It’s a common story: Young person leaves their apartment but the cable bill in her name somehow doesn’t get changed over to the roommates that remain. You won’t have much luck convincing the cable company of the error, but should your youthful screw-up impact your parents’ TV-viewing options?

The Wisconsin State Journal has the story of a couple whose daughter’s former roommates ran up a sizable DirecTV bill after she moved out of the apartment in 2004. As part of the daughter’s settlement with the satellite company, she agreed to never, ever get DirecTV again.

Unfortunately, when she’d originally signed up for the service, she had, like many young people, used her parents’ address as her permanent address. So in August, when the parents tried to sign up for a package deal with DirecTV and Frontier, they were denied.

“[W]e were refused installation because apparently our daughter used our address while involved in the dispute [seven years earlier],” the husband tells the State Journal. “My wife talked to several company people who said it is company policy and not going to change…. There must be lots of people who move and leave satellite bills all over. Why not list the person and not an address?”

After the State Journal contacted DirecTV about the situation, a company rep eventually decided that it would unlink the parents’ and daughter’s accounts because the balance on the old bill was less than $100 and it was older than two years.

SOS: Why did DirecTV blacklist them? [Madison.com]

Thanks to Jon for the tip!

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