DirecTV Spot Beams/Local Channels

When you are moving from one location to another, you are never out of market. This is solely DirecTV's policy and not controlled by FCC or any judge. If I am in Houston, TX it is perfectly fine to receive Houston programming. If I then move to St. Louis, MO it is again perfectly fine for me to receive the St. Louis programming. It's just a matter of getting the dummies at DirecTV to push a button. As I mentioned above, Dish Network does it every day for their customers.

Pirate wrote:
Well, you would think one could just change the location code (zip) to receive locals where you are at. Still don't understand what the problem is. The satellite is beaming down the local data to that footprint. The data is available. Why can't Directv let my receiver receive it?

Don't blame DirecTV. Blame a U.S. Federal Court judge who made it illegal for you to receive out of market network signals except under very specific circumstances.

This may be of interest to others. I originally got an RV only, account in 1999. Eventually, since they made it, not so easy, to turn service off and on. I bought more receivers and started using DTV at home. All the while I paid for and got DNS as well as locals.

A few months ago, in expectation of making a long trip, asked for DNS again and found that they no longer recognized me as an RV customer. I sent a new affidavit and declared that all (6) of my DVR's and receivers were in my RV. It took effect and I now have NY/LA and my locals on all six units.

Bill.Winegard wrote:
DirecTV "could" change your location turning off the old and turning on the new. Dish Network does it all of the time. Receiving the programming where you are staying is perfectly fine. DirecTV just happens to take an unfriendly stance toward making these changes.

That's exactly what they do for us as Fulltimer's. We get NY/LA/and Locals (where we pay those state taxes)

We were DirecTV customers even before they spread around the country. We preordered the receivers about a month before they arrived at Hi Fi Buys. Back then, all that was available was DNS. We got LA stations and Atlanta stations. Worked for us, since ATL was local.

Then the FCC got involved when local channels balked at losing their target customers. So we had to sign a waiver from some of them. CBS, maybe FOX were involved.

DirecTV "could" change your location turning off the old and turning on the new. Dish Network does it all of the time. Receiving the programming where you are staying is perfectly fine. DirecTV just happens to take an unfriendly stance toward making these changes.

Pirate wrote:

Bill.Winegard wrote:
Which part do you not understand? If you want to have your account registered to your RV then you will get the DNS Networks from either NY or LA or only the Networks from the area where your account is registered. It is was it is or you can cancel your service, sign up for Dish and call every time you move in hopes of getting someone to change your account settings. I am not defending anyone, I am only stating the realities.

Hey, I understand how it works, I am trying to figure out why it works that way. I apparently have to pose this question on a different forum though. Is it directv, FCC, what?

This may the reason, but in most parts of the country, you are within several spot beams.
If Directv unlocked all those locals in those spot beams and you had the ability to watch stations in other markets, your local stations would be complaining to the NAB (which has very deep pockets) and the FCC.
They could probably do it, just charge every one a flat fee for locals, and turn them all on, but it will never happen.
And changing the zip code to receive the locals where you are would probably require the receiver to be able to send this request to Directv.
If you have Google Earth, here is a link that will show you the size of the spot beams. The links to the spot beams for the different markets are about a third of the way down.

Spot Beams

It's the FCC. Unfortunately, it's the way that DirecTV and Dish choose to interrupt the FCC regulations.
Don't get mad at anyone here. You know, "Don't shoot the messenger!"
You can contact DirecTV executives but the reality is that DirecTV has 30 millions customers (30,000,000). Nearly all of these customers have a dish on a stick fastened to their house and they make all of their software related decisions based upon this fact. Those of us who choose to "move their house" just have to figure out how to adapt.

It's DirecTV's way of doing business. If you don't like their rules, don't be their customer.

Bill.Winegard wrote:
Which part do you not understand? If you want to have your account registered to your RV then you will get the DNS Networks from either NY or LA or only the Networks from the area where your account is registered. It is was it is or you can cancel your service, sign up for Dish and call every time you move in hopes of getting someone to change your account settings. I am not defending anyone, I am only stating the realities.

Hey, I understand how it works, I am trying to figure out why it works that way. I apparently have to pose this question on a different forum though. Is it directv, FCC, what?

Which part do you not understand? If you want to have your account registered to your RV then you will get the DNS Networks from either NY or LA or only the Networks from the area where your account is registered. It is was it is or you can cancel your service, sign up for Dish and call every time you move in hopes of getting someone to change your account settings. I am not defending anyone, I am only stating the realities.