Sky Complaints

TCM1980

I had Sky+HD installed on Tuesday at 10am, with phone and broadband to follow shortly. I had a dodgy feeling when the engineer turned up and was gone inside 10 minutes saying “Your channels will come on in a few hours, I haven’t signed off my last job yet” I thought most installations were done pretty much immediately but I waited all the same.

I’m still waiting now, after about 12 phone calls, resulting in a 50 minute call earlier I have been told, and I quote “It’s all about the waiting game”

Apparently the crux of the problem is my account is showing as pending, and that I have no viewing card. The viewing card was sent out last week and inserted by the engineer nearly three days ago.

I have been given no timeframe as to when the problem will be resolved, been fobbed off at every opportunity and patronised over the phone “Are you sure you card is in properly?” Er yes. I am on the verge of cancelling the whole thing, what a way to treat a new customer willing to pay over £60 a month! :T

Anybody had any success complaining by letter to Sky? As I say I’m on the verge of scrapping it altogether but wonder if they may offer me free HD or something if I put pen to paper.

spike7451

Ok,I'm confused...Do you have a viewing card?

I have no viewing card. The viewing card was sent out last week and inserted by the engineer nearly three days ago.

If you do,then the installer should've done three things;
1-Connected your phone to HD Box
2-Got a Ringback to activate the card by using the 'Installer Menu'
3-Rang Sky to get the Premium channels & recording activated.
It should take 24Hrs for everything to be working,If the phone's not connected,up to 48Hrs.

To do a ringback,On the remote press:
SERVICES
4
0
1
SELECT
(You should now be in INSTALLER MENU)
6 (New Install)
Then follow the on-screen menu.

If that fails,under SERVICES,you'll see TELEPHONE NUMBERS.
Call Sky Tech Help on 08442411411 or Sky HD on 08442410006

Also,is the viewing card in the right slot?

TCM1980

spike7451 wrote: »

Ok,I'm confused...Do you have a viewing card?


If you do,then the installer should've done three things;
1-Connected your phone to HD Box
2-Got a Ringback to activate the card by using the 'Installer Menu'
3-Rang Sky to get the Premium channels & recording activated.
It should take 24Hrs for everything to be working,If the phone's not connected,up to 48Hrs.

To do a ringback,On the remote press:
SERVICES
4
0
1
SELECT
(You should now be in INSTALLER MENU)
6 (New Install)
Then follow the on-screen menu.

If that fails,under SERVICES,you'll see TELEPHONE NUMBERS.
Call Sky Tech Help on 08442411411 or Sky HD on 08442410006

Also,is the viewing card in the right slot?

Not yet connected to a phoneline mate so I can't do the "callback" myself. Although I'm told it shouldn't be a problem not being connected to a line.

I've got the viewing card, but it showed up on their system I didn't have one despite their engineer fitting it into the box on Tuesday!

TCM1980

3 Operators have said they've never known anything like it and one said "99.9% of viewing cards are active within 24 hours, you're the 0.1%"

spike7451

TCM1980 wrote: »

Not yet connected to a phoneline mate so I can't do the "callback" myself. Although I'm told it shouldn't be a problem not being connected to a line.

I've got the viewing card, but it showed up on their system I didn't have one despite their engineer fitting it into the box on Tuesday!

It may be.As you're a new customer,your box is subsedised by British Interactive Broadcasting which is why you get the box so cheap providing you keep it connected to a phoneline for the first year.
The installer should have known this & ran a phone extension to the nearets phone point.
As you dont have it connected to the phoneline,Sky may,in a month or two as the box is'nt getting a ringback,send you a bill for the full cost of the box unless the box is connected up.
This happens more with Multi-Room installs but I''ve known it happen with Sky+/HD when I was a Sky Engineer.
Good luck,one of the reasons I left was Sky's incompetance!

TCM1980

Finally got it sorted on Saturday night - 5 full days after the install. Sky phoned me up (the first call back i'd had after days of promising) and asked for the details from the system setup. I'd wrote them down days earlier and offered them over the phone mind. Channels came on instantly - surprise surprise!

I said to the advisor "You're basically doing what the engineer should have done then?" to which she laughed and agreed!

I've sent a letter of complaint in anyway so I'll see what they reply with, just a word of warning to people - make sure the engineer gets everything done before he leaves the house!

underlay_guru

Hi,

As a brand new Sky customer myself, I have found their customer services to be rotten to the core.....I have never seen anything like it!

The problems have been created by the TV installers (which Sky had referred me to): a company called TELAER, based in Leeds. When I enquired to buy Sky services, TELAER had offered me a single deal on TV, phone and broadband at an unbeatable £36.25 per month. They even GUARANTEED that all these services would be installed, without fuss, within 8 days (provided I agree to the deal, of course)....

.....But in reality, they were interested in nothing but the TV install. After the TV was installed, and they had my installation fee, they did nothing else but deny I had ever spoken to them. TELAER had never ordered or made any note about providing any phone or BB to our address at all.

Their lame excuse? "Check the smallprint - services are subject to availability. They were available when we sold them to you, but they are not available now, so we cancelled them." I concequently did not get the 'offer' that they had quoted me.


...So thank you the sales agent named K*** at TELAER, for guaranteeing us you could install TV, phone and BB within 8 days, when you know fine well you wouldn't, all so you could greedily hit your TV sale targets for that day;

.....Thank you K*** at T****R for telling me that you had did a postcode check for broadband, that availability was successful, and that broadband would be quote: "No problem" (but there was a problem....it was not available in our area....You would let a pesky postcode availability check get in the way of a sale though, eh K***?) Thanks to this lie, K*** at T*LA*R, my poor wife had to spend virtually every day for the last 6 weeks travelling 16 miles to a depressing McDonalds, sitting in there all day to use their wi-fi because her career is dependent on an internet connection. Cheers mate....
.....Thanks to you and your sales bullsh*t, K*** at T**AER, my mobile phone bill for last month is a kings ransom, because we were without a landline for 5 weeks, which you promised to provide to us within 8 days...
.....And thanks to your sales b*ll*cks, K*** at TEL**R, my Sky bill is around £75 a month for at least the next 12 months.....a far cry from the £36.25 you quoted me.


Sky are more interested in attracting new customers than keeping their existing one happy. As soon as that contract is signed, good customer service is non-existent...

TCM1980

underlay_guru wrote: »

Hi,

As a brand new Sky customer myself, I have found their customer services to be rotten to the core.....I have never seen anything like it!

...

Have to agree with you there mate, I've had some pretty crap customer service - most notably off Carphone Warehouse(don't get me started!) but Sky takes the biscuit. The left hand doesn't know what the right is doing.

spike7451

TCM1980 wrote: »

Have to agree with you there mate, I've had some pretty crap customer service - most notably off Carphone Warehouse(don't get me started!) but Sky takes the biscuit. The left hand doesn't know what the right is doing.

One of the reasons I left,for example,
I had a job in Antrim area,could'nt find the customer,could'nt get hold of her.
When she phoned Sky to find out where I was,Sky put her thru to me.
When I checked her address with her by what I had on the job sheet,I found out she'd moved to the other side of Londonderry! 80 Miles away!
This was a regular occurance & if you could'nt complete your monthly job quota,Sky kindly took the money out of your wages!
One month,I came out with £670 in my paw for 12-14hour day,6 day week!Thru no fault of my own.

underlay_guru

spike7451 wrote: »

One of the reasons I left,for example,
I had a job in Antrim area,could'nt find the customer,could'nt get hold of her.
When she phoned Sky to find out where I was,Sky put her thru to me.
When I checked her address with her by what I had on the job sheet,I found out she'd moved to the other side of Londonderry! 80 Miles away!
This was a regular occurance & if you could'nt complete your monthly job quota,Sky kindly took the money out of your wages!
One month,I came out with £670 in my paw for 12-14hour day,6 day week!Thru no fault of my own.

Hi,

IMO, the problems are lie with sales call centre staff. The call centres are full of slick, jumped up sales agents, working towards targets, thinking they are the best salesmen in the world, and all the while, are fluffing up orders, making errors in customer details and reeling off any old garbage to get the caller to subscribe in a desperate attempt to meet their monthly sales targets ....As long as the customer says "Yes", they don't care about anything else....In the call centres the emphasis is on amount of calls answered and amount of sales made rather than resolving problems keeping customers happy.

TCM1980

Got a phonecall yesterday off Sky, full of apologies, said they'll refund my call charges if I send my phone bill in and also offered me 4 months free HD. :eek:

Quite surprised I got anything to be honest having heard other people's stories - but after their inadequacies it's the least they can do!!