Mastec Advanced Technologies

Victim Location 24266

Type of a scam Other

Mastec is the provider of on-site support for Directv customers in the Tri-Cities/Southwest Virginia area. I recently had to have someone come to my house to correct an issue with the alignment of my dish, which was causing a signal loss error. The technician completed the work and had me sign my name 3 times on his phone as part of what he said was part of their normal process to close the work order. Two days later I received an email from Directv thanking me for signing up for their Protection Plan Premier service ($19.99) with details about the service and everything that it covers. I already have their basic Protection Plan and did not ask to have the Premier version added to my account, so I called their customer service to find out what was going on. They advised me that the technician added the service during his visit to my home.

It’s partially my fault for not asking more questions about what I was signing but at no time did the technician say anything that indicated he was adding an additional feature to my account that I had never asked for and had declined multiple times in the past when calling Directv. This was done, in my opinion, with the hope that it would not be noticed until enough time had passed for the technician and Mastec to receive a monetary benefit from it. This is the textbook definition of fraud and should be reported as such.

To top it off, a supervisor from Mastec called me back about the issue and essentially said it is part of their normal process and users have 30 days to cancel the service before being charged.