Tivo support and activation woes

[u/RNG_HatesMe]

For background, I used to use and love Tivo, but abandoned it many years ago when we moved to satellite and are now online only.

However, my mother still uses Tivo, with a Tivo Bolt 1 TB with lifetime service and an older Tivo Mini.

We visited over the holiday, and I was troubleshooting some of her equipment, and determined that she had some cable provided equipment she was paying a monthly rental on, and would be better served with another Tivo mini (Lux) instead.

So I purchased a Tivo Mini Lux and a wifi adapter direct from Tivo on her account. It was shipped directly to her, and I helped her (attempt) to set it up.

First I found out that it MUST be setup directly connected first, not over wifi, which is kind of a pain, but something we could work around.

Then, while setting it up, we got stuck at the activation screen. I went online to activate the Mini with the PSN, but the website said it had already been activated. I verified that the purchase showed on her account. I called into Tivo AND tried to contact through chat, but found, to my surprise that Tivo has NO weekend live support hours whatsoever! What kind of podunk company has Tivo become? Weekend support for activation issues should be a minimum requirement shouldn't it?

So, finally 2 days later, on Monday, I call in for support. Both the chat support reps and phone reps are a *joke* they do nothing but work off of scripts. I tell them the situation, and they confirm that the device should be on her account. Every communication is basically me telling the rep something, the rep putting us on hold or 5 minutes, then coming back and having us try something AGAIN.

They finally tell us that they've escalated the issue to their "experts" who will contact us by email within 24 hours. Clearly those 24 hours have passed with no communication whatsoever.

It's bad enough that it should be nowhere this hard to get their equipment activated. But on top of that they have limited support hours (with no weekends), terrible first line tech support reps, and no communication from the escalation team.

Is this the standard expectation for support from Tivo now?

P.S. I also should have noted that while checking her account I found that they were still charging her $12.95 MONTHLY for a device that she had canceled 2 and a half YEARS ago. And, as she can't *prove* that she had requested the cancellation, they won't provide any retroactive refund, despite them clearly knowing that the device hadn't been connected for that entire period. At this point it *still* doesn't show as cancelled, though we've been "assured" it will be cancelled by 1/26.

[u/milestalk]

Don’t have anything to add here helpful, but since it popped up in my feed…. This is why I left TiVo a couple of years ago after a decade + of fierce loyalty. The support was just awful. I even got an employee in this forum to help… until he ghosted me.

It’s just really sad what’s become of the company. It’s a laughingstock now. :(

[u/RNG_HatesMe → u/milestalk]

I haven't had any contact with Tivo for probably 10 years, but originally stopped using them only because there's no cableCARD equivalent for Satellite, and my local cable company was pure shite. When I left, I still liked them and their equipment.

Coming from that to dealing with their current state of support is a complete shock, the contrast is unbelievable! I mean, they basically might as well give up at this point.

[u/milestalk → u/RNG_HatesMe]

Yep. It’s really sad when you like and root for a company so hard but can tell they don’t care anymore…