MSE News: BT Sport: is its 'free' offer any good?

VisionMan

shackman wrote: »

First of all, despite bringing it to the attention of Martyn AND his Newsdesk, MSE's story about this contains a major factual error.

She says: "What's more, you pay an additional £3/month for HD, though this is waived if you have BT's superfast Infinity broadband."

NOT SO. BT Sport (including HD) is free to all BT Broadband customers for 12 months providing they sign up before August 1. Do that and there is NO extra fee for HD.

I see some are confused by how to receive it. You will need BT's set top box system (BT vision) OR SKY satellite.

I do wish Martyn would LISTEN to people instead of just shouting them down all the time.

Agreed. And I too have pointed this out. And I also did not get a response. So not only is the article a poorly researched, so was the response.

Heres a far more solid and well researched article from the Guardian (as posted above) -

What you will pay and how you can get it -

http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2013/may/10/bt-sport-what-you-pay

MartinSpoon

3card wrote: »

After recent problems with Orange broadband i was looking to change suppliers and on the back of the offer of free BT sports on my sky i decided im going to sign up with BT
My only query is that i have read that the free sky channels are only available with a 'black' sky box (which i assume means the SkyHD box) and i only have the silver sky+ box

Does anyone know for certain if i need a HD box to get the free BT Sports channels??

Thanks

Any Sky digital box can receive the BT Sport channels in standard definition. You need an HD box for HD.

Former_MSE_Becca

VisionMan wrote: »

Agreed. And I too have pointed this out. And I also did not get a response. So not only is the article a poorly researched, so was the response.

Heres a far more solid and well researched article from the Guardian (as posted above) -

What you will pay and how you can get it -

http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2013/may/10/bt-sport-what-you-pay

Hi VisionMan, sorry for the delay in replying to your post - we were waiting for confirmation from BT before amending the story. I have now tweaked it slightly to reflect the free HD offer if you sign up before 1 August.

Many thanks,
MSE Becca

pauldb_2

jhyn wrote: »

I had everything with sky and it cost me £75 a month. This included unlimited broadband, line rental, sky talk free time, all tv channels except for movies, HD and one lot of multi-room. I have just cancelled my ESPN which was an extra £10 a month so was £85.

We really wanted BT sport as we are a football mad house so looked into how much it would be. To add it to our sky deal I would be £12 a month but if I transferred my phone line and broadband to BT. I would get it free for 12 months. I couldn't transfer any tv as I was locked in until October due to getting loyalty discount so I compared the rest. My broadband unlimited, sky talk free time, line rental and BT sport with HD would cost £41 a month with sky. With BT, unlimited broadband, BT's equivalent to sky talk free time, line rental and BT sport with HD would cost me £23.45 for the first 12 months and then £31.45 for the following 6 months as its an 18 month contract.

This is saving me over £200 a year!! (And because I did it online they are going o give me a £25 sainsburys gift card)

Yes, I think this is where the real value in the deal is available. And you can see where BT are going with this, trying to steal telecoms business by giving away TV content.

I'm a full Sky customer. Forget the TV service, Sky can keep that and I won't have to change hardware/EPG.

But I currently pay Sky £14.50 line rental and £7.50 for broadband = £22. (I believe I could save £4.50 a month by prepaying the line rental, so £17.50.)

If I switch to BT, I can get get broadband for £10 + line rental of £11/month. And I get to add BT Sports via the Sky platform. Even in the best Sky case, that's £3.50 extra per month. But I get a £25 Sainsburys giftcard and I can get £80 quidco.

If I want Infinity fibre (and 40gb usage instead of 10gb) it's an extra £5/month, so £8.50 more than Sky. I pocket £50 Sainsburys and £80 quidco, but pay £30 activation. Still it's free Sports and fibre so 12 months (which is the contract length) before I perhaps churn back to Sky.

Actually my cooper broadband speed is good so I may stick to the basic option. Saves £63 over a year and gets me more Sports.

VisionMan

MSE_Becca wrote: »

Hi VisionMan, sorry for the delay in replying to your post - we were waiting for confirmation from BT before amending the story. I have now tweaked it slightly to reflect the free HD iof you sign up before 1 August.

Many thanks,
MSE Becca

Thank you, Becca.

BT_company_representative

We’ve noticed a bit of confusion over BT Sport and thought it would be a helpful to answer one or two of the questions.

BT Sport includes BT Sport 1, BT Sport 2 and ESPN. It’s free with BT broadband. You can watch BT Sport on the Sky Digital Satellite Platform, but it’s only free with BT broadband. You can also watch BT Sport on BT TV if you have a Vision+ or YouView box provided by BT.

If you want to watch on BT TV but you can’t get BT Infinity, you can watch BT Sport 1 and BT Sport 2 through your TV aerial with a Vision+ box (in standard definition only). You won’t be able to get ESPN on TV if you watch over your aerial, but you can still watch ESPN live on btsport.com or on the BT Sport App. If you want to watch BT Sport through your TV aerial and you don’t already have a viewing card from BT, we can sort that for a small one off fee.

All BT Sport subscribers and all BT broadband customers can watch on the BT Sport App and online at btsport.com at no extra charge.

Some of you have also asked if streaming via the app will count towards your broadband usage cap. We can confirm that streaming video on the BT Sport App and streaming subscriber-only video on btsport.com will not count towards your BT broadband usage limit.

There’s a comprehensive list of FAQs on our website if you have any further questions.

Stephanie

shackman

MSE_Becca wrote: »

Hi VisionMan, sorry for the delay in replying to your post - we were waiting for confirmation from BT before amending the story. I have now tweaked it slightly to reflect the free HD offer if you sign up before 1 August.

Many thanks,
MSE Becca

Still ignoring me then Becca. I too raised the issue but unlike Visionman, you ignore my correction. SHAMEFUL.

VisionMan

BT_company_representative wrote: »

We’ve noticed a bit of confusion over BT Sport and thought it would be a helpful to answer one or two of the questions.

BT Sport includes BT Sport 1, BT Sport 2 and ESPN. It’s free with BT broadband. You can watch BT Sport on the Sky Digital Satellite Platform, but it’s only free with BT broadband. You can also watch BT Sport on BT TV if you have a Vision+ or YouView box provided by BT.

Stephanie

Hi Stephanie.

In regard to the above, it has now been widely reported that BT will also update retail YouView boxes too, for those that register their interest with BT, as per this link -

http://www.seenit.co.uk/bt-to-make-sports-channels-to-youview-retail-boxes/0527313/

BT has now said it will provide a “technical solution” to allow retail box owners who also have BT infinity to receive the channels on the same terms as other broadband customers.

In a statement the company said: “We do intend to make BT Sport available to YouView retail customers who have BT infinity, and to make this available in time for the launch of BT Sport in August.

“These customers should call us, we will register their details and will contact them again when the technical solution is available.”

But if you could confirm the above that would be helpful.

Former_MSE_Becca

shackman wrote: »

Still ignoring me then Becca. I too raised the issue but unlike Visionman, you ignore my correction. SHAMEFUL.

Hi Shackman, I'm sorry that you feel I ignored you - the writers at MSE do not monitor the forums that closely, and so your post slipped past me.

MSE Becca

bubblegun

jhyn wrote: »

I had everything with sky and it cost me £75 a month. This included unlimited broadband, line rental, sky talk free time, all tv channels except for movies, HD and one lot of multi-room. I have just cancelled my ESPN which was an extra £10 a month so was £85.

We really wanted BT sport as we are a football mad house so looked into how much it would be. To add it to our sky deal I would be £12 a month but if I transferred my phone line and broadband to BT. I would get it free for 12 months. I couldn't transfer any tv as I was locked in until October due to getting loyalty discount so I compared the rest. My broadband unlimited, sky talk free time, line rental and BT sport with HD would cost £41 a month with sky. With BT, unlimited broadband, BT's equivalent to sky talk free time, line rental and BT sport with HD would cost me £23.45 for the first 12 months and then £31.45 for the following 6 months as its an 18 month contract.

This is saving me over £200 a year!! (And because I did it online they are going o give me a £25 sainsburys gift card)

I think your calculator is faulty!

Your figures are a little off, but BT would still be cheaper.

SKY:
Line rental £14.50
Unlimited broadband £7.50
Evening and weekend calls £Free
BT Sports £12 (+£Free HD for 1st 12 months if registered before 1st August then £3 after)
Total 18 Months =£630
with Line Rental Saver for 12 months=£575.50

BT:
Line Rental £15.45
Unlimited broadband £16 (1/2 price for 12months)
Evening and weekend calls £2
BT Sports Free (+ £Free HD for 1st 12months)
Total 18 Months =476.10
with Line Rental Saver for 12months=£419.70

So a saving of £153.9 over 18 months or £8.55 per month (assuming BT sport stay free for BT customers the following season and excluding any increases in prices) or £155.50 with 12month WLR in advance.

Also bear in mind this includes an introductory offer from BT without this the difference is £58 or £3.22 per month.

Sky won't be worried, they're just offering a discount to people thinking of switching which betters the BT price.