True Story - Is this how Sky threat loyal customers? Dreadful customer experience.

Stephen Coy

My parents have Sky for many years and one of the things we wanted to sort out was to get an extra Sky Box in the Bedroom. Around early January I was in Whitewater Shopping centre in Newbridge and there is a Sky stall. As I walked past they made eye contact as they usually do and asked if there was anything they could help me with. I thought about the extra sky box for the bedroom and asked him how much it would cost to have it installed.

This is where the problem started. The salesman, a young chap in his early twenties who I know to see and could identify if needed, explained to me that he might be able to get me a better deal. He said that if I signed up to “Sky Q” and “bundled” my internet with him that I would be able to avail of great offers. My parents rely on the phone and internet and had both provided by Eir at the time. He asked me for a number from Eir that would be on the bill that I had to ring my father for. I done so and he checked something on the internet and he then said the transition would be “seamless” and that Sky contact Eir and arrange the switch over. After a lengthy discussion about the benefits of Sky Q, the voice controlled remote etc, and how much money I could save, he then suggested that I sign up as my own account and have my father cancel his account as this was the best course of action as all the equipment would need to be replaced. Just for clarity sake, he didn’t say that we were gaining anything free by this course of action and told me that I would have €180 for the 2TB box. What he was saying and offering seemed to make sense so I agreed. He then said that he would “give it a try”. He explained that because there was an existing box in the house that there might be an issue signing up to another. Whilst on the phone to someone else from Sky he was put on hold, at this point he asked me if my father may be still under contract. I did not know and told him so. I told him my father had been with Sky for as long as I can remember and well in excess of a decade. He said that my father would be out of contract so and that all he had to do was cancel the contract if we managed to get signed up as our own contract. I note this because despite being on hold, he had the phone up to his ear and if all the calls are recorded as Sky say then this conversation should be recorded and retrievable if there is any doubt about the advice we received. Everything went through grand with the guy on the phone and we signed the new contract.

In the following couple of days my father rang to cancel his contract as has been instructed. This took many phone call and many hours on hold to get through. Two things occurred here. Firstly, as we were not really aware that what had been done wasn’t in accordance with Sky’s best practice, we didn’t lie to the lady we were speaking to and explained to her the circumstance under which we were cancelling the contract. She said that this was not possible because there cannot be two contracts on one property within six months. It was made clear, albeit indirectly, that they though my father was trying to get free equipment or a better deal. This was not the case as I have said above we paid an extra €180 and had just done as had been advised by a Sky member of staff. Secondly, she also said that my father was still under contract until the end of the month as he had been contacted by Sky and agreed to purchase some offer on his package 12 months previous. It transpired that most of this was silly stuff like “Sky Go” that he never had any access to anyway. My father said that he would just leave the two contracts in place and cancel his one at the end of the month when out of contract. She said that this was not possible and that she had already cancelled the contract that I had signed. Please remember that this included the Sky Q and the phone line and internet. That was fine so, and if that was to be the case then so be it. We only asked that my €180 be refunded. We were assured that this would be the case. Again this conversation should be recorded and retrievable should what I am saying be doubted.

In the next couple of days my fathers phone and Internet was discontinued by Eir. Apparently Sky had went ahead and looked for a disconnection despite canceling the contract, leaving my parents without phone and internet.

I rang sky up and was talking to a chap who said he would set everything up on my fathers old account but that it would take 2 weeks before the internet could be set up. We agreed to this. The engineer was a week late meaning we had no internet for 3 weeks.
After the engineer who set up the phone line and internet left our house we didn’t receive any phone calls to the home phone for a couple of days. When we checked it turned out that he had changed our home phone number.

We then had to ring through to try and get this rectified. This again took ages on the phone. Eventually it was rectified. About a week later my father received a bill from eir for the internet and phone which Sky had promised would be “seamlessly” changed. My father rang eir to demonstrate but they said that they had heard nothing from Sky and would be freezing the line until he paid the now 2 months phone and internet bill despite the fact that we had been with sky all that time and had been waiting over a month without internet or a phone line in that time. My father then rang sky to explain what was happening. The lady who was talking to him told him sky had not contacted eir and that the bill would have to be paid. She said in order to get it sorted we would have to get cut off for a short while but to ignore any e-mails about leaving sky as this needed to happen in order to reconnect.(please see attached) Nothing happened for a couple of days. We were disconnected that evening and have not been reconnected since. Both of the additional tv boxes have also stopped working and says “technical fault”. I assume this is because there is no internet.

This was the 26th of February, over 3 weeks ago making it 7 weeks out of the last 10 that we have been without internet or two of the three TV’s. Then last week the final straw occurred when we received a bill from Sky for the internet, phone and TV. Both my parents are retired and spend most of their time in the house and I feel angry that they have been left without internet access for so long. To be honest I regret ever talking to that Sky salesman and after all that has happened and how we have been treated we are just so sick of dealing with Sky that we just wish things were restored to how it was prior to us being mis-sold the new package and Sky subsequently not honouring the contract. I feel because my father is quiet and doesn't want to cause any hassle makes things worse. If he rang up and caused a stink this would all have been sorted. It appears the more problematic customer you are with Sky the better you are treated. The amount of time both my father and myself have spent trying to get this sorted can be proven by phone records. Both my own and my fathers mobile bills are available. I also have a record via messenger of how obtuse the staff were when I tried to find out why the engineer had never turned up, refusing to deal with us until we could provide a password that we had set up, as it transpired, 17 years previously.

All we ever wanted was what we have been paying for. As I said my father is with Sky 17 years, has never missed a payment and never once looked for anything in this time. All I wanted was an extra box down in one bedroom. The amount of hassle, time and money this has cost us is just unbelievable.

If Sky refuse to sort this request out I have been advised to seek legal advise. Prior to taking this step I was wondering if this can be sorted out without any further stress to my parents?

So just to summarize:

- My family home were with Sky for 17 years.

- I wanted to get an extra box down in one of the Bedrooms.
- I was persuaded by a Sky member of staff that the “cleanest” and most economic way to get this done was to open an account in a different name than my father and get Sky Q. Just to be clear there was no incentive or free equipment offered here. I had to pay €180 for the extra 2tb box.

- I was also convinced to change my phone line and internet to sky. I was advised to cancel my fathers account the following day and that if my father had been with Sky for 17 years there would be no problem with contracts. Just to confirm, I can identify this individual if needed. His conversation with me should be recorded in case of doubt.

- When I rang and told the truth about what had happened the new contract was canceled

- We signed for a slightly more expensive package under my fathers existing contract.

- We were disconnected from Eir by Sky and had our phone number which we had for 45 years changed even though we were assured this would not be the case.

- We had to wait 3 weeks without internet before connection, one week later than we had been told.

- We then received a full bill from Eir. When queried they said Sky had not contacted them regarding the disconnection.

- When we rang Sky to querie this we were told that it would be sorted out and that they would first just have to disconnect us on the system for a short period of time.

- We still have not been reconnected, over three weeks later. We are still unsure if Eir have been contacted yet or if we will receive further bills.

-As of today we will have spent well over 8 hours waiting on phone lines, which we have being paying for. This is one whole days work spent waiting on the phone. Sky Queue indeed. Every phone call just seems to make things worse. All this inconvenience just to try and get what we have being paying for.

Vic_08

Sorry, fella, not reading all that. Got as far as signing up with one of the shopping centre salesmen and knew the rest anyway.

Moral of the story; don't sign up to ANYTHING without doing research first, and never buy on the spot from cold callers or shopping centre spoofers.

These companies have extensive websites with all their products laid out for you to investigate in your own time, these salesmen are only there to sell you as much product as they can for their commission, they want a signature right there so use all the typical pressure selling techniques to get you to sign up.

Wheety

What channels do your parents watch? I ask this because if it's just the 'normal' ones cancel the tv part of the contract entirely. Although they probably have your parents on a new 12 month contract.

Ten Pin

There are Talk to Sky and Talk to Eir forums on boards that might be able to sort it out.
Comreg is another option, although they normally only intervene after a complaints procedure has taken it's course.
If your parents watch mainly Free to Air TV then look at the possibility of cancelling Sky altogether and stay with Eir for phone/broadband.

There is also the option of getting any direct debits refunded by your bank to your account but make sure you can show evidence that the contract with Sky has not been fulfilled on their part before going that route.

If you find yourself getting nowhere with any of that (it seems that may already be the case) then Conor Pope is good at getting these type of scenarios resolved. Pity that it takes a public airing to sort out what should take at most 10 minutes on the phone.

icdg

OP, I agree with the poster above. There are so many issues in the post that I think it’s so highly specific that you need to deal with Sky themselves on it. I don’t think it’s really suitable for a forum thread. There’s a talk to Sky forum elsewhere on Boards that is staffed by employees of Sky who might be able to directly address your issues.

I’m, somewhat reluctantly closing the thread in the circumstances. In doing so I’m emphasising that you’ve broken no rules in posting here. It’s just that this is a very specific scenario that you need to address with Sky.