With many people spending more time at home, renting and buying movies on Sky Store seems to be increasingly popular. But even with something that looks to be straightforward, there can be pitfalls if you don’t know how things work.
So here is a quick guide for users, with a few hints and tips.
From reading the Sky Store forum, the single most confusing thing for users, is how long a movie rental lasts. This is a typical post:
“I paid £5.49 to rent a movie for 7 days and it has gone after 4 days?”
When you go to your Sky Q box to rent a movie, a pre-rental screen tells you:
Well this is true, but it doesn’t tell you everything you need to know. You do have 7 days to start watching but from the time you first press play, you (almost always) have only 48 hours to finish watching your movie. That 48 hour timer starts even if you just press play for 1 second. Which brings me to my first tip:
- When you are downloading your rental movie, don’t press play just to check it works OK as that starts the 48 hour timer. Don’t press play on your movie until you are ready to watch it.
A regular query on the forum is:
“I just rented Trolls in UHD but don’t have a UHD TV. Will I be charged?”
- You are only charged for a rental made on your Sky box once you start viewing the movie. If you don’t have a UHD TV you can’t view it so you won’t be charged. To remove the copy from your box, as well as deleting it, you have to go to the Manage tab in Recordings (It’s down at the bottom of the menu) Then there is a deleted tab, go there and click “delete forever”. Then you can go ahead and rent the HD or SD version you want.
A final tip is regarding movies you have rented through other parts of Sky Store:
- If you rent a movie on the Sky Store app or from skystore.com, as soon as you order the movie, you are charged for it even if you don’t watch it. Note that you can’t send rented movies to your Sky box to view.
Some rules for Buy and Keep movies are different. If for example you “buy and keep” on an app or at skystore.com, you can send the movie to your Sky Q box and to some Sky + boxes. See Sky Store Buy & Keep/Rentals for more information.
On the Sky Store website there is a useful FAQ section and on your Sky Box there are some terms and conditions to read when renting just before you input your PIN number to confirm the rental. It’s probably worth looking at those pages if there are things you aren’t sure about.
Questions? Post on the Sky Store Forum or visit Sky Store Help.
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