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

geejaygee

I was just having the NTL 2MB broadband at £18.00 a month plus line rental for £12.75, free evenings and weekends. Phoned up and offered to leave because sky were offering broadband and phone for £15.00. They offered me half price broadband and a free freeview box - they also suggested I take off the call waiting which cost £1.75 a month.

So, £30.75 to £20 with a free freeview box (and reception that won't change with the wind). I'm happy - £129 a year cheaper!

lostdiver

hi all,

after reading martins advice and what has been left by others, i decided it was time for action..

after trying many times to get put through to the disconnection department on telewest's 150 number, ( just knew what they were going to say..." the average waiting time is 50 mins") well i decided that tonite was the nite and put the phone on loud speaker... after about 10-15 minutes (what a surpise) i got through..

I told them i wanted to disconnect as i was looking at the sky offer of 3 for £26 (but havent got bt l/lane) they offered me free digitial tv (worth £11) i then mention their new v+ box, its abit like sky's + box.... this would cost me £15.

i should add that i pay £51 at the moment for the following....

size L tv package,
Size L broadband 4mb
phone line, with caller display and voice mail.

the best they could offer me after i mentioned the new V+ box was,

free L package on tv, but i would have to pay £15 for the new v+ box, meaning i would be spending £4 more than i was paying but with new gizmo box(installation charge of £35 drop as well).

said i would think about it... rang back 1 hour later...

and said it wasnt good enough and i wanted cheaper broadband....

new offer of.

Size xl tv package
size m broadband 2mb, (its all i need)
phone, caller display, voice mail.

and NEW V+ box

for a total of £46 a saving of £5 plus i get the new box and a better tv package, the good thing is they even said it was indefinite... so i dont have to ring back up either.... and still no installation charge...

i am a happy bunny:EasterBun .

martin i owe u a beer... in fact no, got to save my money... a thank you will have to do...

caza1001

I have just saved myself about £110 by saying I was going to cancel.

I have been having intermittant problems with my sky box over the last week with what channels I can receive. I think it is more of a dish alignment problem than a box problem. I phoned tech support (using of course the freephone number from saynoto0870 - sky customer services 0800 0512595) after previous experiences of phoning the high cost number and being on the phone for 30 mins or longer.

A very unpersonable person went through various things with me and then said she would need to send an engineer at £65 which would guarantee a fix one way or another. I thought it was a lot of money to pay and had been considering Sky+ anyway so wondered how much that would be so she put me through to sales.

Sales told me it was £159 to have the box installed and for the cost of the box - £99 for the box, £60 installation plus of course the £10 a month subscription to Sky+. Thought that was pretty hefty so said I needed to think about it and was considering cancelling then cause it wasn't really worth it all. He couldn't put me through to cancellations cause they were inbound so I hung up, re-dailed 0800 and chose the option for cancellations and then guessed at the option for turnaround as the others didn't seem to suit. So if you are lucky it means you don't have to speak to Customer Services who have no power.

Got straight through to the person I wanted to speak to! Explained I was thinking of cancelling as I was having problems with my connection which I thought was just dish allignment but have been told that its £65 for an engineer or £159 to upgrade to Sky+ and wondered what deals they could offer me.

He looked up my details, saw I had subscribed for 6 years albiet only on a reasonably low package (no premium channels) and said they were all about customer loyalty now rather than new customers (the usual blurb) but offered me installation Sky+ for £49 all in (plus the £10 a month subscription). He went away and came back and said he could also offer the engineer visit at half price if i wanted to stick with what I have.

I couldn't think of anything else to bargin with (should have read this thread first) so thought it was a pretty good deal saving me £110 on something I was going to do anyway so going ahead to get it done! I probably could have haggled harder and got more (have done it with mobile phone contracts and got excellent deals) but i'm happy with this. I get the better service for less than originally quoted! :beer: :beer:

hunni

geejaygee wrote:

I was just having the NTL 2MB broadband at £18.00 a month plus line rental for £12.75, free evenings and weekends. Phoned up and offered to leave because sky were offering broadband and phone for £15.00. They offered me half price broadband and a free freeview box - they also suggested I take off the call waiting which cost £1.75 a month.

So, £30.75 to £20 with a free freeview box (and reception that won't change with the wind). I'm happy - £129 a year cheaper!

:T i have broadband with ntl also....after reading your post i rang and said the same...i too was offered half price broadband (Not worth £18 anyway!) and phone for the next 6 months....was told to call back then and see if they could extend it!...
I have already managed to get sky+ for £49..didnt think about trying the same with the broadband!!:T

tamarto

Miroslav wrote:

On the back of 'The Sky Month' there will be a heading 'What's next?'

Offered me half price Sky Sports for 3 months on that.

08706 005 645 - for some reason that put me through to Prem Plus, so I hung up and phoned the main number and told them of the offer and they gave it to me

Nothing there for me just rubbish about there phone service maybe as i have the movies and sports already

skkskk

Hi guys,

Just would like to share my experience with you all and hopefully no one has to go through the same as I have!
I have been with Sky for about 4 years now and in October 2006 I decided to go for Sky broadband. Now sky told me that the broadband contract lasts for 12 months. They did not mention the digital tv service even though i asked them about it! They said that I could cancel after 30 days notice (sky TV) but the broadband is 12 months notice.

I am now moving into temporary accomodation to where I can't take Sky as i dont know how long I will be there for. Sky now say that I am tied into a twelve month contract! They have said that the minute i got broadband sky tv also lasts for a year!

So i went down to the cheapest package TV and said ok, let me pay you up front for the remainder and then cancel the subscription. So that would be 15.99 x 10 months and £10.00 x 10 months. However they refused and wouldnt let me cancel it!!!!!!

I am going mad with fury! Has anyone else had this sort of problem?
Sanj

savagevixen

We had a problem when one of our landlords would not let a property have a satelite dish put up. If you email/write to sky and explain that your new landlord will not allow you to have satellite, and that as soon as your are able you will take the service up again. They should sort it out.


Alternatively when we experienced a further problem with sky, and I couldn't get any sense out of the customer services, I sent an email via the website, I put it for the attention of the manager. I explained my situation in full and (although it took about 3 weeks) it was sorted out and they refunded all my money. It was much more professional than the little people on the end of the phone. I would use this option with the broadband problem.


Also when I recently received my new sky card, I had to call to activate. This cost 80p per min for 15 mins. The chap (who barely spoke English) said I should call back if I had further problems. I said 'thats all very well but this call has just cost me £10 and he said that if I wrote and sent a copy of the charge I would be re-imbursed. When I called again I used the freephone number!!

savagevixen

sorry double post.

skkskk

Its so true! I just couldnt believe how well the sky script was. Two people from UK call centres just refused to cancel the subscription!
I am going to write to them, but I doubt it will get me anywhere. Ive even told them that it is just a temporary move, and have been with them for ten years, but they dont seem to give a monkeys!
Thanks for the reply,
Sanj

savagevixen wrote:

We had a problem when one of our landlords would not let a property have a satelite dish put up. If you email/write to sky and explain that your new landlord will not allow you to have satellite, and that as soon as your are able you will take the service up again. They should sort it out.


Alternatively when we experienced a further problem with sky, and I couldn't get any sense out of the customer services, I sent an email via the website, I put it for the attention of the manager. I explained my situation in full and (although it took about 3 weeks) it was sorted out and they refunded all my money. It was much more professional than the little people on the end of the phone. I would use this option with the broadband problem.


Also when I recently received my new sky card, I had to call to activate. This cost 80p per min for 15 mins. The chap (who barely spoke English) said I should call back if I had further problems. I said 'thats all very well but this call has just cost me £10 and he said that if I wrote and sent a copy of the charge I would be re-imbursed. When I called again I used the freephone number!!

FannyHill

I was once in a flat and couldn't put up a dish so what I did was have the dish inside the house peaking out the window. I had it fixed to a microphone stand. You have to have a window that faces southeast though and it doesn't work thru certain types of double glazing.And it helps if you have a zone 2 minidish the bigger one used in northern UK.


If you sign a years min contract you are normally held to it.


When I bought a £20 Freesat card about a year or so back I activated it thru the menu on the digibox,I didn't phone Sky. Can't quite remember what I did but there were a few threads on Digital Spy sat forums on how to do it. I think I had the phone line connected to the digibox to activate and then I disconnected it afterwards.

That old flat now has a sat dish and aerial system for all the residents.