workaround sky protect?

ozwasting

i've been with sky almost 20 years, still using sky hd plus, Q didnt work out for us, anyways i understand these box are old and sky dont do these anymore, so now i've got a satellite signal issue with one of the channels and this has happened twice past 2 years, since these boxes dont belong to sky anymore they telling me i have to £60 call out charge or get sky protect for £10 a month,  my question is there a a way around this, like pay initial £!0 for 1 month and cancel or something else 

flashg67

I just bought a box off a friend who was upgrading to Q, but there are loads of used/refurbished on Facebook, ebay, Amazon etc

Neil_Jones

ozwasting said:

i've been with sky almost 20 years, still using sky hd plus, Q didnt work out for us, anyways i understand these box are old and sky dont do these anymore, so now i've got a satellite signal issue with one of the channels and this has happened twice past 2 years, since these boxes dont belong to sky anymore they telling me i have to £60 call out charge or get sky protect for £10 a month,  my question is there a a way around this, like pay initial £!0 for 1 month and cancel or something else 

The Sky+HD boxes are very reliable, little to go wrong.  The boxes have never belonged to Sky, they were given to you when you first signed up.  Anyway if its a box issue you can pick them up second hand relatively cheaply, but its very rare for that to be the case.

The satellite issue to which you refer are almost always LNB related.  If you find a bunch of channels that don't work and look up their polarisation (H or V), if they're all the same that's an LNB failure.  Or the dish is slightly out of alignment.

http://www.stevelarkins.freeuk.com/mobile/lnb-faults.htm might be of interest.

brewerdave

Neil_Jones said:

ozwasting said:

i've been with sky almost 20 years, still using sky hd plus, Q didnt work out for us, anyways i understand these box are old and sky dont do these anymore, so now i've got a satellite signal issue with one of the channels and this has happened twice past 2 years, since these boxes dont belong to sky anymore they telling me i have to £60 call out charge or get sky protect for £10 a month,  my question is there a a way around this, like pay initial £!0 for 1 month and cancel or something else 

The satellite issue to which you refer are almost always LNB related.  If you find a bunch of channels that don't work and look up their polarisation (H or V), if they're all the same that's an LNB failure.  Or the dish is slightly out of alignment.

Just had a new dish/LNB fitted by independent engineer because of a very similar issue with losing certain channels. I knew that the dish was very rusty but the condition of the LNB was so bad ,I was surprised that I had been receiving any signal !!
Part of the plastic casing had broken off and the rest was split. Paid a bit more than £60 but my dish is much higher up than standard dish positions and didn't want Sky fitter to refuse to work on it because of height.

macman

Just phone to say that you will be cancelling your sub as you can't afford the call-out fee, and, hey presto, a free callout will magically be offered.

Neil_Jones

brewerdave said:

Neil_Jones said:

The satellite issue to which you refer are almost always LNB related.  If you find a bunch of channels that don't work and look up their polarisation (H or V), if they're all the same that's an LNB failure.  Or the dish is slightly out of alignment.

Just had a new dish/LNB fitted by independent engineer because of a very similar issue with losing certain channels. I knew that the dish was very rusty but the condition of the LNB was so bad ,I was surprised that I had been receiving any signal !!
Part of the plastic casing had broken off and the rest was split. Paid a bit more than £60 but my dish is much higher up than standard dish positions and didn't want Sky fitter to refuse to work on it because of height.

The LNB will be more prone to weather/water ingress than the dish, which will almost certainly be made of steel or aluminium, as its the water that causes the issue.  The LNB is almost always the first thing to go in a satellite setup, considering its effectively the first electronic in the chain, and electronics and water don't mix.  The dish doesn't do anything funky, it just acts as a reflector.  They can deteriorate to some serious degree and still "work", since the signal is reflected from the middle part of the dish into the LNB.  If the middle section of the dish is relatively okay, it may be fine for quite some time.

brewerdave

Neil_Jones said:

brewerdave said:

Neil_Jones said:

The satellite issue to which you refer are almost always LNB related.  If you find a bunch of channels that don't work and look up their polarisation (H or V), if they're all the same that's an LNB failure.  Or the dish is slightly out of alignment.

Just had a new dish/LNB fitted by independent engineer because of a very similar issue with losing certain channels. I knew that the dish was very rusty but the condition of the LNB was so bad ,I was surprised that I had been receiving any signal !!
Part of the plastic casing had broken off and the rest was split. Paid a bit more than £60 but my dish is much higher up than standard dish positions and didn't want Sky fitter to refuse to work on it because of height.

The LNB will be more prone to weather/water ingress than the dish, which will almost certainly be made of steel or aluminium, as its the water that causes the issue.  The LNB is almost always the first thing to go in a satellite setup, considering its effectively the first electronic in the chain, and electronics and water don't mix.  The dish doesn't do anything funky, it just acts as a reflector.  They can deteriorate to some serious degree and still "work", since the signal is reflected from the middle part of the dish into the LNB.  If the middle section of the dish is relatively okay, it may be fine for quite some time.

Our dish was rotten the brackets that fixed dish to pole were like cardboard !!

brewerdave

macman said:

Just phone to say that you will be cancelling your sub as you can't afford the cal-out fee, and, hey presto, a free callout will magically be offered.

Doesn't work if you are the middle of a discounted deal !!

ozwasting

right, i'll check if its LNB issue, threatening to leave could backfire, anyways thanks for the replies

macman

ozwasting said:

right, i'll check if its LNB issue, threatening to leave could backfire, anyways thanks for the replies

If you are out of minimum term, how? The worst they can say is 'no'. But by all accounts with those who have tried it, they never do.

brewerdave

macman said:

ozwasting said:

right, i'll check if its LNB issue, threatening to leave could backfire, anyways thanks for the replies

If you are out of minimum term, how? The worst they can say is 'no'. But by all accounts with those who have tried it, they never do.

I can confirm that, if you are paying full price and not contracted for an HD+ Box, they will send out a fitter for nowt when faced with cancellation. I presume that SKYQ customers get service visits free as they don't own the kit ??