letter - no price rise but less channels

[Chrysalis]

I am currently on the analogue base tv pack and today recieved a letter from ntl showing me how they are changing the packages, they stated that digital tv services are unchanged.

at the moment for 13 a month I get challenge tv and living tv, but starting next month they are moving these to a mid pack for 18 a month, seems the analogue customers get a worse deal again.

[paulyoung666]

all designed to force you onto digital imo

[Chrysalis]

thats fair enough if everyone could have digital, but we can't because they wont upgrade the damn area.

[bob_builder]

Originally Posted by Chrysalis

I am currently on the analogue base tv pack and today recieved a letter from ntl showing me how they are changing the packages, they stated that digital tv services are unchanged.

at the moment for 13 a month I get challenge tv and living tv, but starting next month they are moving these to a mid pack for 18 a month, seems the analogue customers get a worse deal again.

Well for £18 you will still get more (proper) channels than the digital base pack @£18 so you should count yourself lucky

[Hell's Child]

Originally Posted by Chrysalis

thats fair enough if everyone could have digital, but we can't because they wont upgrade the damn area.

Done to go with increased costs to provide the channels. Unfortunatally I expect the digital prices to go up soon to seen as sky have just put their prices up and we usually follow suit 4 months later.

Unfortunatally there are less and less channel producers who are willing to send channels out on both digital and analogue and seen as though the goverment want to have all analogue systems turned off by 2011? (something near that date) it means that it is pointless for new channels to go down the analogue route as well as the digital.

I think you will find us upgrading to digital in your area within the next few years (I know where I work in the NW that we have most of BL1, bolton, and other areas that are "non-digital") and I also know what a right royle pain in the arse it is to so completley understand your frustrations, but the price changes are more to do with the cost of providing ther services for you.

[danielf]

Can you get Film Four on analogue in your area?

That's how they forced me to upgrade. They removed Film Four from analogue, so you had to upgrade to digital to keep it. Luckily I was moving house anyway, so I needed a reinstall anyway.

Mind you, I had to fight them as they insisted I took the full pack (for 12 months minimum as well), as this was a new install. Only when I said I would leave alltogether did they agree to me having just the base pack and Film Four.

[Macca]

Here's the latest:

Analogue Base Pack £13.00
BBC1, Cartoon Network, MTV, QVC, BBC2, Channel 4, Channel 5, Sky One
BBC News 24, CNBC, E4, Sky News, BBC Parliament *, CNN,
ITV NewsChannel *, TCM, Bloomberg *, Discovery Channel, ITV1,
TV Travel Shop, British Eurosport, Discovery Home & Leisure, ITV2,
UK History

Mid Pack £18.00 (includes channels in Base Pack plus the following)
Challenge TV *, Nickelodeon, The Box, UK Horizons, Living TV,
Paramount Comedy, UK Gold

Family Pack £23 (includes Base & Mid Packs plus the following)
Animal Planet *, Plus, Trouble, VH1, Bravo *, Sci-Fi, UK Style *,
Men & Motors

* denotes that channel is not available in all areas.

[Chrysalis]

the ones with a * I get itv news but not bloomberg and bbc parliament.

has anyone got the new digital list to put up and compare?

the funny thing is when I go online, it claims digital is in my area, and throws loads of offers at me, of course none of them I can choose

[bigitup_j]

Base Pack (£18 per month) ---about 50 channels
BBC One, BBC Two, BBC Three, BBC Four, BBC News24, BBC Parliament, CBBC, Cbeebies, ITV1, ITV2, ITV News Channel, Channel 4, Five, Channel ntl, buy ntl, Sky ONe, Sky one mix, sky travel, sky travel extra, sky sports news, sky news, bloomberg, british eurosports, ftn, uk history, uk brightideas, the hits, tmf
plus 11 shopping channels!! PLUS 3 guest channels. (march: VH1, CNN and Challenge!)
Family Pack (£28 per month) ---around 120+ channels
loads of them-visit www.ntlhome.com/ntl_tv/family.html
for details

there is also a Mid-Tier Package for £25 month - but that's a bit of a rip off, you only get an extra 10 channels!!

[Frank]

Originally Posted by Macca

Here's the latest:

Cheers Macca.

Wrote this up, hope you don't mind

http://www.ntli.info/index.php?page=index_v2&id=37&c=15

I havn't had a letter, yet. I currently pay £19.99 for two analogue boxes on the 'Variety Pack', channels available include Sky 1, Living & Sci Fi. Now looking at Macca's post, it would seem that just one box would cost £23 to continue getting these channels, plus at least £7 for the second box - I don't think I'm going to be a happy bunny - that's a 30% increase for the same service

[Nemesis]

If NTL Digital is not available in your area ... why not switch and go for Freview .. or Sky ??

Hi Nem

hmm - digital is available, but I don't want digital while the lottery of which box you get & whether it has 'pass though' continues. That's apart from the pixellation, lock ups & loss of sound I have seen reported, which (in my experience) doesn't happen on analogue?

Freeview isn't an option unless Sky1 becomes available & I don't want Sky due to the requirement for the phone line to be connected for the first year. (does this have to be a BT line - mine are both NTL?)

I really like my analogue package, but I suppose I will have to seriously consider my options if this price rise happens - will wait to see if I get the letter, first.

[Hell's Child]

Originally Posted by homealone

Freeview isn't an option unless Sky1 becomes available & I don't want Sky due to the requirement for the phone line to be connected for the first year. (does this have to be a BT line - mine are both NTL?)

I really like my analogue package, but I suppose I will have to seriously consider my options if this price rise happens - will wait to see if I get the letter, first.

This price rise is happening. Just the way it is going im afraid. As for sky, you will find them telling you that you need a bt line, but it's BS. You can have either an ntl line or a bt line, but they get paid some money if they "force" you onto bt at the same time!

Originally Posted by Hell's Child

This price rise is happening. Just the way it is going im afraid. As for sky, you will find them telling you that you need a bt line, but it's BS. You can have either an ntl line or a bt line, but they get paid some money if they "force" you onto bt at the same time!

thanks for that - not wanting to 'shoot the messenger', but do you think a 30% price hike for the same service is good marketing by NTL? OK I know I have various options available - but what about people who can't get NTL digital in their area? Is the objective of freeing up bandwidth by forcing analogue customers to convert to digital worth pi**ing off so many of their customers?