Good old Sky, you’ve gotta love ’em.
I introduced a friend to Sky and got a free Sky Plus box for the introduction. I phoned the number on the letter and gave them the details. A couple of months passes and the phone call to sort out the installation hasn’t materialised so I phoned them up.
“The account number you gave for your friend wasn’t correct, either you read it out wrong or someone typed it in wrong”. My friend was reading his account number to me as I was on the phone so it was right but that’s not a problem, mistakes happen. Phone calls don’t though – why did I have to phone them instead of them phoning me?
Anyway, they sent me a letter telling me to phone and order before the 14th so I phoned today and I’ll be Sky Plussed in a few days. The box is free but I’ve had to pay £60 for the installation. I had the option to pay £99 extra and get a HD box instead but there’s no way I’m paying £99 for the box, £60 for the installation and then £10 per month for a handful of HD channels. Not when I can get them for free.
On Monday the BBC and ITV jointly launched Freesat, a free to air digital satellite service. Not only does it have the free to air channels you can get through the aerial but it also has HD channels. Currently it has BBC HD and ITV HD (exclusively). When their exclusivity contract with Sky runs out they will also have Channel 4 and Channel 5 HD. That leaves only a couple of HD channels that you must pay Sky to watch. The only two that spring to mind are Sky One HD and National Geographic HD and I only watch Sky One for the Simpsons and Futurama and they certainly aren’t going to look any better in HD!
So no, I don’t think I’ll be paying £10 per month and £99 for a HD box from Sky for a few channels, most of which I can get for free by paying £120 for a Freesat box. I think Sky will be seeing subscriptions to HD dropping off significantly in the coming months, especially when you consider that the HD box normally costs £300 if you just decide to buy it on a whim rather that through a special offer.
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To be fair I’d say the Sky Movies HD and Sky Sports HD channels are some of the best around (a Football match just looks so much better in HD, and of course movies are the main attraction for HD).
I only watch international matches on the telly as a rule and I don’t watch films very often. It’s really not worth paying the money for me, I don’t think Sky will have a choice but to make HD free and drop the price of their box.