 manual) and are responsible to any charges up to the date of termination.

At that point, my wife stated this and after an exchange, I told her to get a supervisor on the phone of which I took over. I spoke with Ann the supervisor which tried to sell me the same thing. I told her that was not the agreement I signed up for and that the bill is charged a month in advance. She then told me it wasn't. I read the billing cycle to her. The day was Feb 5, 2005 and I stated the billing cycle is from Jan 26 - Feb 26. Therefore we are being charged a month in advance. She quickly changed direction on that.

She then proceeded to tell me that the policy changed in Dec, 2003. I told her that this policy change was not corresonded to me. She stated that all the customers were notified. I guess I'm not a customer and so are numerous others I have spoken with that never receieved this supposed notice. I advised her that I will pay for service rendered as agreed to in the agreement I signed up for. She then stated that service will be terminated on March 4, 2005. I told her to cancel it now (Feb 5, 2005). She then ended the conversation with "Do you have anything else other than the 30 day policy? I ended it with Cancel the Service Now and hung up the phone. Stay Tuned.


Cory D, N.B.


I Corresponded with the CRTC and they forward my complaint to Bell Canada. I get a letter stating that Bell ExpressVu reserves the right to change their policies at any time. I don't have a problem with that. They also stated that they will notify via mail, bill, or website. Here's the dilema....they do not have that on their website and they did not notify us in anyway. This seems to fall on deaf ears as I have stated in the complaint, to the CSR rep and to the manager. Go figure.
 
#19 ·
Hi Cory:

That is the same way as Bell mobility works...they think they can do anything they want and the customer can just suck it up. Last year Bell mobility had a problem with their new billing system and never sent out bills for like 3 months. Needless to say they never notified us as to their being any problem and when they did finally start billing again, between the wifes and my phone we owed over $300.

I called Bell and complained and they said that they were not charging interest on it (so kind of them), but I now had $300 extra as I pay my bills each and every month when the bill is received. Needless to say in December I will be cancelling both my wifes and my cell accts with Bell and going back to Telus, who by the way are rated the best of the cell phone companies. If I am not good enough to be notified of this MAJOR problem, they are not good enough for my business.

BEV+Bell Mobility+BGM = Consumers mean nothing

Alt
 
#20 ·
My 1 year contract with BEV is up at the end of July. I will wait until the end of June to cancel my account before going back to SC now that the HD PVR is a reality. I've had enough of the 6100 problems. Even my wife is getting annoyed. I called and got the same song and dance about "there must be something wrong with your setup" line. I fully expect BEV will try to make my life miserable when I cancel. Hopefully they will surprise me and be gracious about it like SC was when I cancelled my account with them last year.
 
#22 ·
Altaman said:
Hi Cory:

That is the same way as Bell mobility works...they think they can do anything they want and the customer can just suck it up. Last year Bell mobility had a problem with their new billing system and never sent out bills for like 3 months. Needless to say they never notified us as to their being any problem and when they did finally start billing again, between the wifes and my phone we owed over $300.
Alt,

Went through the same thing here. Everytime we get a Bell Mobility bill as well, it is always wrong. The first three months of our service on two phones was supposed to be free. It was not. We have another account for one of the kids and her bill was on the wrong plan.

I added up the problems over the first 6 months of billing and Bell overcharged us by some $300. Everytime we get a bill in, I have to call to get them to rectify the bill. One more overcharge and we will be doing battle in court over their 2 year contract because I'm not going to put up with it any longer and go back to Telus.

Simply the worst company to deal with ever IMO.
 
#24 ·
As mentioned before Bell will not sell to existing customer

I have Sympatico, Bell long distance, and Express Vu 3100. I get the bell newsletter via email - I got an offer to get the PVR 5920 for $100.00 after credits.

I put in an order ONLINE and "after we have reviewed your account you are already a subscriber" we can not sell the 5920 to you call express vu at their toll free number. The 5900 is not listed as an item for sale online. They only list the 5920 complete with the dish.

Jim Willis - Barrie
 
#26 ·
bye bye bell

After 7 yrs of bell I am finally getting rid of it ..before bev started I was loyal waiting for it for almost a yr...but numerous delays forced me to go to DTV..after two yrs I switched to Bell...now after all this time I have had enough of sim-subbing and a lack of original programming and rising costs........but mostly sim-subbing.....Bev was very good in the beginning but now after being treated like a criminal (as bev reated most customers for a while) and my rates going up steadily it is time to get off this crazy ride.....I want more access to more channels not more ethnic crap..bell continues to tie up bandwith with foreign channels..not english speaking channels..My advice to Bell ..stop trying to please everyone and move your business model more like DTV..please your core customers they will eventually pay the bills....... not niche channels.

one thing about sim-subbing many will say, that is not a Bell problem, but a CRTC problem and I would agree, but Bell is my provider and they will lose me as a customer for it, not some Mandarin in Ottawa..if you want change you must undertake it on behalf of your customers not take from them all that the law allows, to increase your bottom line.Don't get me wrong I believe strongly companies should make a good profit.
Once Bell has you as a customer, they do not try to keep you as one and that is their downfall...I predict bell will belong to someone else in less than 5 yrs or go Bankrupt.
Well time to end my statement and go...... the big crook is on CBC telling us all how wonderfull he and his party are!
But it is like S**T you can dress it up and paint it and make it pleasant to smell but it is still S**t
 
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