Sky...

[GreiginFife]

No need for the snide comment at the end, you are better than that.

I said that I believe current customers should be entitled to the same deals as new customers when their contracts come up for renewal.

I get that you believe that. I’m trying to get to the root of why you believe it. Many new customer offers will be loss leaders.

Again I’ll say, insurance is mandated. Yes driving is optional but if you choose to you MUST by law have insurance. You do not NEED to have subscription TV to watch a television.

Remember, regulation was changed because many complained about insurance deals. Then the change happened, premiums rocketed for all, and the same folk complained again.

I say scrap new customer deals altogether. Everyone can pay a moderate fee that’s averaged of the two.

 

[irip]

I believe companies should reward loyalty and should offer customers who have been with them the same opportunities as new customers once their contracts have run their course.
I’m not sure if you could leave and then return as a new customer I guess that would depend on the company in question.

 

[GreiginFife]

I believe companies should reward loyalty and should offer customers who have been with them the same opportunities as new customers once their contracts have run their course.
I’m not sure if you could leave and then return as a new customer I guess that would depend on the company in question.

Many customers will have already benefitted from a new customer deal. So the company should subsidise your choices twice? Not sure I follow that business logic.

Most contracts will have a return clause (usually within 2 years) but there are a few that forget to write that in to the terms and will verbally try to stop you but can’t enforce it.

 

[irip]

I like the idea of getting rid of new customer deals and everyone paying a middle ground.
It would need all companies to either agree or be forced to do this though.
It would be nice if you paid the same with everyone and then you could decide on who you preferred for customer service etc.

 

[irip]

Many customers will have already benefitted from a new customer deal. So the company should subsidise your choices twice? Not sure I follow that business logic.

Most contracts will have a return clause (usually within 2 years) but there are a few that forget to write that in to the terms and will verbally try to stop you but can’t enforce it.

I understand that when you first sign up you may of got a deal but once that contract is up I think it’s back to square one and you should be offered the same deal as any new customer.

 

[GreiginFife]

I understand that when you first sign up you may of got a deal but once that contract is up I think it’s back to square one and you should be offered the same deal as any new customer.

It’s not though because new customer and new contract are not the same thing. Yes they can be the same at initiation but once a customer is on-boarded, administered and served they are no longer new.

New customer deals are the problem for me, not lack of loyalty discounts and loyalty is hard to define.

In 2010 a media TV company carried out customer interaction sessions with thousands of customers across the UK (I think the final number was around 80k) and one of the questions (that followed “how long have you been a customer?”) was “why do you remain a customer?”.

Nearly 63% or respondents said (thematically) “it’s less hassle/easier just to stay”.

Is that loyalty or laziness? Should the few that answered “because I love the great content” or similar be granted better loyalty offers?

To add context here, I was part of the panel of interviewers for this research.

 

[irip]

I understand your point, (and often I’m one that just stays because it’s easy) but I don’t agree that companies should be able to offer better deals to new customers than they offer to excisting customers.

If you had a car you paid monthly for and after 5 years of paying regularly and everything being fine you decided you didn’t want to purchase the car but instead lease again.
Would you be happy to pay more for the exact same thing as another person who had never used the company before?

I don’t think many people would

 

[GreiginFife]

I understand your point, (and often I’m one that just stays because it’s easy) but I don’t agree that companies should be able to offer better deals to new customers than they offer to excisting customers.

If you had a car you paid monthly for and after 5 years of paying regularly and everything being fine you decided you didn’t want to purchase the car but instead lease again.
Would you be happy to pay more for the exact same thing as another person who had never used the company before?

I don’t think many people would

I’ll be honest, I don’t get the car analogy. If you took a new lease then you’d oay the prevailing market price. If a 2025 Audi A5 is £200 per month more than the 2021 model was then that’s the price. Cars are also vastly more variable in cost affecting factors.

I don't agree companies should expect to subsidise customers multiple times. We basically agree the same thing, mid-market pricing, but for opposite reasons.

 

[irip]

The analogy is if as a new customer they offered it to me for less per month than you and freely advertised it then would you be happy to pay more than me.

It doesn’t have to be a car it could be anything.

 

[GreiginFife]

The analogy is if as a new customer they offered it to me for less per month than you and freely advertised it then would you be happy to pay more than me.

It doesn’t have to be a car it could be anything.

If I had a discount on my last car that others didn’t then I wouldn’t be expecting another. If all things were equal, same lease company, same account with them.
I don’t automatically expect discounts.

Just the same as I don’t expect my client to pay me more than the new guy just because I’ve been there longer.

 

[irip]

Ok I think we will have to agree to disagree.

I think we can both agree though that it would be better if it was one flat fee for everyone

 

[GreiginFife]

They made insurance companies toe the line. I don’t think that was because you need insurance (it’s a choice to have a car after all), the regulations were brought in because they were absolutely at it.

Not sure you’ve got it the right way round tbh. Regulations for mandated insurance came in before any discussions about prices happened. The government cited the mandating of insurance at the same time as the linking of the CMIDB and DVLA and VOSA to ensure all cars were insured, taxed and MOTd in order to be legally on the road. The citation was IIRC, on the back of a paper in to uninsured driver losses across insurers.

It was later people mounted the campaign to stop new customer discounts, as it was now regulated the industry was backed in to a corner and responded by not only removing new customer discounts but also applying retrospective increases to existing policies. Then more people complained but it was FAFO time by then.

I don’t think there has ever been a time where the insurance industry could ever be described as “not at it” but in this case they, in a rather twisted way, gave people exactly what they shouted loudly about.

 

[KenL]

Will this ever end?

Before it does, my insurance renewal just came in. £80 less than last year. No changes to claims etc.

 

[jim8flog]

At the end of the day they are more interested in getting new customers than they are in rewarding loyalty.
Whilst my offer at renewal was nowhere near the full cost it was also nowhere near the offer to a new customer.
So they lost a customer of 26 years of this year.

For me it was simple - year on year they have less and less channels and still want more and more money for less and still wanted to charge for a simple thing that is offered for free to new customers and other providers and on free to view such as freesat and via an terrestrial i.e. HD.

 

[Tashyboy]

Dumped them in September and no regrets, they wanted more £’s for less. So at the moment I am paying less than 90 odd quid a month for 2 x mobiles, fastest EE broadband and EE tv.
Cancelled Sky and the demanded Another months money when I never had Sky installed for 32 days as they said you have to give 35 days notice. A royal PITA Trying to cancel with them.
Again been with them 20 odd years.

 

[chico]

Does anyone have a number they can share to speak to a human? I want a better deal - but am currently in a loop with the very basic virtual assistant. Or do you effectively have to select cancel package to get more options? I don’t want to cancel I just don’t want to pay £125 a month to watch tv - the whole dance is annoying.

Cancel and play chicken, they'll tell you they're sorry to lose you but eventually they will offer a better deal.
I cancelled the lot and in the final couple of days they offered a cracking deal but by that time I'd already changed broadband provider and bought a firestick.

 

[Junior]

Cancelled all our sky tv and returns the boxes a month ago (aside from broadband). We’re on an Amazon fire stick and now tv etc.

Saved quite a lot of money but sky haven’t come calling to get us back.

 

[jim8flog]

Cancelled all our sky tv and returns the boxes a month ago (aside from broadband). We’re on an Amazon fire stick and now tv etc.

Saved quite a lot of money but sky haven’t come calling to get us back.

Interesting that the girl dealing with my cancellation told me to ignore the email about returning the 1tb box I had due to it's age and spec.

Apparently you can continue to use the SkyQ boxes for all the free to view Sat channels, not to bothered myself because I have still got the SKY HD box, which I use. Nice to keep it though in case of HD failure in my other boxes. It is very easy to access on a Qbox.

 

[Arthur Wedge]

Cancelled all our sky tv and returns the boxes a month ago (aside from broadband). We’re on an Amazon fire stick and now tv etc.

Saved quite a lot of money but sky haven’t come calling to get us back.

At some point they will i suspect

It’s always the same with subscriptions

Try and get your best deal

If you don’t like it then can either not pay if the decision is that it’s not worth it or pay

 

[upsidedown]

Sending our old SkyQ box back and trying to reconnect Sky+ HD box which weve still got