Prices get Sky-high for digital viewers

ALMOST 300,000 Sky Digital subscribers are facing a price increase in January.

The charge for the basic family pack will rise by 5.6% from 27 to 28.50 per month, while the Sky World package will rise from 60 to 61 per month. The increase will gain Sky up to3 million in extra revenue.

But the news will come as a shock to consumers, as Sky recently announced profits of 380 million from its British and Irish subscribers for the first half of this year.

The Consumers Association of Ireland accused Sky of using its dominant position in the market to ‘print their own money’.

“I don’t think this increase is justified because when you add this to the 15% price increase they had on some packages last year, it’s more than double the rate of inflation. There’s no control over Sky and a lot of people have no choice other than to use them,” said chairman Michael Kilcoyne. Sky customers must pay bills directly from their bank account and Mr Kilcoyne said this made increasing prices very simple.

“Anytime Sky feel like getting a few bob more, all they have to do is give you a month’s notice and increase the direct debit. They have us over a barrel,” he said.

However, Sky’s Irish director Mark Deering has defended the price rises. “The average rise will be 2.6%, which is much lower than the rate of inflation and our last price increase was 15 months ago.” he said.

Although the cable companies NTL and Chorus have more than 600,000 subscribers between them, Sky is the dominant player in the market. It has managed to change all its customers over to digital while just 53,000 of NTL’s 360,000 customers have switched to the digital service.

But Sky’s price increases may accelerate the changeover to the BBC’s Freesat service, which offers all BBC channels, ITV and Channel4 free of charge.