Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

I have only just discovered Cable Forum and this sub-forum, so I
can now ask about something that has puzzled me for some time,
namely the price difference of Sky Sports TV for BT and Virgin.

Adding Sky Sports 1, 2... to a Virgin bundle is £22 and adding
the same to a BT bundle is £12. That's a huge difference.

Why is this? What caused it? Did BT negotiate with Sky after
Virgin and got a much better deal? Can/will Virgin renegotiate?
Or did other factors come into play?

Any news/rumours/opinions about Virgin coming down in price
when adding Sky Sports to their bundles?

Ken

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

It's heavily subsidised by BT - they make a (significant) loss on every subscriber who signs up to Sky Sports. Virgin and BT get it at the same wholesale price.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Yep, BT make a loss of Sky Sports.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

I didn't realize that BT offered Sky sports for such a low price, having just looked at their web-site you get Sky sports 1 and 2, ESPN and Vision sport for just £12.30pm.
I suppose its heavily discounted to make up for their general lack of channels compared to Sky and VM, either way its a very good offer.

http://www.productsandservices.bt.co...?topicId=25634

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

you got to sign 2 year contract for bt broadband to get it at the cheapest price too

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

They no doubt make a decent profit on the BT landline and BB whch is required to have BT Vision though. Even though their phone and BB is excellent in my personal experience the BB is quite expensive though compared to other ADSL products.

Nevertheless the Sky Sports offer isn't bad but new customers seem to get hit with a 24 month contract though to get the best headline price, ouch!

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

That's a long time to be tied to it, especially if you decide it's not for you after a few months! :)

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Until they become the norm I wouldn't sign an 18 month contract with a provider let alone 24 months, no chance! Unfortunately with BT and Talk Talk and to a lesser extent VM longer contracts are becoming more common.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

I see, BT is making a loss...

This could well be effective, so I hope VM will answer and reduce the Sky Sports add-on price soon.

Here, TV is the king (XL-160 channels) and there is no way I can downgrade with three teenage children glued to Disney-channel, discovery channels and other XL offerings (and self and football-crazy son to ESPN!). Our minimum broadband M (10meg) and phone M are all we need, so there are no savings to be made by trying to downgrade the regular Virgin stuff.

Then, as we want Sky Sports and having to pay £22 instead of £12 hurts.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Why on earth would VM drop pricing to compete with someone making a massive loss? It's not going to happen as a standard pricing change so don't hold your breath.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Its tough managing the finances of a family with multiple demands, you don't seem to have much choice reallyas far as I can see.

BT are trying to buy up customers with such a loss making deal and counter gaps in their TV portfolio which is precisely why you are subscribing to VM I guess. Something has to give in terms of TV choice or the family budget has to be hit elsewhere.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Even at that price, the numbers released in November suggest few are biting: just 50k signed up.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

and don't forget bt only get sky sports 1+2 and vm get sky sports 1,2,3,4 and sky sports news and sky sports 1+2 HD

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Although adding the HD part costs another £7 a month.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

that a sky demand not vm one but if vip50 get it free

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Indeed. The VIP50 bundle I think is a bit of a bargain. Well, £97.40 isn't really a bargain as such as it is quite a bit of money every month, but you get absolutely everything really possible. And hopefully when new things come out (Tivo did I hear you say...) hopefully VIPs get a first look in or some extra discounts.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

The one significant part of "you get absolutely everything really possible" that you dont get is the option to watch "via the red button",this is a must have for any football,rugby,golf etc fan using Sky HD,when I signed up for VM I asked about the red button issue and I was blatently lied to by the sales person because they assured me that they had the same funtionality via the red button as Sky HD.........what a load of tosh!!,am I glad I kept my Sky HD aswell as VM,on a plus point the 50 meg broadband is excellent (the only thing keeping me at VM).

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

I doubt VM will reduce the Sky Sports sub any time soon. BT took a gamble and their take up for the offer is poor.

VM can't afford to offer anything else at a loss. They already make very little from Sky Sports subs.

---------- Post added at 10:48 ---------- Previous post was at 10:47 ----------

Red button is almost here now. Sky and VM have had it in developement over the last few months.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

It sounds like 2011 is going to be another good year to be with VM. I have a feeling there may be a few annoucements next week for a good few things. Would I be right in thinking that....?

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Yes 2011 is going to be a very good year for VM customers ;)

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Lovely jubbly. Maybe VM should start shouting about it more rather than keeping us guessing ;)

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

You'll hear soon enough ;)

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Excellent! I'm not talking about anything specific but would I be right in assuming that VIP customers are considered first for any new things that may come a customer's way? You know, perhaps if VM decided they wanted all their customers to be called Burt. Would we get the choice to be called Burt first?!

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

ha ha. All will be revealed.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Damn you're good!

I shall stop now. I appreciate you can't say anything.

I love the atmosphere on this forum, it's great. There are so many forums that just descend into a slanging match. Very different here, it's good.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Its not £12 for every customer. BT employees have to pay around £17 for Sky Sports 1&2

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

That's a very common lie. I know a few people who have been told the red button lie.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

I've just been going through BT's website and I had a look at BT Vision, from what I can make out the price they are charging for Sky Sports 1 and/or 2 is now more than we at VM are paying.
From what I can make out they are charging £12.30pm for either SS1 or SS2 or £17.40pm for both of them...maybe the OP thought the £12.30pm charge was for both SS1 and SS2 instead of individually, or am I wrong?

http://www.productsandservices.bt.co...?topicId=24694

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

It all depends what level of service you have.

If you have the BT Vision Gold Pack SSP 1 & 2 costs £7.20 individually or £12.30 a month for both. It's worth noting though that not everyone can currently receive SSP on DTT. If you have been through DSO and can receive ITV4, or if you have not been through DSO but can receive CBeebies you should be ok.

However having enquired recently when I was considering my options they seem quite flexible on price but that could be because I still have all the kit.

http://www.productsandservices.bt.co...cId=25634#tab4

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Due to a mistake on Virgin's postcode database, after moving home, I signed up to 12 months with BT Vision. It was the most miserable year of my TV viewing life.

The on-demand content (which is it's star feature) is very poor compared to VM (which I had before moving), it is almost entirely old American box sets which are incomplete. Movies which have been flogged to death on terrestrial TV or havn't even made it to DVD let alone the cinema.

The box is unreliable, as is BT's service. My BTV box was out of action for 3 months out of my 12. And if it can't connect to BTs (poor and expensive) broadband then it wont even work as a Freeview box.

After the first month, I never used it for anything but Freeview (as there was no OD content that interested me or was complete, so my subscription charge was a total waste. I would have been better off with a Freeview PVR.

Thankfully at the time BT were due to release me, VM sorted their system out and low and behold, I could've stayed with them all along (Grrrr).

So you might have gathered, my advice is not to touch Vision with a barge pole. The prices might be collapsing with them, but it's for good reason. It's rubbish.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

As a previous BT Vision customer before joining VM I pretty much disagree with every single point you make.

It just proves we all have different priorities and have different experiences I guess.

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Welcome back to the good stuff ;) :)

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Thank you. I've been back for nearly a year now. And am very happy to be so. Except for the sound drop-outs on HD channels via my Samsung V+ and Onkyo amp. But that's a problem I hope will be resolved elswhere, thankfully, my breath isn't held though. ;)

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

I've got a SA V+HD (as well as VM TiVo) and didn't get sound drop outs on that.

How old is your amp? The customers who have reported that issue have generally had older amps (over 5 years old).

oops! just realised it's going off topic here now!

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

Yeah. It's being discussed on VMs forum. It's this years amp (508) it's connected to the V+ via HDMI for picture passthrough and Optical for sound (as the V+ doesn't output DD 5.1 via HDMI) However many people are experiencing this problem on both the SA and Samsung V+ boxes but not the VHD box. Many many different types of amps are involved. It does seem more common on Samsung boxes though. The current state of play is that VM and Samsung engineers have recently visited a customers home and witnessed the fault, and are due to report back. Progress is painfully, painfully slow. The thread was opened (not by me) nearly a year ago.

I should say that the dropouts are 'added' by the V+ box, in that, for instance id you record a programme, the dropouts will appear in different places each time you play it back. On demand HD is also affected.

Take a look at this (again, not created by me)...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxBnulPqT-c

And I appologise for veering off topic. The issue is discussed (at length) here...

http://community.virginmedia.com/t5/...ighlight/false

Re: Why is Sky Sports on BT so much cheaper?
 

The V+HD does do 5.1 through HDMI though.

I'll have a read of those threads, cheers :tu: