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

wilf55

for now wait til closer to cut off time and then see if they will give an incentive to stay...

ckerrd

I was interested in the NTL £30 deal until I looked closer and realised that the broadband speed and limits were less than I currently get and I would get fewer channels. However the main problem with me trying to get this is the fact that when I enter my post code I am told I cannot receive NTL.
I have phoned in the past and been told the same thing.
Normally that would be fine were it not for the fact that one of my neighbours has cable. There is an access point for the cable at my back gate. I watched the guys install the cable 3 years ago.

I wonder how the hell I would go about getting it if I really wanted?

FannyHill

In my view don't phone to cancel your sub unless you are willing to follow thru.I think it comes across when you are phoning Sky.As said you can always phone back at a later time and say you've changed your mind and want to continue with you sub.
I myself have Sky FTA,FTV and also a Freeview box and don't miss the subscription channels on Sky one little bit.

carpy

has anyone managed to get a deal for staying, since xmas, for ringing up to cancel?

i thought it would be a good time to phone and cancel and lots of people would be after overspending over xmas.

i thought sky would try and retain as many customers as possible??

HACZ

In October, following this thread's advice I phoned Sky. I was offered 50% off for 3 months with no contract or 50% off for six months but with an additional 12 months contract. I was also told to ring back in January to sort out another deal. I have phoned today and have been told that all offers have been withdrawn. I have therefore given my 30 days notice to quit and will wait and see what happens.
If no offer is forthcoming I will cancel and replace Sky+ with a Hard drive recorder - there is an 80gb twin tuner in Asda at £80.

Spot_The_Dog_3

I Rang N T HELL yesterday, was paying £50/month for fone TV and Broadband, told them I was going to cancel, the woman said can I hold, I said no, you ring me back, which she did....result, I'm now being charged £29.99 / month

Aerodiver

Sky offering no retention packages?

Rang yesterday to cancel and they offered nothing. They did "try" by asking what I wanted to pay. I said around £20. Currently I had the full package at 50% off. They then went through the what do you watch routine, and we stripped out sports, then they tried to take out some movie channels (which we occasionally watch, and it was clear we were going nowhere.

They were offering nothing. In a Poker like way she kept "calling my bluff" and asking if she wanted me to put the cancellation through now, to which I repeated yes if thats the best we can do, repeat x3 times then she put it through.

Pathetic. Personally I'm not too bothered, I originally took Sky on an offer from my employer (50% off top package for 12 months) after having just moved house when we'd decided not to bother with paytv.

I phoned to cancel in September (genuinely) and they offered 3 months 50%, so I thought I might as well keep it for Christmas, but this time nothing. Anyone paying £40 quid for Sky is bonkers. Bye Bye Sky.

ajb69

Hello all,

I called up Sky after reading about the £49 Sky+ offer and got it in under 5 minutes!

The first trick is to call their free telephone number 0800 0512595 (which does not tell you that it is Sky when the automated voice talks to you). When you listen to the options choose cancellations and then choose Turnaround. This is the department in Sky that has the power to make offers, and by going straight through to them you manage to avoid all the usual waits, disconnections and blank denials of any offers that you get from front-line support.

Anyway, I got straight through - at 7.30pm on a Friday! - and I did not have to fight at all. All I said was that I did not watch Sky enough to warrant paying £160 for Sky+ so I wanted to cancel, as there were no offers on it that I had heard of.

Immediately I was told there was an offer of the box and installation for £49. You do have to sign up for the 12 months and pay £10 for the line rental each month on top of your usual subscription fee (because there are two satellite LNB lines coming into the box instead of the regular one).

I also upgraded to the movie package but I did not have to upgrade to get the £49 offer, and I can downgrade at any time.

I did not ask for more than that as I was happy to get £49 but I get the feeling I might have been able to get an offer on the movie channels as they were ready to tell me about the offer immediately. So if you want to, try to get more out of them.

A few years ago I used to work for Sky (in their technical call centre department) and I was told then that if you threaten to cancel you do get offered free stuff. So if your sky box is out of warranty, and it breaks down, and the technical team tell you that you need to pay for an engineer to come and fix it - then if you say you want to cancel and ask for the cancellations department they would put you through to the turnaround department which would then offer you a free engineer’s visit (the fee for the visit always covers the cost of any equipment.)

But beware their policy *used* to be that if you threatened to cancel three times then they would cancel your Sky. And their staff do make a note on your account of how many times you’ve spoken to the turnaround team.

Finally, if you lose you Sky viewing whilst waiting for an engineer’s repair visit (if their first available date is some way off) then immediately ask for compensation – they will not compensate you if you can’t view the free channels (BBC, ITV etc) but if you can’t see the Sky or premium channels ask to speak to a team leader because you want some compensation. You actually have to say the word "compensation" to get it. We were told in our staff training that if the word compensation was not mentioned we were to say there was nothing we could do, even if the customer made it clear they wanted something for their troubles: without the “magic word” we should not help them. Finally only team leaders in the technical department can offer compensation and they can also refund your account for the days you are not getting benefit out of your Sky until the engineer visits.

Cheers, hope this helps some people out!

Rebecca

Limara

I phoned to cancel around september after 2 hours on phone i ended up geting a free repair and cutting subscription down, holding onto a package for the free broadband when it becomes available 4 weeks later when they finally sent me the list of packages i realised i was only paying full price no offer no discount at all, and I have since found out it is going to be at least 12 months before it gets to this area I have been with them since it first came out and never had any free installation offers and payed high because we got it right when it was first out.
I phoned again last week to cancel after him trying to push change of chanel packages then trying for the sky+ then came the final straw my direct debit wasnt due to be collected for 10 days they couldnt cancel it or even change it I have to give 30 days notice and they are cutting it off exactly 30 days to the phone call and they cant extend that for the extra 10 days which I have paid for and strangely they cant change the direct debit subscription to collect only for the time they are providing the service for yet they would manage to do it in that time if I was upping my channel selection! they will hold it in credit for me to go back this to me says everything about them I dont want it I am not going back to it if they do every get the free broad band in this area I still wont be going back after this treatment!

bargainhunter_0601

Ive just phoned to downgrade our sky package, we were paying £38/month,
they told me there was no incentives to keep people anymore.(this finished in august) the only offers they do now are on broadband and talk.
so two mixes plus sky plus facility is now costing us £25/ month.
a bit dissapointed but hey!!
wont miss movies cos they were all repeated Anyway!!!