Warning - SKY £75 Pay Once Watch Forever problems

markchadwick

Well who would have guessed it? An issue I thought was finally over suddenly raises its ugly head once more. Today I received two letters: one saying "You now owe us £14.81 for additional services (don't know what they are?)" and another saying "Since we've heard nothing from you, we've since charged £80 to your account (very nice of them)". An account, which I ensured I closed in the middle of January based on peoples experiences documented here. Both letters also had in bold "We will be referring you to our debt collecting agency and this could affect your credit rating".

I was so :mad:, so much so, I even used the 0844 number and was on the phone for 20 minutes sorting out the problem with an apologetic representative named Jenny. I explained my situation and she even found a note on my account from the middle of January saying "customer called and cancelled account?!". She blamed everything on the "new system". A system that conveniently wastes customers time by having a recorded message, spoken by someone who sounds half-asleep (I guess to use up more valuable minutes on your phone bill) full of options with many levels.

To cut a long story short, I requested for a letter indicating my account was closed and I owe nothing. Now, with the inspiring tales from this forum, I intend to claim for compensation. All of the phone calls, letters written and more importantly, my time, must add up to a decent sum in my book. It seems one or two of you have been rejected for any compensation, so I was hoping our forum-starter harz99 could hand out some tips on how to claim compensation. Tickles me reading the comments here, reminds me of how I am so particular in logging everything with these company-idiots on post-it notes. We'd be good barristers with all this experience :rotfl:

One positive is that I have since sold the sky box for £80 to someone on ebay covering my sky costs for the last 6 months

jlj_2

We got Pay Once Watch Forever back in July and since February this year have been bombarded with letters from SKY claiming we owe subscription charges and "we will refer your debt to a collection agency. That could affect your credit status and ultimately to legal action being brought against you".
After many phone calls, I hope it is now sorted. I phoned 0800 0512595 and insisted they went and found someone who could sort the problem out, who knew about the Pay Once offer. They did and said that the reason people have been having this problem is that because there was 6 months free sky viewing in the deal, the code for 6 months free and then normal subscription has been being entered in error. Once they realised this, an e-mail was sent to someone and they have now cancelled my account(which I never had in the first place!!). Anyway i'm hoping this may help someone else as its been so frustrating, but at least if you use the freephone number it can still drive you mad but at least you're not paying a fortune. They have promised to send me a letter(!) confirming the cancellation, i'll let you know if and when it arrives.

vix2000

Counting down to 9th April when my parents package that I bought them for Christmas, ends. Although I've got email confirmation of cancellation I am expecting a song and dance like everyone else on here. Where we live we have no choice of tv provider, as theres only sky and no choice of telephone provider, only bt. Basically they've got us by the short and curlies!!!!!!!!

saintscouple

Hi, Martin’s asked me to post this in these circumstances: I’ve asked Board Guides to move threads if they’ll receive a better response elsewhere (please see this rule) so this post/thread has been moved to another board, where it should get more replies. If you have any questions about this policy please email [EMAIL="abuse@moneysavingexpert.com"]abuse@moneysavingexpert.com[/EMAIL].

cornerstone13

Saintscouple - please can you post the link to where this thread has been moved to.

Thanks

niccy

huh all over,NOT

got a demand today for £15

all i've done is sent it back with a copy of above e-mail



this has now cost me a second class stamp:mad:

NonGeographicalMan

I have sent the following email to Sky senior management and also blind copied it to one or two other relevant people at Ofcom, the Competition Commission, ASA and Freesat likely to have an interest in this kind of quite disgraceful commercial misbehaviour by Sky.

If this doesn't sort them out nothing will. If they start threatening my mother with debt collectors after all I did was give her a present that should have been limited to a £75 cost there will be hell to pay by Sky.:mad:

---

Original Message

---

Subject: Sky Pay Once Watch Forever - Repeated Breaches of Original Offer Terms & Conditions By Numerous Members of Your StaffDate: Sat, 19 Apr 2008 01:58:21 +0100
To: [EMAIL="jeremy.darroch@bskyb.com"]jeremy.darroch@bskyb.com[/EMAIL]
CC: [EMAIL="AllCustomerCareEscalation@BSkyB.com"]AllCustomerCareEscalation@BSkyB.com[/EMAIL], [EMAIL="andrew.griffith@bskyb.com"]andrew.griffith@bskyb.com[/EMAIL], [EMAIL="robert.fraser@bskyb.com"]robert.fraser@bskyb.com[/EMAIL]

Dear Mr Darroch,

Sky Pay Once Watch Forever - Disgraceful Behaviour By Sky Over Customers Wishing to Cancel at 3/4/6 Months In Not Honouring Original Cancellation Terms & Conditions and Verbal Contracts Clearly Entered In To by Sky - Product Given by Myself As A Birthday Present - Customer Installation Address = ***********************

Whilst in Asda last summer I bought one of your Sky Pay Once Watch Forever (with 6 months of free subscription to 2 Sky Mixes) boxes for £75, which I subsequently gave to my widowed mother as a present for her birthday in October. The Pace DS445N Sky Digibox, Dish and Viewing card were then duly installed on a date in November and the 2 free Mixes for 6 months were then activated.

There is now only around a month to go until the end of the free 6 month period of the Sky Pay Once Watch Forever product and I have been very concerned indeed to read the many alarming stories about the behaviour of Sky and its staff documented in considerable detail on two lengthy threads on the www.moneysavingexpert.com discussion forum. These many pages long threads document that basically your staff are trying to behave as though customers who bought a product that stated clearly on the box "No contract=no monthly fee" and "Sky Pay Once Watch Forever" are nonetheless in a contract because of their receipt of the Free Mixes for 4/6 months. It appears that despite repeated notifications by customers of this product that they wish to cancel at the end of the period that they are being quite wrongly and repeatedly hounded by your credit control department with threats of debt collectors and other repeated demands for payment that they are clearly not contracted to pay.

See the two many page long www.moneysavingexpert.com discussion threads on this subject at

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=711597

and

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=497501

The purpose of this email is two fold:-

1. To ensure that Sky honours the commitment of your installation staff given on the telephone in November (and that I was also a witness to) that they will call my mother back and will give her the right to cancel the contract (without question, hindrance or penalty) before the end of the free 6 month period in mid May. If your intent with Sky Pay Once Watch Forever was mainly to try and thwart the success of BBC Freesat by offering a cheaper product that allows customers to get Sky programs as well, when and if they sometimes need them, you are certainly managing to shoot yourselves in the foot by now so blackening the reputation of this product that nobody will ever want to touch it with a bargepole again, especially once BBC/ITV Freesat is launched and as when C4 and Five finally manage to extricate themselves from their complicated encryption deals with Sky.

2. To ensure that no Sky Pay Once Watch Forever customer is ever again messed around again by your wholly inadequately trained staff (at least in respect of this particular product sold only through limited marketing channels) who are either not sticking to the original terms & conditions due to inadequate staff training or conceivably because Sky is quite knowingly and deliberately marketing this as a "No Contract" and "Pay Once Watch Forever" product whilst then ignoring that marketing basis and those contractual terms and trying to trick customers in to believing they have to go on subscribing and cannot unsubscribe when the promised 3, 4 or 6 month free Sky tv is over and the customer wishes to take advantage of the "No Contract" promise your company so clearly made.

I find it hard to believe that Sky can behave in quite such an apparently astoundingly unethical manner when it is trying to get permission from Ofcom for Sky Picnic and, if successful, will have to try to persuade the section of the great British public who have so far avoided Sky that this is a low cost and flexible product that they can easily opt in and out of without experiencing all of the ruthless tactics for preventing customers leaving you for which your company has so unfortunately become renowned when any customer ever tries to exercise their quite legitimate right to cancel your service.

I do not just want this matter resolved in my mother's case. I want this matter resolved for all Sky Pay Once Watch Forever customers so that a major investigation in to the selling methods and contractual terms of this product is not required by Trading Standards and/or the OFT and/or the Competition Commission. I do not expect to read any more posts in the MoneySavingExpert forums indicating that your company is still refusing to honour the rights of customers who want to cancel the product after the advertised 3, 4 or 6 month free Sky Mixes period.

I find it embarrassing in the extreme that I bought this product as a present for my mother genuinely believing there was no further commitment than £75 and no obligation after 6 months only to find that my mother will be potentially presented with a barrage of intimidating demands for money by Sky when she only wants to exercise her quite legitimate right to cancel the service on the "No contract = no monthly fee" basis so clearly promised on the front of the box in which this product was originally sold. Not to mention the product name "Sky Pay Once Watch Forever", which I feel sure any County Court in the land could only construe in one possible way.

I trust that you will therefore now launch a proper high level investigation by a Director of Sky Digital in to this matter and ensure that the problems afflicting customers who want to cancel the service, because they do indeed want to "Pay Once" and "Watch Forever" without entering in to a contract with Sky for further monthly payments with restrictive cancellation terms (as indeed is possible with www.freesatfromsky.co.uk but apparently not with this service), are fully and permanently resolved.

I look forward to your comments.

Regards

harz99

saintscouple wrote: »

Hi, Martin’s asked me to post this in these circumstances: I’ve asked Board Guides to move threads if they’ll receive a better response elsewhere (please see this rule) so this post/thread has been moved to another board, where it should get more replies. If you have any questions about this policy please email [EMAIL="abuse@moneysavingexpert.com"][EMAIL="abuse@moneysavingexpert.com."]abuse@moneysavingexpert.com[/email][/EMAIL].

I do not understand why this thread has been moved, as it is getting less replies than on its original board.

Having tried PM ing saintscouple as to why, I was advised to contact the "abuse" link, which I have just done in the hope that the thread can be restored to its original and more prominent position for everyones benefit.

chrisgeller

Hi

I've just had this installed - and seeing the trouble a lot of you have went to am a bit concerned about cancelling.

Do you have any tips for the best way to go about it with the least stress? I've already cancelled my direct debit!

NonGeographicalMan

chrisgeller wrote: »

Do you have any tips for the best way to go about it with the least stress? I've already cancelled my direct debit!

Cancelling the direct debit at this stage will just mean they then deactivate your 3 or 4 months free viewing as the 3 and 4 months deals made it a condition to provide a DD to get activation of the 3 or 4 months free Mix viewing as I understand it. Also cancelling the DD before the end of your free viewing runs the risk of them generating an invoice with an extra £4 charge (for payments not made by DD or CC) during your last free month. Whereas if they wrongly charge you on the DD then you are entitled to demand the payment back from your bank anyway as Sky would be in breach of contract.

My recommendation to avoid having a problem would be to send an email to [EMAIL="jeremy.darroch@bskyb.com"]jeremy.darroch@bskyb.com[/EMAIL] (the new CEO now that James Murdoch has moved on to run his dad's newspapers) with cc to [EMAIL="AllCustomerCareEscalation@bskyb.com"]AllCustomerCareEscalation@bskyb.com[/EMAIL] around one month before the end of the free viewing pointing to the original offer and terms and conditions and this thread and the other thread on this forum and making clear you do not want to continue as a subscriber at the end of the free viewing period.

Ask that they confirm that you will be cancelled at the end of the free viewing period and that they make the necessary changes on your account so their accounts department do not incorrectly hound you for breach of contract etc. Point out this is a 4 months contract and that their accounts people are wrongly setting this up on their system as 12 months and that this is where all the issues appear to be coming from on this product.

If you take this pre-emptive step then I doubt you will have a problem at the end of the 4 months. Although with Sky one can never be sure they won't still screw things up.:eek: :mad: