Our new Broadband Haggling guide - please share your feedback

johncoatjasper

Now that Sky have been taken over by Comcast they are now using the American method of negotiating: i.e. "take it or leave it"

I have been offered renewals at double the price of the offer to new customers and even when put through to the "retentions department" they will not offer the same deal.

I have put in two complaints and the first one did not elicit a response whilst the second one  I asked for it to be escalated as the "customer service" rep said she could only deal with e-mail complaints and had no authority to negotiate a renewal so she then just closed my complaint.

I am a VIP customer but this does not seem to have any standing and even though I have already had my projected bills after the end of the contract I was told that these would not be honoured as I was not  signing a new contract.

If I have no response within the next few days I will cancel Sky and settle for Freeview,

brewerdave

johncoatjasper said:

Now that Sky have been taken over by Comcast they are now using the American method of negotiating: i.e. "take it or leave it"

I have been offered renewals at double the price of the offer to new customers and even when put through to the "retentions department" they will not offer the same deal.

I have put in two complaints and the first one did not elicit a response whilst the second one  I asked for it to be escalated as the "customer service" rep said she could only deal with e-mail complaints and had no authority to negotiate a renewal so she then just closed my complaint.

I am a VIP customer but this does not seem to have any standing and even though I have already had my projected bills after the end of the contract I was told that these would not be honoured as I was not  signing a new contract.

If I have no response within the next few days I will cancel Sky and settle for Freeview,

If you look at the "haggling" threads on the main Phones and TV board, you will see that people are still achieving good deals from Sky on renewal. Without much effort ,I got ~ 50% knocked off and the "admin fee" credited back to the account. And some are reporting even better numbers.

JSmithy45AD

My Sky BB discount at £28 with E&W calls came to an end recently and the best they could come up with was £28 without a calls package. I called them twice with the same result and started a switch to Vodafone, they sent me a couple of identical emails and a whitepost letter that said the same. "Call us to see what we can do for you". Why would I? I've called you twice with no result.

They seemed very uninterested in keeping me considering I have TV and mobile from them as well (I'm top tier VIP too).

As it happens Vodafone totally messed everything up and I've had to cancel that and have no landline right now. What is it with Vodafone and not communicating AT ALL with a customer.

neilmcl

I couldn't be bothered with haggling with Sky this time around and just went ahead and ordered the Now Broadband Super Fibre package for £22pm incl. anytime calls for 12mths. Sky rang up a couple of days later and asked why I was leaving and when I said price they said if it was below £24 they couldn't offer anything even though ultimately it's the same provider. TBH, I think they just want to get all their customers onto the Ultrafast FTTP packages where they're available.

waseem432000

Mine isn’t exactly a success but would like to share my experience with plus net anyway. 

My 18 months contract ended(was paying £22.99 for fibre) and got offers ranging from £22.50 for 18 months or £26 for 12 months renewal. I joined plus net for £10 a month BT sports app but that is now offered at £16 a month plus price changes next year. I only enabled my email contact preference on so they sent me an email when I started my switch to Now TV, offering me 18 months renewal for £21.99 with 50 cash back. They also said that if I wanted them to price match deal which I was leaving them for, I can give them a call. 

Called them last week and customer service wouldn’t even match their own emailed offer to start with and when I rejected her best offer, she offered to match the email offer. I asked her to discount BT sports app back to £10 a month and they can even keep their cash back but she refused to discount even a single penny on BT sports. My broadband was moved to Now TV today for a package of £22 a month for a 12 month contract along with £80 cash back so I believe I have made a good choice to switch but don’t know why plus net wouldn’t discount BT sports app even tough by offering them to not offer me any cash back, I was basically paying half of that discounted amount back to them anyway. 

brewerdave

waseem432000 said:

Called them last week and customer service wouldn’t even match their own emailed offer to start with and when I rejected her best offer, she offered to match the email offer. I asked her to discount BT sports app back to £10 a month and they can even keep their cash back but she refused to discount even a single penny on BT sports. My broadband was moved to Now TV today for a package of £22 a month for a 12 month contract along with £80 cash back so I believe I have made a good choice to switch but don’t know why plus net wouldn’t discount BT sports app even tough by offering them to not offer me any cash back, I was basically paying half of that discounted amount back to them anyway. 

Re BT Sport access - originally I had BT Sport for £2.50 pm ! Went up to £7.50pm ,then was going to £10 pm before I cancelled. This time when I renewed my deal in June, I suggested I might be interested in rejoining BT Sport but the best she would do was £15pm - no wriggle room at all.

waseem432000

brewerdave said:

waseem432000 said:

Called them last week and customer service wouldn’t even match their own emailed offer to start with and when I rejected her best offer, she offered to match the email offer. I asked her to discount BT sports app back to £10 a month and they can even keep their cash back but she refused to discount even a single penny on BT sports. My broadband was moved to Now TV today for a package of £22 a month for a 12 month contract along with £80 cash back so I believe I have made a good choice to switch but don’t know why plus net wouldn’t discount BT sports app even tough by offering them to not offer me any cash back, I was basically paying half of that discounted amount back to them anyway. 

Re BT Sport access - originally I had BT Sport for £2.50 pm ! Went up to £7.50pm ,then was going to £10 pm before I cancelled. This time when I renewed my deal in June, I suggested I might be interested in rejoining BT Sport but the best she would do was £15pm - no wriggle room at all.

Exactly. I don’t know if they have been explicitly told not to discount anything on BT Sports app so the customer support rep I spoke to, refused to even discus any discounts on that and basically told me that they can’t retain me if I am expecting any discounts on BT sports app. My EE mobile contract is up at end of the month so I am signing up to BT mobile’s sim only deal which comes with BT sports app(may not work on TV but works fine on my chromebook). 

JJ_Egan

Even BT are difficult to get much of a Sports deal discount .

Possibly due to BT Sport up for sale .

Chromebook/ Mobile and cast to TV ??

waseem432000

JJ_Egan said:

Even BT are difficult to get much of a Sports deal discount .

Possibly due to BT Sport up for sale .

Chromebook/ Mobile and cast to TV ??

I couldn’t cast from my mobile and chrome book last time I used BT mobile app, I think app must have got some restrictions in place, but chromebook/tablet is good enough for me.

flaneurs_lobster

I wish BT would differentiate between their two flavours of BT Sports app in a more transparent manner. Had to cancel an EE mobile contract after a day when the app supplied as a deal add-on was the mobile-only version rather than the Chromecast-able full fat one. This despite assurances to the contrary by the in-person EE sales rep. 

The difference is just about made clearish in BT's/EE's own sales puff but once it's been reworked by the resellers then good luck.