We have been with Sky Broadband on their fibre network for the last few years. While pricing started competitively, once out of the initial contracts, prices quickly rise.
We used the Gigafast product which was actually very good except the price. We were paying nearly £65 including broadband boost per month.
I phoned Sky to negotiate but it was a fairly frustrating experience. They were not up for negotiating and the discount offered was not competitive compared to other competitor offerings. My attempt to gain a decent price also took forever via chat. Realising that they were not going to budge, I had no choice but to leave.
My main issue was that other providers could provide much cheaper packages. The exact same offering with BT on the Fibre 900 is £45 a month which is the same product really as both services are via Openreach.
The £45 price is good for the first two years and then it will be £50 with yearly March increases. This is way cheaper than what Sky would offer. Bearing in mind Sky will also increase prices over the next two years, it was a non brainer. A shame that Sky cannot be more competitive or reward loyalty.
If just a few quid, I would have likely lived with it. However, having been a TV, broadband and Sky mobile customer, we were paying more than £250 a month. Sky really need to reward loyal customers more by also looking at total spend across all products.
I was of course initially a little unsure whether to go ahead and switch provider as my wife and I both work from home and need reliable broadband.
The good news is that the switch did go smoothly. On the agreed day, I lost my connection at 3am and BT was then up and running. The router had also arrived by post on the day agreed.
The BT line and speed is fab and a slightly better speed than Sky. I noticed that our Sky Q appeared to lose WiFi connection initially as reported by other users. Sky Q doesn’t always play nice with BT. However, I now have the box connected via Ethernet and turned off the WiFi in the Q box via the engineers menu. All now good.
Overall, the transition has gone well and I now save £20 a month which is a decent annual saving of £240. Worth doing.
Researching online, it does appear that Sky really are reluctant to reduce pricing when you are out of contract nowadays. A shame really as with the cost of living, many are saying they will leave when out of contract when you look at online forums. Certainly my Sky Q will be next to go as the product is not worth the cost.
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