Virgin vs Sky

ClaireLR

I've recently had the expected letter from Virgin about the price increase. I've been on a deal for the past 18 or 24 months (can't remember) of £50.45 now going up to £70.45. I've rung to haggle but they're not playing this time!
So, time to shop around. Sky seems to have some good deals. I've never been with Sky, what's the service like? Any issues with Internet (important as I work from home). I'd love to know if anyone's switched away from Virgin to Sky (or otherwise) if there's any features of Virgin you've missed that Sky doesn't have.
Thanks 😀

emmajones1976

Sky internet top speed varies wildly, went to my dads house the other week and its no faster than 10mbps there and only topped out at 6, took a look online for him and thats the fastest they do in his area. Meanwhile at mine its regularly above 60 and had no issues with it whatsoever.  Check what your postcode can get.

ironmanjason

ClaireLR said:

I've recently had the expected letter from Virgin about the price increase. I've been on a deal for the past 18 or 24 months (can't remember) of £50.45 now going up to £70.45. I've rung to haggle but they're not playing this time!
So, time to shop around. Sky seems to have some good deals. I've never been with Sky, what's the service like? Any issues with Internet (important as I work from home). I'd love to know if anyone's switched away from Virgin to Sky (or otherwise) if there's any features of Virgin you've missed that Sky doesn't have.
Thanks 😀

I ditched Virgin last year for my broadband and moved to Sky Fiber (Fiber terminating at home). It has been great for us especially as we had a lot of drops and change of routers twice with VM since mid 2020 that did not help. It depends on where you live and if you do get the ultrafast fiber terminating your property then it does work well. Both me and my partner work from home fulltime and have video calls at the same time with no issues whatsoever. Any streaming on UHD/HD also works fine at the same time so I would recommend it certainly. 

JJ_Egan

Not everyone can get terminating at home FTTP fibre . need to check if optical cabling installed by Openreach.

So max speed 80 meg and that depends upon other factors .Likewise all the other Openreach providers that come down the same pipeline .( totally different infrastucture to VMs cabling .)

Moving from VM may lose phone number .

ironmanjason

Of course not everyone can get FTTP but if they do then I don't think there is going to be difference between what Virgin offer and Sky do if you are using their basic equipment.

Geranium44

I’m I’m about to ditch Virgin. I’ve spent in total 3hrs speaking to different retention people trying to get an itemised monthly bill so my employer can reimburse the broadband and line rental. I’m either disconnected, the call handler doesn’t understand how to help or says they will sort it out and never get back to me. None of the virgin team ever respond to my feedback surveys. 

Get the feeling it’s time to move after 19years?
Shame that a simple request to itemise a bill results in losing loyal customers. 

knightstyle

I have just moved and switched from Sky to Virgin as Sky couldn't give us decent BB speed at new house.
I preferred the Sky TV set up and found their service good. Virgin use their own cables so completely separate from open reach.  But I had a lot of trouble getting connected to their box in the road, several people dealing with it and each one gave a different story.
In the end it took over two months from the original date but the system works fine and we have not had any problems.  I get over 50mbps  plus basic TV for £29.99 a month so am happy with that.

babymable

I think it will all depend on what area you are in. I'm in Northern Ireland and was with Sky. The broadband speed was horrible, constantly dropping, hours - days without broadband. We have been with Virgin for 3 years now and have never had an issue with broadband apart from 1 days where all of virgin services went down.

If you want to stay with Virgin tell them you want to cancel, once you get through to the rententions team then they will offer you a deal to stay. My package was £65.50 a month and was going up to £74 next month due to the price increase then up to £100 in May when the promotional price ended. I called to cancel and ended up being offered the same package with higher speed boradband and a £30 credit for £66.

HaroldWren5

ClaireLR said:

I've recently had the expected letter from Virgin about the price increase. I've been on a deal for the past 18 or 24 months (can't remember) of £50.45 now going up to £70.45. I've rung to haggle but they're not playing this time!
So, time to shop around. Sky seems to have some good deals. I've never been with Sky, what's the service like? Any issues with Internet (important as I work from home). I'd love to know if anyone's switched away from Virgin to Sky (or otherwise) if there's any features of Virgin you've missed that Sky doesn't have.
Thanks 😀

I think it's important to take into account four things:

1. Can you get Full Fibre (FTTP) broadband to your home via an internet service provider (Sky, BT, Vodafone etc etc) on the Openreach, CityFibre, or specialist networks?

2. Can you get a good TV signal via an aerial (Freeview), or satellite (Freesat)?

3. Do you need the channels you get on TV packages with Sky/Virgin, or can you get them by other means (e.g. Streaming apps like Discovery+, NowTV (Sky Sports), BT Sports Pass Ultimate (BT sport), Netflix, Amazon Prime etc)?

4. Do you need the ability to pause, or record TV and if so would you be happy paying upfront to buy your own Digital TV recorder rather than rent from Sky/Virgin/BT?

With regards to (1), if you can get Full Fibre internet - meaning a fibre line all the way to your property/premises, you will get a reliable internet connection far superior to FTTC broadband. You can also choose your speed package, which can go all the way up to 900Mbps. And with fast, reliable internet speeds, you can much more easily stream content to watch on your Smart TV, Tablets, Phones etc as well as work from home better.

Sky, or BT will no doubt offer deals to entice you to have everything (TV, broadband, Recorder, Sports, Mobile) with them alone which might work out cheaper, though sometimes it might pay to have things with different providers to increase your negotiating power and have far shorter contracts.

Sky and BT, as well as Vodafone, TalkTalk, Cuckoo, Shell Energy and Zen for instance all offer FTTP broadband (some of them going up to 900Mbps speeds) on varying contracts between 30 day contracts to 12 months to 18 months to 24 months. Sky and BT will discount your broadband if you take the TV package with them. Vodafone discount if you have a mobile with them. Note that with Sky you can get TV via the satellite (helpful if your aerial reception isn't that good), BT is basically Freeview via aerial and their Sports channels, or NowTV via the internet. The user interface of their TV devices is slick, but you can buy your own Digital TV recorder (e.g. Humax) and record without the need for Sky/BT if you prefer and just use Freeview which your TV would have anyway. Or pay a one off and get Freesat (Free TV channels via satellite)

Please note, you could just subscribe to things like Sports on a rolling basis without a contract. Sky Sports via the NowTV app (between £25-35 a month depending on offers), and BT Sports Pass Ultimate (£25 a month)

Regarding beating £70.45. You could for instance:

1. Get 500Mbps FTTP broadband from Sky for £45 a month (discounted to £36 if you opt to take a TV package with them which depends on which channels you want, can range from an additional £28 up to £100!). Or TalkTalk 500Mbps for £40 a month, and subscribe to Now TV passes to get Sky channels on a rolling basis rather than the whole year. 

2. Get BT 900Mbps for £54.99 a month on a 2 year contract. Or for the same price for a 12 months or 30 day contract, go with Cuckoo (which guarantee no price rises for 12 months). Or for an 18 month contract, Shell Energy do it for £49.99. Then subscribe to any TV services (NowTV, Discovery+, Netflix, Amazon Prime etc on a rolling basis directly with each).

3. If you cannot get FTTP, then go with Vodafone's broadband for around £22 a month (2 year contract), or Cuckoo for £29.99 a month (rolling or 12 months), or Sky for £25 on an 18 month contract (which gets discounted if you take out a TV package).

From what I've heard if you must subscribe to a TV provider, then the Sky Q interface is meant to be slick. Though most of the benefit comes from signal strength of a satellite and the ability to record if you need that. BT's TV recording product is only available if you have broadband with them. Sky TV you can take out with any internet provider.