Price cut
Sky Original pack is getting a price cut on 1st June.
Not a first but definitely a rarity.
Here's some details:
http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/92/33681059-general-sky-tv-discussion-page-185.html
Not a first but definitely a rarity.
Here's some details:
http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/92/33681059-general-sky-tv-discussion-page-185.html
0
Comments
Why?
They did it before when they moved the 6 mixes into 2, if you had a particular mix that meant you would need to go onto the new higher price pack, they put you on it for the same price you were paying, as they can't force you onto a new pack at a higher price, or take the channels away (well, they probably can if they wanted, but it would cause more uproar than a price increase does).
I think it may backfire though as more customers on the variety and family bundles may downgrade due to the bigger price difference between package costs. For someone who is not bothered about kids and documentary channels and box sets the cost of adding HD is now £16.00 per month ( £192.00 per year ). For sports and movies subscribers who are only interested in sports / movies the HD premium is now £21.25 per month ( £255.00 per year )
Price is onyl for new customers, I'm still being charged £21.50 a month when I look at my future billing so existing customers dropping down will pay £21.50 not £20.
Bit unfair offering a lower price to new customers than existing customers.
Well I took up their kind "50% off" offer today, 4 days before my notice to cancel Sky TV runs out. I was told by the advisor that Original bundle would cost me £10.75 pm... but it shows up on my account as £10 a month for the future bill costs. Even happier now than before!
The reason is likely a combination of large-scale recent customer cancellations, and the much lower BT TV entry point... they are terrified of BT TV getting too strong a foothold 'on their patch'. I predicted this a while ago, for that very reason.
BT doesn't even come close to matching the premium offering that Sky has. BT has very little choice and few channels. Yes it's cheap, but you get what you pay for.
Not only does Sky have the most complete television offerings by a very wide margin, they also have the very best technology. Sky mobile apps blow away everything BT has to offer. Sky on-demand and catchup services are phenomenal. The Sky+ app is just a million miles ahead of what BT has to offer.
The Sky boxes themselves have amazing software on there that handle all kinds of technically challenging scenarios - such as series links, new series, scheduling clashes, and organising content.
When you connect the BT box, you feel like you're going to back to the 1960s it's so antiquated. It's horrible.
Sky has nothing to worry about in regards to BT. The latter should just keep creaming the profits from their monopoly on fixed line telephony services. Trying to compete with Sky in television is not going to end well for BT.
My Original Pack still showing £21.50 in future billing and already paid this for June
How do existing customers get this new price, do you have to threaten to cancel or just ask?
I don't think BT are trying to match Sky- their tv service is intended to be a complementary and affordable upgrade to their broadband/fibre packages.
BT's "Entertainment" Pack is much smaller than Sky's range of channels, but it also includes channels/genres or has flexible "bolt-ons" for £3 per month, that are not included in Sky's Original Bundle.
HD content (including BT Sport) is available as a £3 per month "bolt-on", whereas Sky's HD content starts from £36 per month (Family Bundle) and is £66.75 per month to include Sky Sports.
Reducing the price of the Original Bundle by £1.50 per month isn't going to change the above equation much, in my view.
BT TV is entry-level with moderate upgrades available. They have filled the "under £20" space left by Sky, and it's a canny policy IMO. They are not trying to compete head-on with Sky, they are going for the huge gap left by Sky, with obviously some overlap. It's what's forced the Sky Original bundle down in price when all else has rocketed.
Most BT TV customers and would-be customers won't care two hoots about all the so-called "amazing software" offered by Sky - though to be fair, their current Youview boxes are just as good in what I use them for, I have both, and your "back to the '60s'" comment is frankly bonkers, if I may be so bold as to say so.
I've emailed the Executive Team who I've been dealing with on a compliant why this is the case.
I'll post the response if they give me any response of substance, which I doubt they will!
Why don't Sky create a new entry level pack with fewer channels than orginal pack, they could charge say £15.99 per month and say cut down on quite a few of the original pack channels.
They should then scrap the original pack and move people on original pack to Variety pack at £21.50 for say 6 months but say that it will increase to the full Variety pack price at that point.
Sky could do a similar thing to remove the variety pack later on so that they have a basic pack at £15.99 and a family pack at £29.99 instead of £36, this would encourage more people to actually go to the family pack.
Of course if anyone is still using an older box without HD they would have to be kept on the current variety pack price rather than the piprice I have suggested for family pack, as they wouldn't be able to access HD or on demand.
Because they don't need to. It's ridiculous people say Sky are losing customers to BT. Sky has the lowest churn rate in this industry in the entire developed world. They continue to report staggering numbers and profitability and there's no evidence of ANY competitor posing even a tiny threat to the viability of the business.
I think Sky's fear would be that such a pack at an entry-level price would appeal to enough customers that they'd downgrade to it- including those whose primary purpose in buying the current bundles is so that they can add Sky Sports and/or Sky Movies.
That's a large price reduction for the millions of customers who add Sky Sports and/or Sky Movies to a base pack!
The above is why I think that BT have been clever to fill a gap for entry-level tv with premium features, by offering it as a cheap addition to broadband/fibre. BT have positioned their tv service somewhere between Sky's "pay/feature-lite" Now TV service & the high prices of the content & feature-rich Sky TV service.
Sky's business performance remains very strong, so they don't need to try to appeal to all, and are generally quite cautious, on the strength of solid results, when making changes to the structure of their tv packages.
Because they probably can't, while they still insist on charging £10 a month for the Sky+ HD recording facility, which if they dropped it would in theory make them drop all packs by £10 a month (or at least make subscribers clamour for that drop) - something they clearly cannot afford to do.
BT TV do not charge anything for use of the Youview box recording facility (once you have the box) and it will continue to record (Freeview channels) if you subsequently cancel BT TV.
Neat move by BT, slotting into a price range that they know Sky can't really afford to do (except on retention deals like mine - £10 a month for original Pack, no contract, 12 months
I'll await your response with interest.
I suspect the £21.50 price will stay for existing customers and the £20 price is for new customers only.
Sky are a monopoly, they charge extra for HD channels you can already get on Freeview for, well free. They charge extra for a recording facility as well, which again you can get for only the cost of the box and no sub via other means.
Do tell which HD channels are available for free that Sky charge for
I am not a new customer, but I was working through my 31 days notice to cancel, and the £20 (well half of it!) shows up on my next two future bills already.
The way to do it seems to be to cancel and get reinstated, for people not already on a good retention deal, so that may be the key. I was lucky with my timing, earlier this week.
I suspect the £20 price is only for new customers or those negotiating a better deal, not sure how many are on the Original Pack but if it's half of subscribers that would be £7.5million a month in lost revenue for Sky it they all automatically moved to £20, so £90 million a year, can't see Sky just giving up on that revenue so I think they'll only offer the discount if there is something in it for them either adding a new subscriber or retaining an existing one who is going to leave the rest Sky just see as a cash cow, suprised they didn't put Original up to £23 for existing customers to offset the £20 for new or leaving customers.
Existing original pack customers can either threaten to cancel or upgrade to variety / family for one month then downgrade to the original pack at the new lower price.
I don't want to cancel as have the Legacy HD pack, which I wish to keep for the F1, so cancelling isn't an option. I've recently given up the full package to reduce to the Original Pack as a result of the signficant price increases and I'm quoted £21.50 for the Original Pack. My package doesn't reduce until 13th June.
I've received a response...you were correct!
We‘ve made some changes to the price of our Original bundle which will make it even more attractive for New TV customers to join Sky. From 26 May, the Original bundle will be for sale at the new lower price of £20.
There’s no change for existing customers who have the Original bundle and they’ll remain on the current price of £21.50. Current Original customers will have the option to move to the new Original bundle, however, this will be treated as a downgrade. As this is a downgrade to a lower pack, the customer will lose their price hold offer and may lose any other existing DTV offers on their account.
Any customer downgrading from the current Original bundle to the new Original bundle must re-contract for 12 months.
I knew Sky wouldn't give the £1.50 discount for nothing, you can get it but only by agreeing to a 12 month contract so they at least guarantee another £240 of revenue from everyone on the £20 price and I'm sure it'll then be back up to at least £21.50 in another year anyway.
Or even sneaker the £20 price may only be for 3 months as Original did not increase in June they could quite reasonably put it up to £22 in September, only a 10% rise so all those in 12 month contracts remain locked in, not sure I'm prepared to sign up to 12 months if all I get is a £1.50 a month saving possibly only for a few months.
This is all about Sky minimising cancellations when everyone (I suspect most people don't at the moment) realises European football is all on BT and consider cancelling Sky for BT and maybe using Now TV for the odd Sky game, if people are locked into 12 month contracts they won't be able to leave.
Interesting times for Sky and their ability to retain customers whilst knowing they need a significant increase in revenue to cover the huge increase in football rights whilst actually showing less football matches in total from next season with the loss of Champions League.
Depends what you class as poor, I want Sky Atlantic and Sports in HD, I already have the legacy HD pack so why would I want to pay an extra £10 to £16 a month for Variety or Family just to get some extra channels I don't watch.
I'd say Original is excellent value compared to Variety and Family as it contain the main channels, Sky 1, Atlantic, Arts, Living, Watch, Comedy Central, Gold.
I don't see much value in the extra channels on Variety/Family, docs would be ok but lots often end up on something like channel 5 at a later date, Kids, I have them and they watch far too much with what the BBC, ITV and C5 offer why any parent would want their kids watching even more TV I have no idea. Music, no MTV channels but most of the others are now free to air so plenty of music channels on Original. No Eurosport but if you're really into Sport you'll be watching Sky Sports or BT Sport instead.