"Unplug the box, put the remote face down (numbers down) on top of the box"

First thing my mother says to me this morning (after I wake up and pee), is that the remote to her TV isn't working. She's already tried changing the batteries and it's still not doing anything. 

I take a look at the remote, and everything blinks when I press a button, so I don't think it's that. But just to see maybe those batteries on on their way out, I change them to a new pack. 

Still not changing a channel. Maybe it needs a factory reset?

I get online to see about doing a reset and can't find the instructions for our box, as Hotwire has several different brands they use. Of course, ours being a TiVo, the first page of searching doesn't have what I need. 

Must. Include. "TiVo". As. Keyword. 

As I'm doing this, my mother decides she is going to call Hotwire because it's becoming on of those situations that's taking up too much of our time. 

She calls the first number she has saved. It goes to a sales rep's office number. 

She hangs up. Tries another number and it goes to a call center. Presses the right keys to get a live person and explains what is going on.

Only after confirming our address and so forth.

The call center person asks some questions, I think to find the right script to read from. 

My mother explains how last night the remote barely worked so this morning she tried changing the battery. Two different tries, the remote doesn't seem to be talking to the box. Is there something she can do?

Call center tech confirms our boxes (three) and my mother says "yes, it's the primary bedroom one".

Call center says to us to "go to the box and unplug the first plug from the back of it. Put the remote face down, numbers side down, on top of the box, and don't touch it" because she's going to do some stuff on her end, puts us on hold. 

My question is, what in the hell does putting the remote face down on the electrically unplugged box have to do with anything? My mother shrugged.

A couple minutes go by and the call center gets back on the line. Asks us to plug the box back in, and we can take the remote off the box. 

Okay, we plug it in. Fision splash screen comes up. TiVo splash screens come up. The "press OK / Select to continue" message appears. We pressed OK. 

Channel pops up. I try the up arrow. Channel changes. Press the down arrow. Channel changes. 

My mother says to the call center "it is working" and asks me to go to a different channel all together. I did and it worked.

Call center says that sometimes they break, but she is happy to have helped us fix the problem. My mom thanks her and phone call ended. 

I said to my mother when she hung up, that this is totally fecking weird. We completely severed the power to the box by unplugging it. There has to be a battery back up of some sort within the box because otherwise, why would the tech have had us unplug it and put the remote on top of it? If they did some troubleshooting on their end, it must mean there is some back up power still going to the box. Otherwise the remote wouldn't have worked when she told us to plug the box back in.

Especially since I had started to do a factory reset on the remote. 

My mother said she doesn't understand it, except it's some Big Brother level stuff. I just had to laugh at that because how do I make a come back statement? My mother usually doesn't make that kind of joke, so for her to come out with it, you know something's funky.

I said to her that "I wonder if the next time this happens, we just do the same thing we just did and not call, see if things happen" and she said "worth a shot". 

It's just strange... cutting the power from the cable box and a remote call center still having access to it. I mean, I'm sure she saw on her screen that one of the boxes were offline... so surely something else would have needed to happen, besides putting the remote face down on it. Once we plugged it back in, it magically synced?

Makes no sense. Except I really think Hotwire has rigged these machines to be running 24/7/365 regardless of whether or not you have power. There's got to be some sort of battery backup in the box or the Ethernet cable runs power or something else is going on. The box is getting electrified whether it's plugged in or not. 

Scary. Messed up. Hotmess Hotwire. Comcast is fishy, but not this scammy... Way to start the morning!