Virgin Media to drop Sky One

compmad1

"Virgin slams BSkyB in TV dispute

Virgin Media is to drop the Sky Basics TV package, which includes Sky Travel and Sky Sports News, after Sky raised the fees it charged the cable firm.

Sky One includes some popular series, such as 24, Lost and new episodes of The Simpsons.

But Virgin Media said it was confident it could compete with Sky if it did not show Sky One."

I watch loads of Sky One. I shall have to move back to Sky, but it's a pity because I much preferred Telewest customer services etc.

I have phone, Sky and Internet (4mb and unlimited downloads) through them. What's going to be the cheapest way of doing things? It's a real nuisance to have to swop everything over again.

JulieBarlow

compmad1 wrote:

"Virgin slams BSkyB in TV dispute

Virgin Media is to drop the Sky Basics TV package, which includes Sky Travel and Sky Sports News, after Sky raised the fees it charged the cable firm.

Sky One includes some popular series, such as 24, Lost and new episodes of The Simpsons.

But Virgin Media said it was confident it could compete with Sky if it did not show Sky One."

I watch loads of Sky One. I shall have to move back to Sky, but it's a pity because I much preferred Telewest customer services etc.

I have phone, Sky and Internet (4mb and unlimited downloads) through them. What's going to be the cheapest way of doing things? It's a real nuisance to have to swop everything over again.

Don't jump ship too quickly, you might find that negotiations are still ongoing and suspicions are that there will be another turnaround so that Virginmedia can have Sky channels. Hang fire and see what happens in the coming days/weeks.

angieth

this is on the virgin Media website:


Fair play
Hello,

Good to see you!

If you've heard some news about your non-premium Sky channels, and you'd like to find out the full story. You've come to the right place.

Read on and we'll tell you more below.

What's happened?
Thanks to Sky, some of their non-premium channels, like Sky One and Sky News may be disappearing from Virgin Media's service soon. Sky Sports and Sky Movies are not affected by this.

How come?

While we've continued to make Virgin Media channels like Living, Bravo and Challenge available to all Sky customers, Sky may withdraw their own non-premium channels from Virgin Media's service – in order to force you into switching service.
Virgin Media were willing to pay an increase in costs in order to get the complete range of Sky content and channels.
However, Sky has consistently demanded an increase that bears no relation to their channels' market value.
We have refused to accept this increase, since it would mean absorbing significant costs ourselves, and passing the kind of price increase on to our customers that is simply unfair. We are not prepared to rip off our customers.
So Sky have picked up their ball and gone home.

What happens next?
As a Virgin company, we're well used to the attempts of large corporations trying to manipulate markets, stifle competition and rip off consumers.

Luckily, we don't think Sky's the limit.

We think the future's full of fresh entertainment and communication possibilities. And we're looking forward to bringing them to you. With all the freedom and choice you deserve.

We've launched Virgin Central, a revolutionary type of TV channel, where programmes start and stop when you say so. This is only available on Virgin Media, since Sky don't have the technology to be able to transmit it. What's more, it's available to all of our digital TV customers.

And there's our unique on demand library. A giant collection of over 500 films, 1000 music videos, 100s of TV shows – all at your beck and call. You can access them at any time.

We're not scared of competition, we welcome it.

brummybloke

sky suck big time. to watch a pay per view football game on prem plus, it costs me £16 for 1 game, because i do not subscribe to sky sports. yet i can watch the exact same game on telewest/virgin for £8 without subscribing.

it just shows what sort of company sky is that they will try and rip customers off to such an extent.

the only thing i may miss is skysports news, i have sky down stairs and telewest upstairs.

i bet when the advertisers see they are losing 30% off their audience ( at a guess) the revenue from advertising will slap the sky rip off merchants back to reality.

flopper

I am sooooooo disappointed to hear this news!! :sad:

I have been a loyal ntl customer for years but would seriously consider switching to Sky if this happens...:shocked:

angieth

flopper wrote:

I am sooooooo disappointed to hear this news!! :sad:

I have been a loyal ntl customer for years but would seriously consider switching to Sky if this happens...:shocked:

thats just what sky planned...
bad sky:mad:

compmad1

JulieBarlow wrote:

Don't jump ship too quickly, you might find that negotiations are still ongoing and suspicions are that there will be another turnaround so that Virginmedia can have Sky channels. Hang fire and see what happens in the coming days/weeks.

Thanks for the moral support. I hope you're right. I don't mind paying more if it means I can stay with cable. There is so much hassle involved in swopping over, which I did when I went from Sky to cable. I only pay £5.50 a month for my Sky package, as I only really ever watch Sky One. The cheapest package on Sky is £15. You end up with loads of programmes you don't watch.

angieth

this is from digital spy:


Sky "surprised" at Virgin announcement
Friday, February 23 2007, 14:59 GMT

By James Welsh, International Editor

Sky is "surprised and disappointed" by Virgin's "premature" announcement that Sky's basic channels would be withdrawn from Virgin TV at the end of this month, the broadcaster claimed this afternoon.

In a statement that pointedly referred to one of Virgin Media's former names, NTL, Sky accused the company of trying to "free-ride" and denied that it - as Virgin claimed this morning - wanted to double the price of channels such as Sky One.

"With several days remaining and active discussions continuing, we're surprised and disappointed that NTL/Virgin chose to attack Sky and suggest, prematurely, that their customers will miss out on Sky basic channels from 1 March," the company said this afternoon.

"Unlike the open satellite platform, NTL/Virgin's cable network is closed. The only way Sky's channels can be available to cable viewers is if NTL/Virgin chooses to carry them.

"NTL/Virgin can't expect to free-ride on Sky's commitment to bring viewers the best TV. They need to decide whether they are going to invest in the programmes that their customers enjoy."

Some details about the ongoing negotiations were revealed by Sky. The most-recently made offer - which the broadcaster said "remains on the table" - includes carriage of high definition services, Sky Three, and Sky Arts

Kzlnd

We only signed up fairly recently to Telewest, tv/broadband/telephone because we moved home and decided we wanted to save a few pennies - after being with Sky for 2 years at our previous place.

When we signed up, we knew nothing about 'Virgin Media' and were not told about it.. Nor we were told about channels being removed.

We're not overly happy about Sky One being removed, it's a channel we watch and we'll just switch back to Sky if/when it happens.
We had very few problems with Sky, better service, no annoying delay between entering the channel number and actually having it switch channel! :rotfl: and we had no mess ups with getting it set up/installed like we did with Telewest. Only issue, it's a bit more expensive :rolleyes:

However, can anyone give any advice as obviously we have a 12month contract.. although I suppose they're not fulfilling their side of it as they're taking channels away that we pay/paid for and wanted as a basis of signing up?

Diminutive

I will be pretty annoyed if skyone goes =( all this rebranding rubbish makes no sense most of the time too, i have no idea which package I will get... are we meant to just get the same thing while new customers get higher packages at the same cost etc. (like the 3 for £30 deal now has a better television package).

Dee140157

I have to say if we lose sky one then I am off to Sky as I am an addict for so many of their programmes. I have held back from trying to get a better deal friom virginmedia as I did not want to be tied into a contract . My last 12 months contract has long since expired, so can jump ship as soon as is necessary. I shall be watching closely.