Saga of the New Tivo, Part V

Previously : Troubleshooting and a new plan

Fast forward to December 23, 2005. I had been working 80 hour weeks for three weeks in a row. We had visitors in town over Thanksgiving and other obligations kept me from completing the Tivo saga. But now I had vacation for the rest of the year and some time to finish it. In the meantime, I had received email from Weaknees telling me that I had to activate the new Tivo soon or face penalties charged to my credit card. I called them and got a brief extension and, so, activating the replacement Tivo was my mission for the day.

For those of you not familiar with DirecTV (DTV), each receiver has a little slot in which you slide an “activation card” that tells DTV that you are legally using their satellite service. The card is exactly the same size as a credit card and has what appears to be a small amount of flash memory on it. I had successfully activated the previous DirecTV Tivo (DTivo) before frying it but Weaknees needed to have the replacement DTivo activated in order to fulfill their contract with DTV.

I pulled the replacement DTivo out of the box and opened up the little door that covers the slot for the activation card. To my surprise, there was no card inside. I then scoured the inside of the box only to find the little plastic bag in which the card came and some packaging materials. I searched around the house in spots I thought I might have left the card. I also showed an activation card to every member of the family and asked if they had seen one like it. Negative on all counts.

Now in a semi-panic I remembered that I still had the card in the broken unit. I called DTV and told them my situation and asked if I could use the card from the broken unit in the new unit. The representative said I could do that and he would walk me through it. Thirty minutes later the new DTivo was activated with the older card. Then I called Weaknees to apprise them of the situation and to find out exactly what remained for me to get square with them.

Well, Weaknees was not cool with the activation card shuffling because, according to them, it would get them into trouble with DTV. Explaining that I had lost the activation card I had received with the replacement DTivo, I said I wanted to make good and asked how I could do so. Here’s the course of action they requested:

1. Call DTV and ask for a replacement for the lost activation card.
2. When the replacement card arrives, activate the replacement DTivo with the replacement card.
3. Call Weaknees when activation is complete.
4. Send back the broken DTivo to Weaknees with original activation card.

So I called DTV again and told them the plan. Their representative was doubtful about the need to do all of it, but I wanted it done and they were willing. The rep had a replacement card sent to me to arrive the next day and he waived the activation fee they normally charge.

Unfortunately, due to the holidays, the card did not actually arrive until the next week on December 28. It came with a set of directions on how to activate it via their automated phone system. I followed this procedure nearly all the way through before I noticed in the printed material accompanying the card that it was set to replace the card in our working DTivo! I aborted the automated procedure so I could talk to a rep, but after he put me on hold for 15 minutes, I discovered that it was too late. The replacement card was now “linked” to our old DTivo (the one in the Big TV room) and the card that had been in the old DTivo was now a useless piece of plastic. The only recourse was for DTV to once again overnight a replacement card for the lost card—which they did and at no charge again.

The next day, the replacement card arrived and I called a representative at DTV and described exactly which DTivo (by serial number) needed to be activated for the new card. After 10 minutes, the card was activated for Tina’s DTivo and I was almost ready to move on to the next phase of the operation. But first, I called Weaknees and gave them the skinny on the activation situation. They were not happy with the long delay (remember this had started two months before), but said that I should return the defective DTivo immediately, which I did that day.

Next: “…this saga may finally come to an end and Tina will have her birthday present before Valentine’s Day.”