Digital TV Cost Cutting Article - Discuss What You've Been Offered

Techno

Not sure if this is the right place but here goes.
We are going to pay for Sky for 12 months for Mum-in-laws christmas present.
Is there any way to get the £50 from quidco (for her) and the £50 of M&S vouchers for us for referring or can you only have one or the other?
BTW we already have sky + and OH has point blank refused to allow me to try threatening cancellation and now it seems I'm too late so want as much out of them as poss!!!!!

carpy

so they're getting tough are they?!?!

there must be a way of reducing what i think are very excessive prices to watch tv but i can't live without the sport!!!

it not like sky can't afford to keep a small percentage of their customer base happy by regularly giving them a bit of discount........how much profit do they make?

i would bet at least 90% of their customers never bat an eyelid over what they're paying?!?

when you add your monthly subscription up over a year it's quite scary!!!!

i know with the right equipment you can pick up foreign broadcasts which show premiership matches (for example). what is the crack with this? is it legal?

i keep thinking about it because the equipment isn't that expensive (it would soon pay for itself) and you can buy these 'foreign' cards on ebay for a fraction of the price it costs to subscribe to sky for a year.

anyone doing this or anyone know much about it?

stiffnuts69

I think if thats skys attitude then we should boycott them. Go to digital tv or an alternative provide. They make too much money from us for showing second rate repeats.

The only thing that I had sky for was football, but now I have bought a foreign satellite dish and get all the premier legue football I want. Vote with your money and leave sky

carpy

stiffnuts69 wrote:

I think if thats skys attitude then we should boycott them. Go to digital tv or an alternative provide. They make too much money from us for showing second rate repeats.

The only thing that I had sky for was football, but now I have bought a foreign satellite dish and get all the premier legue football I want. Vote with your money and leave sky

i'm interested in a foreign dish, can you give me more info?

how much did it cost to set-up?
what are the on going costs (subscriptions etc.)?
what is the quality of service like?

thanks for any advice

techmob

carpy wrote:

i'm interested in a foreign dish, can you give me more info?

how much did it cost to set-up?
what are the on going costs (subscriptions etc.)?
what is the quality of service like?

thanks for any advice

how much did it cost to set-up?

all depends on the equipement, but you can probably get setup for about £300

what are the on going costs (subscriptions etc.)?

you have the likes of ART, which provide full english commentary and premiership coverage,m even saturday 3pm kick offs, allot more than sky does, which costs anything from £90-£120 on ebay for 12 months sub

what is the quality of service like?

as for the coverage, it is the best value for money out there, as for quality of service, its good but not as good as sky

lizhog10

Actually things moved on. The Sky Engineer phoned at 8 am on the morning of the 'visit' to say he would be with us between 11 and 2 that day, and then at 9.30 we had another call to say he had phoned in sick and they were cancelling out service call. We were most unimpressed and told them to forget it, cancel the policy and we would go to NTL. After a long discussion they offered to come out and do a complete new installation for free. We agreed to this, they came, and it's now working well. Yes, it would have been nice to have a special deal of the channels but the bottom line is the price for NTL and Sky (for the package we have) is very similar so either way we would pay the same. We now have a completely new system which, after quite a number of Sky, we are quite happy with.

rob5ta

Humanoid wrote:

Hello all,

This is my first post so please forgive me if I am covering old ground.

Yesterday I called Sky to cancel (as I am currently out of contract) and the following points were made:

1. Sky told me that as of two weeks ago they stopped any kind of package reduction deals. They are getting tough!

2. They said it was costing Sky £14m (not sure if this is per month or year).

3. Sky said they are fully aware of what is discussed on forums like this one and know exactly what people are up to! Therefore they will call your bluff and disconnect you (which is exacly what they are doing to me). The Sky representative also said that you would not try this in a supermarket!

4. However, they are only prepared to offer a discount on the equipment
now. I was offered a Sky+ box for £49 including installation BUT I would need to pay full price for all the channel packages. I must admit that I am on the most basic package and if I was in their shoes it would make better sense to retain a full package customer over me! But still worth a try

It looks like it is going to be a Sky free christmas for me this year but I have a feeling that come the new year Sky might be slightly more interested in doing a deal.

Sorry but i dont buy that. I spoke to retentions about 3 weeks ago, and basically said i wanted to cancel as i liked the variety of Sky World, but could not justify the price. They offered me a 25% discount for 12 months as a customer loyalty offer. Only catch was i had to stay with them for another 12months. I have only been with them 12 months as well.

To be honest i think it just depends on who you speak to. Sky cant afford to "toughen up" as there is too much competition out there. They need to retain customers the same as any other big corporation. They would rather discount the product and keep the custom for another 12 months rather than lose them altogether.

Humanoid_2

Hi,

Thanks for posting your experience. I suspect that this new policy may have come in just after you called (3 weeks ago) and just before I called (3 days ago). Sky said the policy had been in force for 2 weeks and maybe you called 1 day before they implemented it?

In terms of competition - which other satellite provider offers a comparable or direct like-for-like service? Cable companies to my understanding offer the same Sky sports and Sky movies as Sky do directly via satellite.

The Sky representative I spoke to was categoric in saying this is a blanket policy and "there are no discounts on channels anymore, just discounts on equipment" (my paraphrasing). I actually found that equipment was no cheaper than before.

If someone is spending £00's a month on box office and per view events then of course it would be foolish for Sky to loose a customer over a relatively small discount and on those grounds I find it hard to believe that Sky have a "no excpetions policy to this blanket policy"

Therefore, the two issues are: 1. Me trying to get a bargain when I am very low spender and have a poor bargaining position and 2. Sky saying that no one never is going to get a discount on channel packages.

In terms of to whom one speaks to I am not sure it makes a difference. Maybe others who have called subsequent to my call have different experiences as I would be interested to hear!

The only other aspect it that maybe Sky will offer something tempting during the 30 day notice period? If so I will post it here!

In terms of what a large company needs to do (in a member of the publics opinion) and what they actually do is another issue altogether! I do not dispute your general logic but I can only go on personal exepriences and those of others

carpy

techmob wrote:

all depends on the equipement, but you can probably get setup for about £300



you have the likes of ART, which provide full english commentary and premiership coverage,m even saturday 3pm kick offs, allot more than sky does, which costs anything from £90-£120 on ebay for 12 months sub



as for the coverage, it is the best value for money out there, as for quality of service, its good but not as good as sky

so about £400 to get up and running for 12 months which is less than it costs me to have sky sports world for a year (£444).

on going costs of £90-£120 a year.

only one winner there..................

computersaysdoh

theloft wrote:

I say wait until January, there will be deals around then as loads of people will be cancelling to get the bills down after Xmas. Interesting to see that someone else gets picture break-up when it's windy & rainy, I get this problem as well, does anyone else? Have had SKY out to fix it, (F.O.C.) and it has improved a bit but still happens from time to time, we even get a box on the screen that states "No satellite signal is being received". We have to switch back to analogue viewing then, with the loss of all Sky channels. What worries me is, when we all switch to digital, will the signal be stronger or what??

We sometimes get sound break up, or pixel problems with the picture. We first spotted it on some sky+ recordings, then noticed it would happen at broadcast time too, which at least proved it was not a recording problem. I see several people have this with wind/rain etcc, and dont want to pay £60 for sky to come out, and then say its down to external factors . . .

This raises a question where sky and ntl are fundamentally different. Since you dont own the ntl box, you can expect them to fix STB issues free.