Sky are rippng me off?

I agree with James - main negative is the endless and substantial price rises. About once a year I ring and threaten to leave - and that seems to bring the price down for a while. I got nearly fifty quid a month off last time, but they've got about half that back through relentless increases.

We have Sky with unlimited broadband ,phone, HD premium movies etc. Thinking of waiting out when the new skybox Q silver (I think) starts broadcasting some material other than sport in UHD, then try and negotiate a new deal as new customers.

Not so bad a price once you've paid of the mortgage !

Goon525 posted:

Solid, Gary, I'm not particularly trying to defend Virgin - but neither of you are really describing what it is that you can do better or easier on a Sky box. Incidentally, I've got Virgin's 70Mb broadband, which is pretty reliable. I can't justify paying for faster service.

I think one of the main advantages is that the remote control has basically stayed the same for 20 years or more (as Simon has already said). It is largely intuitive anyway, but because the user interface almost never changes, it is supremely easy to use.  I am even using with my Sky HD box the remote that came with my original Sky+ box, largely because I can. The new one had an identical button layout but I preferred the colour of the old remote.

Sky almost never changes anything about the user interface. They had to make a change to add the PVR functions with Sky+, but that they did in a really sensible and consistent way and they have redefined the odd button, for example the help button was reassigned ten years or so ago to taking you directly to a menu that allows you to turn subtitles on and off easily, but that's it basically.  The on-screen menus change from time to time as they add services or re-arrange them, but navigating them never changes.

I have occasionally used the Virgin Media TiVo box, for example when baby sitting my grandchildren, but it always seems to take me endless key presses to find what I want and it's slow to do what it's told too.  Notably in both cases the bill payer abandoned the VM TiVo for Sky HD as soon as the original contract expired, just keeping VM for broadband. VM pretty well give away the TiVo box on new broadband contracts, presumably because they have trouble getting people to pay for it.

best

David

It's also worth mentioning the excellent Sky app. for controlling the box, showing what you've recorded, access to the catch-up services, box sets to download, etc. You can use it to record remotely, as long as you've a broadband connection. Then there's Sky Go, for watching stuff anywhere...

I looked at the various Broadband packages and stayed with BT - they do give try unlimited (just like virgin etc.) but also BT 's upload speed are good vs Virgin /Sky (we are not on optical where we live) since they dont reduce this as much as Sky/Virgin etc.

I also have the new BT Homebub modem/router and does seem to work well - I no longer need to purchase a branded modem/router as I did in the past.

I personally didnt have any problems setting the BT Broadband - worked first time...

We did have Sky years ago - but I got fed up with the constant price rises and now we have Netflix and Amazon as part of the Pime offering - otherwise if I want to see a film, I just buy the Blu Ray - longer term was cheaper than paying for Sky. 

I guess Sky is good if you are a stong sports fan....

Turned on the Tivo/TV at 8pm to find the menu system had been modified. Not a dramatic upgrade, the actual system hasn’t changed but the style of display has been changed to something more modern and the reaction time is a lot quicker.

However, catch up TV has changed dramatically, I think the menus have changed, but the main upgrade is the speed it now works at. Amazingly fast. Previously it was so slow, it was virtually unusable.

Solid Air posted:

I have experience of both . . . the Virgin Tivo box is good, but Sky+ is just miles better. All the same functions basically, just much easier to use. Sky do have this nailed for TV. Plus Game of Thrones, obviously.

For broadband though, I use Virgin fibre, and it's the fastest and most reliable I've used. I recommend it if you have it in your (UK) area. I buy 50Mb and actually get 50Mb pretty consistently. 

Simon - Sky used OpenTV middleware for its early STBs but replaced it more recently with NDS (now Cisco) Linux-based software.

Interesting, it's a fair few years since I worked for Sky.. I seem to remember in the very early pre launch days NDS had an EPG offer but it was inferior to OpenTV.. NDS effectively managed the security software of the box as well as the advanced SI and broadcast encryption and OpenTV sat on top of the security framework.. So NDS replaced OpenTV in the end... In fact I do seem to remember hearing that...but the design appears to have have largely stayed aligned to that early OpenTV EPG... a real credit to that early software.

Pcd posted:

Gary, spot on

*you could always try your luck and threaten cancellation with sky who will
then put you through to their cancellation team who appear to have special
powers to give you more value..... Crap way of running a business but
that's their current thinking. *
It has always worked for me when needed and all providers seem to be the
same the cancellation team seem to have a different price structure.

Regards

Pete

I got Sky HD, inc movies and sports for just £30/month. The house has Virgin high speed internet, a good deal. Pete has the right idea, ring Sky and threaten to cancel, check what prices are available to new subscribers, and suggest you are a good customer and should be offered the same deal.

Hope this link helps....

http://www.moneysavingexpert.c...isting-customer-tips

djh1697 posted:

Pcd posted:

Gary, spot on

*you could always try your luck and threaten cancellation with sky who will
then put you through to their cancellation team who appear to have special
powers to give you more value..... Crap way of running a business but
that's their current thinking. *
It has always worked for me when needed and all providers seem to be the
same the cancellation team seem to have a different price structure.

Regards

Pete

I got Sky HD, inc movies and sports for just £30/month. The house has Virgin high speed internet, a good deal. Pete has the right idea, ring Sky and threaten to cancel, check what prices are available to new subscribers, and suggest you are a good customer and should be offered the same deal.

Hope this link helps....

http://www.moneysavingexpert.c...isting-customer-tips

 

Is that just an introductory offer ?

Been doing a bit of research and Virgin still seems to offer the most reasonable deal for Fibre (well Fibre to the cabinet up the road and still coax to the house). Looking at the packages, we have the Fibre bit already so just need to ditch the phone and TiVo box. Apart from losing 1/2hr of time i'll never get back having to explain why i want to downsize than add a load of extra crap i don't need it should be pretty simple. 

I will have one last look at Sky though - must admit the new service looks good. I haven't had Sky since my student days and used to have a spare PC sitting next to the Sky box emualting the card to get free TV  

James, that seems quite an ordeal just to get freesat.. or was it an intellectual challenge to simulate the CAM for the free channels 

I'd like to say it was the intellectual challenge Simon but it was more the money saved went on Beer at the time. The free Sky experience did help in a job interview though so lets call it an educational experiment...

PS - it was back in the very old Videocrypt days so pretty easy to do (especially with the later PIC based cards) as i'm sure you well know 

ahh I thought you were referring to Sky Digital.. Yes Sky analogue was notoriously easy to hack, which is why Sky went overboard with NDS military grade encryption and conditional access  on Digital and premium channels... They learnt their lesson.

fathings cat posted:

you could always try your luck and threaten cancellation with sky who will then put you through to their cancellation team who appear to have special powers to give you more value..... Crap way of running a business but that's their current thinking.

I tried that once and have been Skyless ever since.

Me: Hello, I'd like to cancel my subscription.

Sky: Ok ... Bye!

I've tried this week. At £92/month for our tv subscription (no broadband or phone) I felt it was getting too expensive.

Their first offer was to reduce to £77-20 for 12 months. This wasn't enough so we proceeded with the cancellation.

Within 5 minutes of completing the cancellation, an offer of 50% off our subscription appeared in the iPad Sky app. This wasn't as good as it seemed as it didn't apply to multiroom or HD pack but did reduce the monthly subscription to £55/month for 12 months.

One quick phone call later and it's all in place. I do wonder how far it could have been pushed as the end of the one month notice approached but it isn't a bad reduction and more realistic price I feel.

After all that, and after a bit of a chat with their retention team and a look at the options, we've got the same package but at £29.99 - price of the Fibre broadband (i was expecting this to be £32.50 but if you add the phone then it drops to £29.99  .

I'll look again in 12 months when our latest contract is up but to be honest, if the price doesn't rise much we'll stay. Reliable and pretty decent and pretty good value compared to most package.