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

dazco

This is a long thread and I cannot be bothered to check if this has been posted before but, in my experience of sky, if you want free sky plus just tell them you are cancelling because your job has changed and all your favourite programmes are on after you have gone bo-bos. They are happy because they can read out of the manual to you and you have not got their back up by ranting.

Easy:D

overdrawn30

I have been with Sky TV for 6 years, and have had their Broadband service for around 2 (so well out of contract of both), and wanted Sky+ however, could never justify the cost etc.

We have had the full package on Sky - absolutely everything, but dropped the Premium Sports last month as we just were not using that package.

I was annoyed that at my local shopping centre over the weekend, there was a Sky stand offering Free Sky+ (usually £149 for the box) with £30 installation for brand new customers when ordering Sky, I was however told at the stand that this was not available to existing customers.

Called Sky up last night and threatened to cancel both TV and Broadband with them unless they could give me a reason to stay, I was immediately offered a £100 discount on Sky+ with £30 installation, but I said that this wasn't acceptable as I wanted it for free (as per new customers) and said that I would cancel Sky, leave it a couple of months then sign up as a new customer.

I was then offered Free Sky+ with Free installation if I took their Phone service, which offers the same package and cost as my existing Pipex package, so I did and it's being installed in two weeks time, I also get 1 direct debit less to worry about as it's all in 1 big Sky payment for everything.

Worth the cost of a 5 minute phone call even if it's 084xx number (Landline on https://www.saynoto0870.co.uk doesn't work anymore and refers to 0844x number

eslick

dont forget if you dont get any where with customer service you can write to the main man himself [EMAIL="james.murdoch@bskyb.com"]james.murdoch@bskyb.com[/EMAIL], he doesnt reply obviously but the team that does are normally quite good. I cancelled because they wouldnt drop the prices of HD from over £300 + £120 a year. I wrote them saying freesat and virgin was free and they still wouldnt budge on the price. To be honest wasnt really bothered about HD would have been nice have had but not paying for it. So asked them what they would do to make me stay for a few months whilst I decided whether to go to freesat or virgin, had to ask the question though and they gave me 2 months free viewing. Had the 50% and 25% discount in the past for a couple of months and was quite happy with this.

Had been told on the phone that sky dont do discounts as well. Quite happy as the saying goes every little helps.

snootycow

Hi,
I don't know if this has been posted before but according to SKY website it sounds like you have to change your phone service to a BT line even if you only want sky tv (ie, i dont want telephone or broadband). Does anyone know if this is true?

regards
snootycow

Oliver27

No thats not true, all that matters if your just having
TV is that box is conected to a working telephone line,
this will be done at time of install be the fitter.

its so the box can call Sky once a month (0800) to tell them if you have
ordered any box office films etc.

snootycow

Thanks for that, so if i want to order SKY tv with SKY + i don't have to change from Virgin to BT.... correct?

Thanks for answering

regards
snooty

BexTech

snootycow wrote: »

Thanks for that, so if i want to order SKY tv with SKY + i don't have to change from Virgin to BT.... correct?

Thanks for answering

regards
snooty

That is correct. If you only want the TV service whether Sky standard box, Sky+, Sky HD, a combination of any other them or all of them, you don't require a BT line only a working landline - it's never been a requirement for a BT line.

When we had Sky Digital installed like many others on 1 Oct 1998 we have a cable line.

You only need a BT line with Sky when you take either their calls package or Broadband, this is because their calls package runs over the BT line and cable don't allow such access on their phone network and the ADSL broadband runs over the copper BT landline and cable to have ADSL over their cable phone lines or allow access to them. BT are forced to allow other providers to use their network, cable aren't.

toejumper

I rang sky on sunday and said i couldnt afford it anymore but wasnt offered the free sky+ do you think i can ring today and say i would like to cancel because im going to bt vision or do you think its to soon to ring them back

The_Hornet

I just had a long (40min) chat with Sky and managed to blag a deal.

I've got a pretty full package of Sky+ HD, Full entertainment mix and Sports Mix at £48 per month. Obviously there's no chance of them offering me any freebies such as Sky+ as I already have it so I threatened them with cancellation (I'm out of contract now) as I was "trying to save some money". The first person I spoke to talked me through the possibility of changing the mix of channels to reduce my monthly payments by a couple of quid but I said it wasn't worth the hassle. He then came up with the first offer - my existing package for £35 rather than £48 for 3 months "to give me time to make up my mind". Also it would not extend my contract.

After saying no I was put through to "Retentions" when the other guy also went through various options including suggesting I cancel the sports package until the new footie season started. I asked about cancelling and going to Freesat on Sky (for a one off £20 card) but apparently although I can still get BBC HD and the other Freesat channels I couldn't use the Record/Pause etc. features in my Sky+ HD box.

After initially saying he couldn't offer any subscription discounts (!!!) he suddenly found he could offer me half price HD (£5 vs. £10 a month) for 6 months. A bit more haggling got me both offers so in all I saved a total of £69 and with no downgrading of my service for the cost of 1 phone call. As this was on the landline quoted above I got that for free out of my mobile included minutes.

snootycow

I got a leaflet the other day offering me a completely free SKY + box, valid til 31st (i think). No mention of it on the sky website though, that still says SKY+ for £99 instead of £149????