Sky or Virgin?

I admit to being a bit of a dinosaur with modern technology, but I'm looking for advice from users of both Sky and Virgin media as to which is best of what seems to me to be a bad bunch. I first became a Sky customer in 2004, after responding to a 'special offer.' One year later I noticed from my bank statement that the cost of my Sky subscription had increased by about 30 per cent. When I rang them and, (eventually,) got through, I was told that the special offer was for the first year only. Something that had not been made clear in the ad, (even in the small print,) and not explained to me at the time I signed up. I stuck with it as it wasn't much more expensive than Virgin Media at the then current rate, but when we moved house in 2007 Virgin Media was connected to the new property and so I signed up with them. No knocking their product, but their after sales service was soooo bad that after one year I kicked them in to touch and moved back to Sky. When one of my daughters came to stay recently she pointed out that I had no internet connection to our Sky box and so couldn't access certain things that I'd been paying for since the day I signed up. They weren't particularly programmes I would have watched, but others in the family might and I should have at least had the option. This was an installation error and so I phoned Sky. To say they were unhelpful would be an understatement. They wanted to charge me £65 for an engineer to come and connect the above, at which I baulked. After leaving me on hold for about five minutes, (0844 number,) while he spoke to a supervisor, he said he could reduce that to £40, but that was the best he could do. I said no to that as well as I didn't see why I should pay to correct their error. If anything I should be entitled to a refund for the service I've been paying for and not receiving. He said he would get a manager to call me back shortly. That was an hour ago. Still waiting.

Been with Virgin for years Chalkey, no problem I have phone,television,broad band....I love it...on the rare occasions there is a fault when you phone they can tell you automatically if there is a fault with the service and when it will be rectified automatically...my daughter has sky package and is not satisfied and is thinking about changing.. read that back...repeated myself!

Hi chalkey

Seems like Sky are pretty quick answering internet related posts over on their "help forum".

You may get a better response, with some action, on there. Perhaps they can point you at someone you can discuss refunds with.

Also, remind them of their contractual obligations with you!

Forum is here.

Thanks, guys & gals.
Jan, I can only say that Virgin must have improved their after sales service a million per cent since I left them. Perhaps after the many times I told them what I thought of them, the message finally got through. On the subject of 'getting through,' that was the problem. It was virtually impossible to get hold of anyone when there was a problem.
I eventually got a call back from Sky and the guy blinded me with science. When I spoke to my daughter later, she told me that it sounded like he hadn't even understood the problem and his answer was not relevant to the complaint. I sometimes wish I still had my old black and white tv and my steam radio.

Virgin were remarkably kind and refunded a young man who had virgin installed in his flat and was victimised by neighbourhood bullies , he was very vulnerable..I phoned to explain and pay for him and they cancelled the agreement! He left the property because his health and sanity were being compromised...this was in derbyshire..

I am a Virgin customer, have been for 12 years. Their customer services team is awful! I'm in £70 of credit and they will not give me a refund, they told me not to pay any more money to them until the £70 has been used for bills.

I think it really depends on what you need from the services provided.

Do you get Internet, Phone and TV from them? In which case it’d be cheaper to find a cheap internet and phone provider and then get Freeview. You can get something called a Freeview PVR (Personal Video Recorder) which will do pretty much what the SKY+ does, only for free. I’ve been on that setup for a while and don’t really miss SKY channels at all. It also allows you to switch around with internet and phone depending who’s cheaper without having to set everything up from scratch again – and if you want SKY back you can get a cheap entry offer.

You can find some general advice and info on haggling down your costs on this site (which I use quite a lot).

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/utilities/?tab=13

Thanks, dronid. I will look in to the 'Freeview' thing.
At the moment we do have all our eggs in one basket; TV, phone and broadband, all with Sky.
Just put the house on the market, so I guess I'll stick with what I've got until we move, then review the whole shebang,
All the above comments and advice has been useful, thanks to all, and it will help when the time comes.

I am with Talk Talk (used to be called Homechoice, was sold to Tiscali and is now called Talk Talk).
I moved from Virgin (who always seem to have problems with cables rotting away outside). Have not had any issues with Talk Talk.