MSE News: How to beat Sky price hikes

DUKE

Although I'm usually the haggler in our family, I've been telling Mr Duke for absolutely ages that he must ring Sky seeing as it's in his name. He did, & we've had our bill reduced by £22.40 a month :j Thanks MSE, I never doubted you

vmaxjude

I have been a Sky satellite subscriber for about 17 years, and had Sky via cable for a few years before that. I have 2 Sky+ HD boxes, phone and Sky Talk package and free bundled broadband. I must say I have always found Sky one of the best and most reasonable companies to deal with, even if you have a problem. Their staff in Scotland are always the most friendly. I recently called them to enquire about upgrading my standard Sky+ HD box in the living room to a new 2TB box, only to baulk at the £299 price. But the guy I spoke to managed to wangle ending my subscription, then restarting it as a new customer, meaning I got a 2TB box for only £50 plus free installation by an engineer, and re-siting of my existing box in the dining room to replace the old Sky box there. A great deal.

I called them this morning to try and negotiate a discount after reading the tips on MSE. I did the threat of leaving for Virgin, big price rises etc etc. Apart from the lack of fibre-optic broadband in my area (surprising as I live in Surrey, very close to South London) I am completely happy with Sky and actually had no intention of leaving. Without any need for hard bargaining, the chap I spoke to managed a total discount of around £16 per month for 10 months, and also told me to call again after 10 months to see if they could do anything further before the charges went up. You cannot say fairer than that.

chuckerbuttie

Have just rung Sky cancelling my Movies package. Also complained about recent increase and accepted offer of 20% reduction on rest of package for next 12 months. Many thanks Martin.

greensalad

I'm considering calling up for a haggle. Can I ask, how do you go about starting the conversation? Do you call up and say "I'm not happy about the price hike, I want a good deal". Or do you say "I'm not happy about the price hike, I'd like to leave please" ?

We currently have Sky Fibre Broadband + top TV package (movies, HD, sports) and in fairness we do watch them all (we previously ditched movies but found we were missing it so added it back). We have been considering multi-room but I'm not adding another £11.25 a month.

Considering trying to get movies for free and multi-room for free for a year and see how that goes, do we think that's reasonable to request?

I was thinking of calling up on the premise that we're not happy about the price hike and "had been considering getting multi-room" but now that they've increased the price we're going to leave and go elsewhere. We are currently paying £72 to Sky for internet+TV. Virgin offer the same for £12.99 a month (basic package) but we do like the extra sky box-sets and content we get.

hazyjo

Best advice I saw was 'don't go in demanding a deal'. Just say it's gone way over your budget and you're just ringing to see if there's anything they can do as you've been happy with Sky's service...


Works for some... Didn't for me, but as soon as I left, they constantly rung me.


Don't bother signing with Virgin, they diddle you on every corner lol!


Jx

4711

Following reading the article I decided to ring sky as we were not happy with the £4.50 per month price rise, having been loyal customers for 12 years. To add insult to injury, when I costed up the price for the same package we have, for a new customer, it was working out cheaper! I was put through to billing first who could only reduce the broadband from £10 to £7.50 which is the price now anyway, so we had been paying over the odds for months. When I mentioned we had shopped around he put us through to the retention's department.

I followed the advice, stayed calm and polite and came away with permanently reduced broadband as mentioned and also line rental reduced by £10 per month for 12 months and can renegotiate next year. Therefore, a saving of £12.50 per month (£150 over the year) rather than paying Sky another £54!!

Thank you Martin!

stephenliverpool1

Oh dear why don't people realise ? I posted a previous post on this thread with regards how easy it is to get a 50% reduction on any Sky subscription; namely when you join Sky u are on a 12 month contract; then after 11 months give your 30 days notice, wait to u get a an offer to stay (normally 50% off but can be 60% off if you wait long enough), etc. just play the game with Sky.

I left VM many years ago cos with Sky, I watch a lot of Sky sports and I have saved a loads of money with them with their 50% off deals, which I have done for several years as detailed above.

Roll on next year with regards Sky and another 50% off deal.

IMHO, if you don't get at least 50% off your current Sky TV package, you have not got a good deal so please listen and learn.

eljmayes

hazyjo wrote: »

I was on hold for most of that, but I called just before around 2.45pm, then he called me back (had around a 15 min break inbetween) and was on the phone until gone 5.15!


He was very helpful but did need to ask a lot. I think he did more for me because I was a returning customer (he and his manager were very shocked that I wasn't offered any deals). I've always been nice to everyone and am pretty easy going. Did go mental at Virgin cos they told me some porkies to get me to sign up for 18 months.


I must say, there must surely be a simpler 'game' to play than all this. Perhaps instead of the wasted hours, the stress, the offers or no offers, the battles, the changing from one service to another... would it not be simpler to have NO deals, and just fixed cheaper prices and everyone would know where they stood, and you'd probably never have to worry about these sorts of conversations, bargaining, deals, etc - and I doubt people would leave in the first place!


Jx

They will always have deals as people's circumstances/options differ greatly- for example I lived in a market one/A exchange until a year ago and clearly Sky knew that I have no options to change my TV provider. If you live in a cabled area you can play off Sky against Virgin I'd imagine.

If you are getting nowhere I'd suggest simply cancelling and seeing what offers they come back with (likely a third off).

Interesting that Sky are only offering 10 month deals now.

hazyjo

Sorry I had some earlier posts which might explain better... I have now (today) switched to Sky from Virgin. Got 50% off everything and 60% off TV. Paying £58 pm for phone, broadband, tv: movies and sport, 2nd box, HD and all that malarkey. Don't think I could've done better. Have been a couple of hiccups in getting everything sorted (including an overcharge which I spotted and took 2 advisors to acknowledge) but fingers crossed all okay. Took an initial call of 2.5 hours to get all that! Virgin released me 6 months early with no charge. More on that above somewhere...

Jx

xbagpuss

Just saved £70/month following the tips. To be fair I'm pretty good at that sort of thing anyway but just kept going and eventually we got there and I figured that was probably all they'd be giving up!