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Contract Changes - April 2010
I am not enormously keen on the contract change starting in April which arrived (by snail mail) today!
For those who have not seen it it says that "you will need to give 31 days notice to downgrade any subscription."
As I like taking Movie Channels for 1 month only this is going to cost them money - I will give "notice to downgrade" immediately after upgrading rather than, as now, when I reach a point when I have no time to look at many movies (which might be significantly longer than 1 month!)
For those who have not seen it it says that "you will need to give 31 days notice to downgrade any subscription."
As I like taking Movie Channels for 1 month only this is going to cost them money - I will give "notice to downgrade" immediately after upgrading rather than, as now, when I reach a point when I have no time to look at many movies (which might be significantly longer than 1 month!)
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Ok, you dont like it because its going to cost them money? i think its sensible at last. like you i add on sports every so often and i dont want to keep on remembering whether i called on the 6th or 7th of the month. so now when i upgrade i can say ok just take my notification now that i want to change in a month again. billing remains exactly as i want it.
People who routinely cancel Sky Sports for the summer will need to calculate and remember when 31 days before the end of the EPL is!
Currently the majority of customers fail to understand how the current downgrade process can impact on their bill. The classic example are those who receive a Movies/Sports offer for 2 or 3 months. They call up on the day the offer expires to downgrade their package, but it's often the case that their following bill has already been generated on their higher subs (as typically the bills have been generated for the month in advance prior to the downgrade). This annoys a lot of customers as they have to shell out more than expected in their next payment, and Sky get a lot of grief.
With the new process the billing system will be able to accurately generate the next bill, without the customer paying extra in advance then receiving a corrective credit the following month.
The downside of course is you'll have to plan your next upgrade carefully if you only want it for a short period, as you won't be able to just downgrade on the fly whenever it suits.
I'm sure Sky has an ulterior motive but the official justification for the policy change is so that it falls in line with the account cancellation process where 31 days notice is also required.
As long as they will accept notice of cancellation on the day something new is ordered I can plan ahead!
The idea is that they get another one months worth of money off you. I bet the offers will not be there when you phone to cancel as the first thing you will be told is that you have to give one months notice.
I personally think it stinks! If I choose to downgrade after one month, that’s up to me. Hope that one day someone else gets a decent place on the sats market and gives Sky a run for their money.
Cannot believe that people are so laid back about this !
My worry with the old system is if I rang and gave notice on just the HD sub on the 9th April and that went on the 10th May I would ring on the 10th to cancel everything else and someone would tell me as my package has just been downgraded that day they may say I have to wait 30 days before I can downgrade again.
Changes don't really bother me. Just need to plan ahead a little
They probably expect to make a killing by people who say "end of soccer - must downgrade for summer" - who will be stuck for another month!
16th April.
You don't if you are outwith your minimum term - you can just cancel your account.
The contract you initially agreed to probably contains various clauses which allow these sort of contract changes to occur - so you have agreed to it in a roundabout way.
So even those of you who upgrade for a month,then give notice immediately to cancel, will still have to pay a fee. No mention of what that fee is of course, as this is a contractual amendment. I'd guess a nice round £5.
I always thought it was a great service to be able to instantly downgrade anyway and how unusual it was from any other subscription I get (phones etc).
Its a shame though that Sky have to turn a great bit of customer service into just a standard bit of service and not try to be a bit different. After all, every customer spends a fair bit of money with them monthly.
Fairy nuff. I guessed they were moving to this as they've added a statement saying they "will let you know the amount of any fee in advance".
The first I knew about this change to cancellation terms was today when tried to cancel Sky Sports! Never received any letter and was told by Sky customer services that I would have been notified in the Sky magazine.
Only problem is that we never get a Sky magazine!!!
Why does it suddenly need 31 days to cancel when it didn't last year, or the year before?
Comes across as a ploy to con people out of an extra month of expensive TV that they don't want to watch.
Presumably that was the reasoning behind it?.