Digital TV Cost Cutting Article - Discuss What You've Been Offered

gk172 · 23 November 2005 at 7:35PM

phoebe03cat wrote:

Cor - that was a good call then. I'm a bit confused with ntl and telewest. Are they the same thing? As far as I know we are still with telewest. I have phone, computer and tv. When I rang yesterday as I'm possibly going back to BT with onetel was told I don't get any allowance for having the threesome package. Has anyone had any experience with pushing telewest down? :beer:

We pushed telewest about 8 weeks ago when sky were doing the offer of free sky sports for the year, we had tv, phone and internet and our bills were coming in including calls for £70-90 so we called telewest after seeing on there website that they were matching it for new customers only to be told 'new customers only' so we threatned to cancel to become a new customer or just join sky and they offered us the deal, so now we get 4mb broadband, the supreme package and talk unlimited, we have added caller display and disney and were paying £71 for 12 months which we will change back down so we are saving money and getting the sky football chanels free for the year and you get the teleport service free.

Telewest offer free sports and movies Remember to threaten to cancel if they wont give you it.

savings4me · 23 November 2005 at 7:36PM

Thanks again but she says it's a staff (?) number and gave me the 0870 number
Aagh. think I'm going to have to give in and ring it. It's not so much the cost as I know I'll save money but the time!

kiwichick · 23 November 2005 at 7:58PM

theloft wrote:

This is all very interesting, but if like me, your household are avid sports fans, then you have no choice but to stump up £49 quid a month! Sky have almost all the footie, all the cricket, rugby, r.league etc. If anyone knows a way around this I would be pleased to hear it. Will be trying the cancellation route though, but have a couple of friends who tried this and Sky immediately accepted the cancellation! They keep coming round here now !! By the way, the free sky through your TV is streaming of Sky channels via the internet, but you get a picture on Windows Media Player or similar, not suitable for the whole family to watch !!

Why not try doing it this way???

http://www.sky.com/ordersky/joinsky/costsummary

Cost is reduced from £49 to £34, first 3 months £17 which would pay for the £49 cost of the SKY+, you dont miss any of the sports channels.

bugbod · 23 November 2005 at 8:05PM

savings4me wrote:

Thanks again but she says it's a staff (?) number and gave me the 0870 number
Aagh. think I'm going to have to give in and ring it. It's not so much the cost as I know I'll save money but the time!

Sorry about that. I'm sure that's the number I used to phone when we first got Sky though. Maybe it'll be easier to get through at night.

dedicus · 23 November 2005 at 8:24PM

I had Standard Digital TV pack with Phone and 300K internet deal and average bill was approx £55 per month, I contacted BT about swapping to them for phone. Next day NTL rang me, and by the end of the call I had Standard Digital TV pack, Talk 24 Unlimited (free phone calls anytime, except mobiles) and 3Mb broadband for £14.50 a month.
I reckon I'm saving £350 - £400 a year
:j

Binxy · 23 November 2005 at 9:05PM

Can anyone please explain to me where I stand with Sky?

We have been Sky customers for around 5 years and a couple of months ago upgraded to Sky+, with multiroom. It has never worked properly (although according to the engineer if it doesn't do it while he's there it technically isn't faulty :mad: )

I'm under no illusion that I'm tied in with them, and I don't seriously think they'll make any allowance for the fact that is has never worked, what I want to know is - is the box mine, or is that only after the first 12 months? Can I cancel the Sky+ and go back to "normal" Sky? We're paying £46 a month (£552 per year :eek: ) for channels we don't watch (otherwise it'd be an extra tenner because of no premium channels) a multiroom that isn't being used and a Sky+ system that doesn't do anything that Sky+ should do.

Any advice appreciated

dbaffy · 24 November 2005 at 9:21AM

Sky+ is quoted as £199 plus £60 installation fee for existing customers. I phoned and said I was going to cancel because I was unhappy with new customers getting all the best deals (£49 and free installation). After all I've been a customer a long time and paid a lot into the system. The lady in the cancellation team offered me sky+ for £65 all in. (still have to pay 10 quid per month unless I have 2 premium chanels though) but a good deal methinks.

savings4me · 24 November 2005 at 9:36AM

Hi,
Thought I'd give you an update on how I got on yesterday.
Finally got through to sky on the 0870number (it was quicker later on) and was put through to cancellations but not before she gave me their direct line. It's still an 0870 number but answered quite quickly and you don't have to phone the other one first
It is 08705 488485
Nice chap, got that reduced to 1/2 price for 3 months and he's told me the date to ring and get it extended

Rang NTL and got my £40 bills reduced to 19.99 for 12 months.

Switched energy supplier (different thread) and will be saving money there too.
Now off to Aldi to do my very cheap but extremely good weekly shop.

Yes that is a halo I've got there! I've been meaning to ring sky and ntl for MONTHS and I feel very virtuous that I've done it and made some good savings.
Thank you everybody xx

terrierlady · 24 November 2005 at 9:49AM

well done i think with many of us its inertia that stops us all saving money....Well done to u, bet iv spelt that wrong!!!!!!!!!!

theloft · 24 November 2005 at 10:33AM

kiwichick wrote:

Why not try doing it this way???
http://www.sky.com/ordersky/joinsky/costsummary
Cost is reduced from £49 to £34, first 3 months £17 which would pay for the £49 cost of the SKY+, you dont miss any of the sports channels.

Thanks, but I think you will find that the half-price offer is for new customers only! I have looked at Sky Plus and the only advantage I can see is that it allows you to record 1 channel on Sky while watching another. If I keep Sky I expect I will eventually get it! Meanwhile I can reduce the price to £36 by just having the Sky Sports option, so when I find a non 0870 number that works, I will get in touch with them. (only joking, but it really annoys me that we are paying all this money each month and then have to fork out 8p per minute to talk to them , and we are the customers!!)

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Digital TV Cost Cutting Article - Discuss What You've Been Offered

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