Dad Paying over the odds for TV+Broadband (Skysports, TNT Sports (BT,EE)

TooOrangeyForCrows

Hi. Merry Christmas Everyone.
Just got to dad's place for the holidays and realised he is paying what seems like way over the odds for his Digital Sports+Broadband deal.

Details (He has been out of contract for a while so can change at any time). It's through BT (which I think is now EE):

Big Sport £49.33

This is the cost of your TV at £49.33 a month, charged in advance. This includes:-NOW Sports Membership (RRP £34.99)

Broadband Package £43.94 Fibre 1

Boost   £6.00  (*This allows things to be played on another device - which is useful)

So the total is a whopping £99.27 a month.

He also made a couple of landline calls which sent the bill into 3 figures which is what initially caught my attention (he doesn't use the phone that much so that's an expensive tariff)

Anyway, all he is interested in is Skysports and TNTSports (and wants to keep the Boost - as grandson actually uses that in another location to watch on an ipad or something).

He has complained that the SkySports red button (Skysports+) - that let's you watch other live games that aren't on the main channel doesn't work on BT.

Whilst I am here I'd like to get this excessive price changed for him as I am sure they are just taking advantage of someone that isn't that clued up. Any ideas on how best to do this? Any deals out there? I am sure that almost 100 a month for broadband and sports is a bit steep, right?

I am pretty clueless about this as personally I haven't had any digital TV deal since the olden days of NTL (lol). 

Thanks.

EDIT - Just to add in case the tech set up makes any difference:

His TV is pretty old: SAMSUNG UE32D4000

Currently the set up is via a Youview box (Bt Hub 2) which runs through a BT connector hub - as the internet comes from where the phone line is located in another room (corridor) about 5 metes away as the crow flies.

Billxx

What Broadband speed does he get now and what do you think is required?  At face value this does appear a little over the odds.  By comparison I have 1gb broadband, Sky Sports, Sky Movies, TNT Sports & Netflix (alas with the ads) for £106 (via VM).

Hope that helps.

iniltous

New customer price is around £83 almost all the difference is from being out of contract for broadband him paying £50 ish instead of £35 ish when in contract….it’s undeniably a lot , but it’s not outrageously high , if out of contract negotiation may get better than £83 but sport on TV isn’t cheap 

TooOrangeyForCrows

Billxx said:

What Broadband speed does he get now and what do you think is required?  At face value this does appear a little over the odds.  By comparison I have 1gb broadband, Sky Sports, Sky Movies, TNT Sports & Netflix (alas with the ads) for £106 (via VM).

Hope that helps.

Do you know what your price would be with just the Sports only?

I have no idea what speed is required. Enough to run the TV and at the most (occasionally) 1 other device (usually a laptop. It's not like there is a family of hardcore gamers here.

As far as I am aware 'fast' broadband speeds seem to be a bit of a marketing con in many regards as they say 'up to....' and then blame the cabling, distance from the exchange ..blah blah when you get nowhere near what you're supposedly paying for (hence the up to clause, I guess)


This is what the BT marketing says currently:

Your BT Broadband

Fibre 1High-speed fibre broadband.Unlimited usageFree access to 5 million BT Wi-fi hotspotsBT Web Protect, BT Virus Protect and BT Parental Controls includedDedicated UK and Ireland-based support

Your normal available download speed will be between 49-50 Mbps

Your normal available upload speed will be between 8-9 Mbps

Minimum guaranteed download speed

Your minimum guaranteed download speed will be 49 Mbps

I just did a speed test here with nothing else connected apart from this device:

https://www.speedtest.net/ says:  

DOWNLOAD Mbps

4.24

 
UPLOAD Mbps

8.09

https://www.broadbandspeedchecker.co.uk says: 

Download 1.06 Mb/s

Upload 8.96 Mb/s

littleboo

Were you testing wired or wirelessly? Speed tests need to be done from a wired device.

iniltous

BT/EE won’t sell TV unless around 25Mb or better is available from broadband, so either your testing is wrong or their is a fault….FWIW , the TV is not broadcast, it’s streamed so if those speeds were genuine TNT and Sky sports would not be watchable 

flaneurs_lobster

You can use the MyBT app if you have the login details for your Dad's account. It will give you the broadband speed to the router rather than to a device.

That package looks like it's at the top end of normal, should be able to get Fibre 1 down to £25 - 30 on a new contract with a bit of haggling.  BT TV Box + TNT Sport is another £30 and Now TV Sport (aka SkySports) is about the same again. That Boost allows HD on NOW. 

TooOrangeyForCrows

flaneurs_lobster said:

That package looks like it's at the top end of normal, should be able to get Fibre 1 down to £25 - 30 on a new contract with a bit of haggling.  BT TV Box + TNT Sport is another £30 and Now TV Sport (aka SkySports) is about the same again. That Boost allows HD on NOW. 

Perhaps I should have added that there is no Sky 'red button' on BT either so there should be a discount for that alone. I don't want to slag off anyone's team here (lol), but oftentimes the main match shown on the main TV is a really terrible one.

Timalay

Is your father in law willing to switch to a fttp connection?  I will mean an Openreach engineer visiting his house, to install it.  It's a fairly painless process.  But it will mean drilling a small hole into the brickwork to feed the fibre cabling through.  Also an external junction box will be fitted on the outside of the house, and an ONT near the router.  Judging by his needs, 76Mbps package should be more than enough for him.   It should work out at only £73.99 for that and EE Sports package.  He will get a new TV box with this too.
BT Group are phasing out the need for the phoneline now.  So if your father doesn't feel the need for it, he can have broadband without the phoneline.  However some fibre ISP's do offer phone services with their broadband.  Another thing to bear in mind if he does have a phone with broadband, BT are phasing out standard phone systems, for a digital voice/VOIP solution.  This will also mean potentially having an adaptor for his phone to work.  Also these new FTTP connection doesn't have power backup that the traditional copper lines used to have.  So if there is a power cut, he won't be able to make phone calls.  I know EE offer a couple of solutions for this.  The first one is a battery backup system, that should give him up to 1 hours work of calls, or they have more traditional handset with upto 8 hours of standby time and 1 hour of talk time.  That also has a 4G backup system, so if the broadband went down, it would revert to that.  With unlimited calls his package would go up to £91.99.

southsidergs

TooOrangeyForCrows said:

flaneurs_lobster said:

That package looks like it's at the top end of normal, should be able to get Fibre 1 down to £25 - 30 on a new contract with a bit of haggling.  BT TV Box + TNT Sport is another £30 and Now TV Sport (aka SkySports) is about the same again. That Boost allows HD on NOW. 

Perhaps I should have added that there is no Sky 'red button' on BT either so there should be a discount for that alone. I don't want to slag off anyone's team here (lol), but oftentimes the main match shown on the main TV is a really terrible one.

All the sky games are on the now tv app so are viewable if not on a main channel