TV price rises
 

TV XL package to go up by £2 in April so what are your thoughts on it?.

http://shop.virginmedia.com/digital-...-packages.html

Well considering sky have frozen prices and only virgin increase, not forgetting channels going with no replacement, I think it's wrong

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It was inevitable really to pay for all the extra super duper channels they have been giving us...........:rolleyes:

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Give them time kop.;)

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Ok,on a serious note Den tell me one channel that they have added that is worth the price hike?

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Can they put price up if you agreed a contract at a fixed rate? I agreed a set price for 12 months can they just change it :confused:

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DF or any of the Virgin staff will give you the correct information on that as l am not sure.

---------- Post added at 11:04 ---------- Previous post was at 11:04 ----------

Perhaps there are happenings on the horizon.

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Technically yes they can, as it's the terms and conditions. As with any price rise though, you have the right to cancel any service that does have an increase.

However normally if you have a short term offer (3 / 6 months) then they are usually honoured and price increase doesn't occur until the end of the offer period

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Obviously not to do with TV but are there any broadband or phone price rises in the pipeline Ben and also are Sky premium TV channels prices going to rise as well.

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Sky Anytime content. The UKTV HD channels. Sky Arts HD. Sony Entertainment. CBS Action.

They've all launched since the last price change

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So just to confirm if they put the price up i have the right to cancel?

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You can cancel any service affected by the price change, but not the ones that aren't. So if the TV goes up but the phone line doesn't, you can only cancel the TV

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Big mistake at a time when a lot of people's disposable income has been cut , pay TV is getting far too expensive , it will be interesting to see what happens at Sky in September. The XL with TIVO will become 29.50 now won't it when took with a phone , seems steep to me.

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That might be the way out for a lot of unhappy TiVo users then..

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but then you will lose any discounts your package had got

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about time we paid for the channels we actually want rather that all the rubbish that gets packaged and we have to subsidise. There really needs to be a cull of the unwanted channels

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Considering the equivalent Sky Package (Entertainment Extra and HD) is £35.25, it's still comparible

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One persons TV Gold is another persons..............

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Oh well we've nothing to complain about then have we.........;)

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Yes even l will admit it seems to be a unwise move by Virgin in my mind.

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Careful Den..........

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Remember l do have nine lives and l still got two left at the last count.:D

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Firstly, I think you are wrong, because with Sky you don't have the choice of packages like you did before, you only have 2 mixes and the XL equivalent is £25 which is currently more expensive than Virgin Media's XL TV package, bare in mind, although Sky has more channels, you are legally not obliged to pay a penny for most of those channels through Sky and only the big name channels are paid for.

Furthermore, an investigation needs to be carried out into Sky and its status in the market, they own too many channels and content and are also restricting a lot of content to other platforms at there own loss.

Sky maybe freezing its prices, well not really because it will find some other way of extracting money from you without you even realising, you could have made a cup of tea and could have made £15 out of you in that time.

Just remember that Virgin Media has to pay carriage costs for the following broadcasters and also has to fund for its on demand content, something that Sky does not really invest in, this is the reason why they should never have sold off Virgin Media Television off.

And furthermore, the service treatment from Virgin Media is much better, if you run into finance trouble and cannot pay by direct debit at least Virgin Media don't keep cutting off customers until they have the direct debit re-instated and I find the customer service acceptable unlike Sky where my friends said they kept getting a recorded message telling them to call back later because they were receiving excessive calls.

I would rather pay that extra £2 per month and get a good service rather pay less and get less.

Sky know they have to supply all there content to Virgin Media customers so it's only a matter of time before nearly 4 million Virgin TV customers get all the Sky basic and Atlantic channels on M and XL TV packages, all I know, a lot of friends which was with Telewest until Virgin Media pulled the Sky channels are now coming back to Virgin Media because they say they are not happy with there Sky service.

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Vm keep getting accused of wanting new channels on the cheap,Maybe they need it to up there offers by a pound lol

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Everything else is going up in price at the moment so why should pay TV be immune? We're talking about a price hike of just under 7 pence per day. At the end of the day you either pay the extra £2.00 and keep your Virgin TV or you don't and leave. You have the choice whether to "Stay and pay" of "Say no and go". Power to the consumer!

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Another own goal by Virgin media, their main competitor Sky freezes prices whilst increasing OD, 3d, HD channels at a greater rate than VM.
This is a disgrace in these present times.

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I'll expect a few new channels after this rise, especially the ones which have nothing to do with Sky. ITV 2/3/4 and Universal in HD for starters, along with CBS Action in SD.

Given recent announcments by Sky, Lovefilm and Netflix, the timing isn't great.

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Exactly.

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7p per day does not sound much but it equates to over 7.5% ,I admit everything is going up but you show me anything that has gone up by 7.5% in one go.

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Sky's price freeze ends at the end of August this year, after this no doubt their prices will go up too.

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Car insurance, home insurance, rail travel tell me when to stop .......

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No it never stops.:(

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Sky invest millions in content

God forbid a company who cut you off for not paying your bill :rolleyes:

How will they keep going :D

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Info thanks to Virgin Media insiders:


With effect from the start of April,

TV packages product prices:

TV M+ will increase by £0.50 to £7.00 per month (all bundles for existing customers.)
TV L will increase by £1.00 to £19.50 per month (existing customers with Solus bundles.)
TV L will increase by £2.00 to £14.50 per month (all bundles for existing customers.)
TV Size XL will increase by £2.00 to £26.50 pm (all bundles for existing customers.)

Paper bill charges:

From 1st April the monthly charge for customers who request a paper bill will increase by 25p to £1.75 (currently £1.50).


Labels: Media Boy, Virgin Media Reactions:

http://mediaboyblog.blogspot.com/

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Wish they would say price rise is coming soon !!!! lol

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Yes i tend to agree denphone sky have offered a price freeze until at least this August i think,it would have made sense for VM to follow suit and do likewise.:(

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l quite agree.

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In the case of sky arts HD Ben they arrived just after the last increase so, surely the last increase in price for the TV package paid for them.:confused::confused:

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And maybe this price rise will pay for Sky Atlantic one hopes and several other must have channels.

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I understand both sides - people don't want to pay any more, and VM want to make some more money.

Market Forces - people can move to an alternative supplier; however, it will be interesting to see how Sky customers who were moved to the Entertainment Plus package at no extra cost (when they moved from six mixes to two packages) will react when they get the uplift of over £5 in September of this year....

This Sky customer explains it better than I could....

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shocked::shocked: I see what you mean Hugh its the first time i have come accross this, could be skys generosity with the years price freeze has to be paid for somehow if i am reading it right.

I like the comment from a poster calling him/herself anonymous at the end in relation to the sky package article link .


"I live in the US but that sound terrible what they are trying to do. The cable companies over here play the same game. Their all without sight on the right!"

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l wonder if Muppetman is aware of this as he is usually on the ball.

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Probably get on the dog and bone to retentions although I suspect there will be a large percentage of these customers will continue to pay thus making a considerable amount of money for investors such as Mr Murdoch :D

I'm well aware I have a friend in this situation , I always had 6 mix so doesn't effect me but Hughs point is a very valid one.

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Yes a excellent valid point made by Hugh from the link.

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I wonder is it just the TV thats going up or is this increase accross the board.?

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l am sure we will find that out in due time.

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Thanks denphone the good news awaits.:D:D:D

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Let's not also forget that Sky could also increase prices in September , if they also increased theirs by £2.00 the guy in Hugh's link would be 7.50 worse off unless they drop to the Entertainment pack at £20.00. It's a ludicrous situation from both pay TV companies which can only help the likes of Netflix , Lovefilm etc.

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Yes the prices are becoming far too high in my mind and they have to watch that they do not lose customers to other platforms as if they continue like this they will lose customers.

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Depending on your VM TV bundle, I believe some customers may not get the full increase.

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Can you say any more on that?

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Just the way discounts are worked out for VIP etc. You should get a letter soon detailing how it will affect you.

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Has the price of postage and paper gone up by this amount? It doesn't cost any more to actually produce the statement, so I assume they want to make more profit on people who like a paper statement

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Luckily, the Size M Package is only going up by 50p, the others a lot more

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukne...ail-plans.html

The Royal Mail said it is hoping to increase second class stamps by 53 per cent from 36p to 55p. The price of second class stamps would then rise further by inflation every year for seven years. There would be no limit on the price of a first class stamp, which currently costs 46p.

Royal Mail was responding to a proposal by Ofcom, lodged last October, to lift restrictions on the level at which it can set the price of stamps.

Ofcom had suggested Royal Mail could charge unlimited prices for first class stamps, and increase second class stamps from 36p to between 45p and 55p.

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Well everyone there is always Freeview..;)

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i was talking about this the other day to my wife saying i bet VM put there prices up again in april, those poor workers at VM loosing there jobs at that same time is this rise to pay for there redundacy ! nice one VM ! i know i have posted on here about VM but iam sorry enough is enough iam off ! freeveiw for me !

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Ha Ha :D

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I don't understand the logic of second class stamps and post, it takes longer and the saving per stamp isn't much different.

Bit random for this thread though, but interesting to know!

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freeview/freesat should not be dismissed , there is plenty of choice and now 4 HD channels. I have just brought a freeview+ HD box as back up to VM, I have to say having tried it out I am pretty impressed.

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Hi
If you look at virginmedia shop the prices have gone up between £ 1 and £3
on tv L £18.50 now £19.50
Im on TV L + Tivo and BB L it used to be £36.50 now its £39.50

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My freeview is best:erm:

Police drama's -Friday and Saturday Nights in the town?

Hospital drama -Every night in the A&E Dept?

Jeremy Kyle type shows -All the time during the day in Barnsley:D

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Freeview/Freesat are great. I had both for a few months last year but only problem was I really needed a good pvt and neither platform had one that I got on with.

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Well here in Wakefield, the Jeremy Kyle show is known as 'The Barnsley News' :D

Cheers

Grim

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I thought it was South Yorkshire's equivalent of "Made in Chelsea"?:D

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Plus Netflix and Lovefilm. I can see a Freeview-YouView-Netflix-Lovefilm combo being very attractive to those not ready signed up for Pay-TV platforms.

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the link seems to not be working, now.

what did it say?

nevermind. found it on google cache.

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Thanks for the vote of confidence :erm:

We'll true but for £5.25 more they get 30 more hd channels

---------- Post added at 12:25 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:23 AM ----------

Amazing the only thing they can give a definite on is price increases never channels

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True, but no ESPN if you follow sport which is about a £10 extra with sky.

But is included on VMs XL TV pack.

I know but if you dont watch there is a difference that all I mean

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Yes thats true enough,its the same with everything its hard to please everybody my self i would rather have ESPN included in my TV XL sub then pay £10 for more HD channels,just my personal preference though.:)

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Looks like most things are going up now. Changes on Virgin's site:

Broadband:
L from £13.50 to £14.50
XXL from £25 to £25.50

Phone
L from £4 to £4.60

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I've always been a big believer in VM and have been with them for over 5 years now sticking with them through the loss of Sky Basics, the seeming endless sagas of new channels "coming soon", etc.

I also love TiVo but think like many others on here that whilst the box is amazing, it is seriously let down by content. Obviously extra HD channels, Sky Atlantic , etc, would be nice but the big lead it had on competitors was it's connectivity and the endless possibilities this could bring. VM however serve us up some tripe with poor quality YouTube and Ebay apps and all the others are generally rubbish apps which are more like adverts promoting Sky Sports & Movies and the latest Harry Potter film.

The apps section could bring endless possibilities by adding the likes of Facebook, Netflix, LOVEFiLM, Google, a web browser and many more. Whilst I appreciate these might take away from VM's pay-per-view selection, they now claim to be a content provider and with this in mind should provide additional content for customer choice.

Sky have just announced the addition of BBC iPlayer and ITV Net Player along with improved Anytime+ and up to 40Mb fibre broadband in the near future.

VM then offer to increase our broadband speeds for 'free' yet suddenly increase the prices on all their products.

I think VM have seriously lost their strategy as Sky are quickly catching the up now with VOD, BB for general users (obviously VM will still be better for heavy downloaders) and obviously Sky's channel content is king.

This current price rise has seriously annoyed me. I have for the first time in a long time considered leaving VM and going to Sky. I priced up a few different packages with Sky and realised I could save (post VM price rises) between £5 and £20 a month dependant on which package I opt for.

I therefore need VM to pull something out of the bag to keep me as I am a pretty basic users who wants to watch linear or recorded tv, have plenty of content, broadband that allows me to surf, check email, shop and a telephone line is a telephone line.

Superfast 30Mb + internet and endless VOD is not necessary for me personally and therefore (although I hate to say it) I may seriously have to consider the switch to Sky as for my needs their packages and prices are looking increasingly attractive.

Superblade7

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As i left Sky last year, for the far better Tivo box, i am hoping that better content not just VOD but more channels will be added. (to be funded by price increase)

Sky keep sending me half price offers to come back to them, one day i may just return. But will stay with Virgin to give them a chance to increase the channels to ones that keep them competing with Sky.

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But you'll realise after a while that them so called offers never seem to make your bill smaller, they are about the same or just a few quid cheaper. They will find something else to make up the difference, they will find some other way of getting the normal price out of you.

That's why I never fell for them offers 'Free Broadband'. Well for a start you have to spend about £21 to £25 on the homephone package to get that and that was advertised by TalkTalk,Sky and Orange. And then it comes with a small usage allowance, people easily used it up and then began paying extra for going over board. Then TalkTalk had the cheek to remove that special 'Free broadband' offer after 18 months as they claim it was in the small print.

Also keep switching back and forth can also cost money on things like new connection and installation charges.

Virgin Media will add more channels, it is in fact the broadcasters themselves that have a lot of say in this as well, like Viacom when they keep pulling off TV channels and replacing them with something else.

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:clap::clap:

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I have only been with Virgin Media since October and was a long time Sky customer before then and for me, VM's problem does not relate to the TV channels they have or don't have.

I like the TiVo, the Broadband is the fastest I have ever had and even the useless SuperHub is bearable compared to the old Sky Router I had...

...but, I have never, ever, experienced as many faults with a service as I have with VM.

Putting aside the major outage a few weeks back, I have lost my Broadband on 17 occasions which have required a reboot (yes I have counted), and 3 times due to a local fault.

With the TiVo we have had problems with On Demand streaming, occasional pixelation on Live channels and complete loss of TV for an hour or more twice.

That is why I would begrudge paying more to VM, because they can't even deliver smoothly what I pay for NOW! Unless something magical happens between now and when our contract ends, we will return to Sky, especially as they will have an Unlimited Fibre product by then.

You can have all the toys and speed in the world but the network just isn't able to support it consistently, which equates to a poor customer experience, something I am not prepared to pay £60+ a month and rising for.

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Also have just seen this posted by BenMcr77 on DS.

http://forums.digitalspy.co.uk/showp...77&postcount=8

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Ouch

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There must be something big on the horizon to give us as a appeasement for all these price rises coming our way.:(:td:

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does this mean that vip50 package will go up?

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Ben or DF can answer you better on that.

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Stop moaning. £2 quid is nothing. Look what they've given you this year

- a promise of a BB speed upgrade (could be 18 months away in my case)
- an 'upgrade' to TiVo to stop you using TiVo Commander (because its much better than anything they could hope to produce, fair enough I guess)
- reminders (well, sometime, well possibly never actually)
- red button (a definite possible, maybe)
- BBC Iplayer (well not as good as V+ and it buffers/cuts off before the end)
- ITV HD sound (not in sync but at least it's sound)
- making loads of staff redundant

Worth every penny. I for one would gladly give house/car and soul to VM. They're doing a fantastic job.

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VIP is on the sales site as being £105.71 http://shop.virginmedia.com/bundles/...e-package.html

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Ouch :shocked:

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Yes indeed and one wonders what could be on the horizon for loyal Sky customers as well.:(:td:

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:LOL:

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That says £91.81

edit: ah plus line rental.

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Well that's £4 extra a month already if your on XL and have TiVo. I wonder what price rise is still be announced, surely not line rental again!

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Yes £14 plus pounds for line rental is a rip off but its that with the other providers as well.

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Mine is 12.25 with Sky and includes evening and weekend calls

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It's Coming Soon :erm:

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They better add more channel and VOD content after this!

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Lets hope so.;)

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Just an idea:

Sky Movies Collection OR Sky Sports Collection included in the XL package
Picturebox included in the XL package
More non-premium TV channels on the way

The overall price increases across the whole TV service would definately make up for this, however, M,M+ and L TV package would not receive any Sky Movie channels.

If they did that, then that will definately make Virgin TV look more attractive and Sky would eventually have to drop that price although for the HD channels an additional fee would still exist.

Maybe that is a reason for price increases?

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Not happy about paying £3 for a epg That is constenly wrong and not regularly updated.so defo not pay £5.i think vm are trying to get everyone to cancel tv then it is easier for them to shut tv division down and just become a broadband+phone provider

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They'll phase in the £5 per box Tivo charge to current customers in a few months times (about September is my guess). Common tactic. They won't want the initial TiVo adopters to runaway come April time when a lot of contracts are up. I can draft the letter for them now:-

September 2012

Dear Mr K.

Good News !

Reminders, Red Button, BB Speed increase and TiVO apps will be coming soon blah de blah....

PS. We've held your price for TiVo so long as you're a loyal customer blah de blah, but now we're forced to pass on a small increase to harmonize our billing systems blah de blah

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No they wouldn't advertise it so much and invest in tivo or be adding new tv channels or invest in Nagra. The only thing they will shut down from there TV division is the BT leased franchises which are Analogue and any MATV contracts which distribute Analogue TV, they are not interested in MATV contracts it becomes uncommercially viable after a few years as technology changes. If Virgin Media was to continue supplying a MATV service, it would have to spend money on upgrading the service to Digital and then by the time that is complete, something else will come out and it will need further investment. It's a drain on the companies resources and finances, some people don't pay anything for the analogue services they receive, just basic 1 to 4 channels or a few extra without even using set top boxes.

Anything that Virgin Media needs to look at closing down is the landline service, invest more in Voip, some countries have already done so.