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Your view: do TV sports packages cost too much?

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Profile photo of Andrew Collins Andrew Collins Which? Tech Support Senior Adviser
Comments 7

You were keen to kick into Sky and Virgin Media’s plans to increase prices for sports packages from June 1. It’s clear many of you aren’t happy to pay more for sports packages you already think cost too much.

As we said earlier this week, Sky Sports will raise its price by £1 a month, while Virgin Media’s Sky Sports bundle will be an extra £2 a month.

Do you already pay enough?

Alfa kicked off by criticising the price hike:

‘We already pay enough to Sky for what should be the ultimate in sports viewing. Now the service is diluted by BT Sport, which we refuse to pay extra for and we do not want its broadband.

‘If BT have so much money to spare, they should be improving its existing network so people can get decent broadband before entering the expensive sport market.’

Are we really a nation of football fans?

People say that we’re a nation of football fans, but Malcolm was keen to dispel this myth:

‘Sky Sports pricing assumes that all users want to watch soccer. I only use Sky Sports for the rugby union coverage, which used to be quite comprehensive.

‘But when BT Sport became involved we got less matches and paid more. Now the charges are going up again.

‘In an ideal world Sky soccer coverage would be a separate package so that those who are happy to see their money go to vastly overpaid professional footballers could do so, and the rest of us could simply get what we want to pay for.’

Chris said:

‘I hate football, but want to watch cricket, golf and rugby. The sooner they have a football-only package the better.’

How’s that for loyalty?

Peter found that cancelling his sports and films packages actually increased how much he paid:

‘I’ve just cancelled my sports and movies as the end of promotion price and the increase made my monthly premium jump by £18 per month. Long-term customer with Sky over 25 years and no incentives to try and keep me. How’s that for loyalty? New customers are offered huge incentives to join.’

Can you live without watching live sport? Are you already paying enough to these providers? What are the real benefits of being a loyal customer?

Comments
7
Anthonyh says:
2 May 2015

I refuse to pay the large monthly cost of a Sky package as I only want to watch the matches my team are in. I would welcome a 1 club package that showed every game, but that’s highly unlikely to happen, so I’ll buy the 1 day Now card for a big game and use other means to watch most games for free.
The only way to stop the price hikes is to cancel subscriptions then neither Sky nor BT will have the money to pay such vast sums for the licences and the clubs won’t get so much to pay inflated wages. Again a lot of people won’t cut off the sport they love, so we continue to get ripped off.

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Footloose says:
3 May 2015

I have to say that fopball (that’s NOT a spelling mistake!) Cricket and Rugby, are of little interest to me at all, yet I have to ‘suffer’ subsidising the interests of others. That’s to some extent ok, except in the case of Fopball, which rakes in far too much money due to the ‘battles’ between networks to televise it live, and it looks like the 1st division clubs, get the lion’s share of this income. There’s far better things programme-wise which this amount of money could and should be spent on, as long as it isn’t game, celebrity and soap type programmes. I would be more than happy if the availability of this ‘sport’ LIVE, was only pay to view, and the broadcasters can only base what they offer to pay for showing it LIVE, is from the money paid by those who actually watch it.

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alfa says:
11 May 2015

I have had several emails from Sky telling me to activate Sky Sports 5. When we checked it some time ago, it worked so we ignored the emails.

Now if we select Sky Sports 5 there is a message to “press the red button to upgrade your subscription to receive this HD channel or call 08443 41161”

It is supposed to be part of the Sky Sports package but Sky seem to have a very underhand way of getting you to activate it and con you into signing up for their broadband at the same time.

Doing a search on the internet found a lot of disgruntled comments. Here is one I found:

“Had a bit of a Twitter conversation going on today, and Sky initially seemed surprised that I’d lost the picture – but then directed me to the website that has the ‘Add SS5 and redeem offer’ and ‘Add Sky Sports and redeem offer’ buttons. So I asked which one to select in order to NOT redeem the offer, and was told that I could send them a private message and they can then make the arrangement to NOT give me the broadband.”

There doesn’t seem to be anything on this channel that we would watch so will not bother activating it. But that is not the point. We are paying for this channel AND they are about to put the price up.

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ian w says:
14 May 2015

and indeed they have. £4 a month in my case from Sky.
they have a captive audience and unless we leave in droves things will just get even more expensive.

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Imran Awan says:
18 May 2015

Yes , these are costly packages to watch sports but You can watch free sports online.

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Essex Blues says:
30 May 2015

It would help if OFCOM became a quango that is paid for by the people to actually represent the people. And not its own muddled priorities.
David Cameron once said we would have a bonfire of quango’s. OFCOM needs to burn in allowing the likes of BT, Sky etc to control the media market.

There are in the pipeline even bigger price increases on line rental due in 2015.??

Let alone the price increase on the sports package forced upon us. Because some executive thought it good it could spend what it likes in the auction. They knew it was the public who would have to pay for it.

How many sports has SKY ruined due to its control and b buying power.? Cricket, Golf, Rugby, Boxing, motor racing. With boxing you even have to pay ‘extra’ to watch. Where on earth is OFCOM on this greed?

It would help if people like Witch. Who work for the people directly and indirectly? Reported the public’s concern to OFCOM. Even help to raise awareness by assisting or organising a campaign against the rip off prices of the media. Smaller players just cannot get a look in. With e dominance of these companies that OFCOM have actually allowed to grow.

BBC cannot now compete yet we are forced to pay an outdated, outmoded licence fee for loads of twaddle. So there has to be control of the media moguls. Or is this another political hot potato as previously seen with Blair and Cameron cronies.

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Peter J. says:
26 July 2015

Sky Sport subscription is now too high. We are paying more for less matches and more commercials. I am only interested in watching Premiership football, tennis and golf so I don’t see why I should have to pay this amount for sports I do not watch such as cricket, rugby and boxing.
Unless Sky split their sports package, so we can choose which sports we want too watch, I will cancel my Sky subsciption at the end of the 2015 – 2016 season and try Now TV’s streaming service
which costs £6.99 a day. After all I don’t watch all the Premiership matches shown so this should work out cheaper in the long run and I won’t be tied to a contract.

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