What's the best way of getting a tech to show up? (On the verge of leaving DirecTV after 24 years)...

I loved, loved, LOVED DTV when I signed up in 2000. We live in a small town and had no cable options on our road at the time, so DirecTV was a total TV savior. 

I appreciated the customer service + technical support. Whenever I would call them, they always had special offers and every season gave me the "loyal customer" rate on Sunday Ticket. I even got it for free a couple of years.

But times have changed. They lost the Ticket to YTTV, the promos aren't quite as rich as they once were and the customer service has taken a huge nosedive.

All of this leads me to...

We lost service on 12/26 (error code 775, need a new SWiM device) and did the tech support rigamarole (unplug, reset, check wires, etc). Ended up scheduling a tech service call for 12/30.

We waited from 8 am to 9 pm. The tech never showed. And every time we called customer service to check on the status (must've been about a dozen times), we got a different excuse "he's running late"..."he's stuck at another appointment"..."He's on his way"...and finally "he had car trouble." By the end, it definitely felt like we were being punked. 

We rescheduled to today (Jan. 2nd) and the same thing has happened. We had an 8am–noon service window. Got ghosted again. We were forwarded to the "advanced tech service team" and was fed the same trumped-up "excuse script" that they must be trained to read (running behind, keep your line open for a call).

Finally, my wife asked "Should we just cancel DTV and go with another service?" Once the customer retention flag was raised, he actually admitted that no technician had been assigned to our job and dispatch controlled all the jobs from their end — assigning techs as they saw fit, regardless of the schedules appointment. That was a hard, cold smack of reality.

Apparently, the next date a technician can come out is now Jan. 10th — doubtful if he'll even show. And likely we cancel our service by then. 

Just curious if anyone has found a better method of contacting techs?

We've talked to customer support (express line), tech support and customer retention. A lot of apologizing, a lot of excuses and some discounts and gift cards throw our way — but no resolution. 

Does DTV truly value my business? Sure doesn't seem like it.