DirecTV's Customer Service: Just as Crappy as Comcast's

In the past, I've had good luck with DirecTV's customer service, but a bizarre series of billing errors has made me change my mind and I must now characterize its customer service as crap.

Due to these billing errors, almost $800 of incorrect fees were added to my account. Yes, you read correctly: $800!

The short version of this story:

1. My HD DVR unit was defective. Let me rephrase that: My second HD DVR unit was defective (as was the first one, which DirecTV replaced).
2. A tech dude came out, saw it was defective and replaced it with a new unit -- telling me that DirecTV would send me a "recovery kit" with which to return the defective unit.
3. The recovery kit never shows up.
4. DirecTV bills me $300 for a "lost or damaged" unit. (My unit is neither lost nor damaged; it's defective.)
   
5. I begin a long series of phone calls to DirecTV. Sometimes I'm cut off in the middle of a call and have to call back, retelling my long story all over again.
6. DirecTV promises to send me a recovery kit and remove the $300 charge. It takes them over three weeks to remove this incorrect fee.
7. The recovery kit arrives; I immediately send my unit back.
8. Two weeks later, DirecTV charges me over $400 for not returning the unit.
9. Phone calls resume. It takes two weeks to remove this charge. Consequently, for several weeks there is almost $800 of incorrect charges on my account.

Now that is crappy customer service.