Pros
After being here 9 years, the pay is good. My salary has more than doubled since I started. However, I was around when there was actually a career path for coaches and not just an annual appraisal that may or may not come with an increase. You can basically do whatever you want because there is no accountability. Your peers are great and just as disgruntled as you. If you, by pure luck, have good metrics you can get a good schedule.
Cons
The benefits are absolutely horrible. The company likes to pretend they "improved" our benefits by allowing same-sex couples to cover their spouses, which is great in states that allow same-sex marriage. The rest of us received an increase to our benefit payment while we still only have two choices - a $500 family deductible with only $10,000 in coverage, leaving the employee owing thousands if someone in the family has minor surgery, or a $2500 family deductible that means unless we have minor surgery, nothing will be covered in the coverage year. Dish is a multibillion dollar company and should be able to afford a non High Deductible Coverage Plan (HDCP). Tuition reimbursement is a joke. They reimburse tuition but not fees, so the 75% is really like 25%. They don't seem to care that their management team doesn't know how to manage. They have offered additional Leadership training, but that doesn't change the fact that some of their people are poor leaders at the core. Our management team says they care about people, then do the opposite. I'd post examples but I am trying to stay anonymous. There are ridiculous rules, like you can't wear a hooded sweater at your desk, but its ok to wrap up in a Snuggie or blanket. In a position where no customers see you, you cannot wear Dish-provided t shirts unless its the weekend. HR is a joke - they play favorites and work behind the scenes with the management team against the employees. We hold our agents accountable for things that aren't their fault. If a customer is dissatisfied with a price increase and take a survey and give a bad score, the bad score hits the agent. If a technician calls in and requests a receiver to be replaced, and the testing department determines there is nothing wrong with the receiver, the agent takes the hit. If the agent follows the troubleshooting and sets up a technician visit, but the technician has to replace the receiver when he gets there, even though the troubleshooting doesn't say to replace the receiver (and agents are required to follow the troubleshooting) the agent gets hit with an invalid tech visit. If a tech calls in and activates an account today, and the customer calls in 3 days to change their programming, or even complain about the tech, the agent gets hit with a repeat call. And for all of these metrics, they refuse to provide us account-level data because we would see all the errors and mistakes in reporting. The company holds agents to made-up numbers. Lack of transparency. There is so much more. Don't work here. Ever.
