Charging for Ad Skipping

[Jason+Golding]

I wonder why sky charge for ad skipping when virgin don't one their stream service?  Virgin don't even charge if you don't subscribe to any channels on their free stream service. In such a competitive world - seems strange how sky can justify this. If the catch up services were completely free of ads I would totally understand - but charging just to be able to skip ads when virgin doesn't seems wrong. 

[bob1234 · Accepted solution]

@Jason+GoldingI suppose the only answer is because they can.

[Jason+Golding]

They can because people are willing to pay I guess. Just seems wrong to me. There is clearly no need about from pure profiteering 

[Anonymous]

Money Money Money!

All channels well majority on stream are HD with Q you were charged to receive the standard HD content on stream Sky had to find another way to replace the £5 so they came up with the absolutely abysmal mind blowing AD Skipping.

This charge probably one of the most complained about.

AD free then acceptable but to pay to FF through adverts is criminal. Gosh could do that for free on my old VHS and it worked 🙄

[TimmyBGood]

@Jason+Golding 

Worth remembering that Virgin has to work harder to get customers because its national network distribution is necessarily limited.

[bob1234]

I have not done it but rather than look at the individual packs I would compare the actual total cost of all the things you want. It may be that some build the sky "extra" into their other packs.

Certainly Sky try to make their headline price look quite cheap when they know most will want at least one add on.

[Jason+Golding]

Virgin stream 

base entertainment pack £8

sky sports in HD £18.75

sky cinema £11

ad skipping free 

kids pack £2.50 

[peter+and+fiona]

It is ridiculous that they charge for advert skipping considering I could record onto a Sky Q box and fast forward myself. 

Contacted the team this morning to see if they could do anything and the answer was no. Ended up removing Sky Sports, Sky Ultra HD (speed was never fast enough anyway) and ad skipping and saved myself £39 a month. With Sky Glass nearly being paid off my total bill will reduce from £111 a month to £37 a month come August.

I'll miss the sport but will have to work around it going forward 

[Mr+Michael+P]

The adverts within on demand premium paid for service is the main reason i will leave sky and not return next  july once my contract is up. i now purposly find alternative ways to purchase shows say on Apple to avoid all the ads on premium paid for tv from sky, Its just madness and you can get a cheap freeview recorder and fast forwards ads for free. I could live with paying to fast forward ads within live tv broadcasts that are on timeshift its all the ads within boxsets that you have paid for i find totally unacceptable and i will not stay if this continues at least offer a paid option to remove all the ads. 

Its weird because Netflix who sky do a deal to include does not have adverts and neither does Paramount Plus for example so you end up purposely finding content on those platform to avoid ads. A small plus at the minute is that UHD boxsets dont tend to have adverts but if the UHD tv shows was shown in that format on a tv channel i sure they would load it with ads just like all the others shows. 

[TimmyBGood]

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@Mr+Michael+P wrote:

Its weird because Netflix who sky do a deal to include does not have adverts

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Netflix does have adverts if the subscriber doesn't choose to pay enough not to have them ; )

[Mr+Michael+P]

Yes i should have been more clear i know netflix has adverts as an option depending on package but the difference is netflix offers various packages where you can pay to actually remove the ads, however sky have no such option you pay a premium more money actually than netflix and the ads are forced on you regardless, SKY offer NO option as payment to remove ads but netflix, paramount, etc do offer it. 

[Mr+Michael+P]

I spoke to somebody at sky a few months ago and they did say offering an ad free option to on demand for shows from sky was something they was looking into and considering, but I have not been able to see anything about this online or in the media and was wondering if anybody has heard anything regards a paid option to remove ads?

I dont really want to pay much more and I feel if you subscribe to multiple packages such as sport, movies and entertainment, UHD with atmos than ad free for on demand such be included but i would pay more to remove ads it just dont feel like a good or similar viewing experience to say netflix or other similar services until ad free is an option. 

[FootPH1]

It's a nonsense, and completely unjustified. 

[peter+and+fiona]

Sky Forum say that's an answer.... that's not an answer!

[Tommy92]

Sky stream Is still cheaper than sky q so I really don't mind paying the 5 pound ...I mean if sky q was cheaper and they charged 5 pound to record everyone would moan ..maybe they should charge 5 pound more and include it 🤷‍♂️🤷‍♂️