SKY blocked me for have no landline phone.

bottomdog

I have been cut off by Sky because i have no landline, I have a Sky plus box I was happy to pay for my sports et-al package. This is a crazy policy. I only have a mobil phone but Sky are now insisting I get a landline phone if I want their service. Can anyone offer an ideas?

zAbbo

How did you get Sky+ installed with no-phone line ?

ixtlan

More details are required...

Do you have multiroom apart from the single Sky+?

How long have you got the service?

Although this is strictly a condition of the Sky+ install (though apparently there's now an option to pay money to exclude it), it would seem extraordinary for Sky to terminate an account.... unless you have 2 Sky boxes...

Ix.

bottomdog

Thanks guys, I have it about three months, The TV shop signed me up for sky+ without checking if I had a phone line, their installer arrived and put up a satelite dish and installed the wiring and the box. I had signed the contracts to have Sky Sports and 2 other general packages. At first I recieved Free to air Sky. I rang Sky to activate the Sports Channels but the guy on the phone said I needed a phone line/ I said I didn't have one. so he said he could not activate the card, I explained it was already working bar Sports and some other paid stations. He just said it was immpossible to connect me. I contacted the TV shop and asked about my credit card. They said it would not be activated or charged. It wasn't. So I resigned myself to living with Free to Air, A week later Sky cut off the entire supply of channels and left me nothing.
I am happy to pay the charge to get connected as mentioned byIxtlan above.I am always happy to pay for whatever service they can give me. BUT I am not paying for a phone line just to satisfy SKY if it can be avoided.
But any advice about how to handle this would be appricated. The shop said it was not their fault because I never indicated I did not have a phone line in the house/
Its frustrating, just wish sky could take my money and swich me back on/ or is there other providers that can get me up and running. I do not have a SKY 2 box

zAbbo

Ahh sounds a little different to what you first indicated

Seems it's the installers fault for setting you up, when you had no phone line (how did get activate it?)

Have you ever been charged by Sky?

bottomdog

Your right Zabbo. its not exactly clear in my first post, its probably just the frustration of it, you are right the installer screwed up, but it was activated straight away, all the channels bar the premium ones, that is the free to air channels.I have never been charged by SKY but i did fill in the forms to debit my card which they never did. The cruz is the system works fine, I am prepared as ever to pay, but SKY have a fixation that stipulates ' No landline- No connection' unless someone else here knows different or can offer a solution.

Tony

Take a look at the thread about no phone lines

Ulsterman 1690

The shop said it was not their fault because I never indicated I did not have a phone line in the house

WTF

I mean if it was the case that you didnt have ELECTRICITY in the house then fair enough but not having a landline phone is hardly unheard of and since when has it been the responsibility of the consumer to inform a retailer of what public utilities they are not availing of ?

Kintarō Hattori

Hmnnn I don't visit this forum often and can't see that thread. Any chance of a link?

Tony

eo980 wrote: »

Hmnnn I don't visit this forum often and can't see that thread. Any chance of a link?

well its only a few threads down but anyway http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055160502

Kintarō Hattori

Many thanks Tony.

HungryJoey

Sky are D!cks anyway. I'll never deal with them again(until court ) 2 Years ago we signed up with Sky+ Multi room and every channel under the sun. 1 month later we were cut off. They made 2 accounts for our name somehow, claiming payments are failing also on our account (whick 1 ?? ). 3 months later still no sign of our service resuming.We had enough and we wrote and got it cut off with their agreement also. We are still getting billed over a year later even thought we cancled over a year ago and they are still charging us for a service we don't have NOR ever did have when we were with them. They also sent a few threatning legal letters because they havn't recieved payments 1 year later for a service that doesn't exist. We payed 150 euro a few months later down the line just to clear off the month we did have viewing etc..:eek: Absoloute joke they are. 3 Months without TV because they can't resolve a simple issue they created. Their poxy support line with customer service staff that don't speak a word of english doesn't help either. Never knew what they were saying to me. Stup!d cnuts.

*Appologies about anger, but it was a nightmare situation*

Hj

bottomdog

Thanks guys, from what I read on that thread SKY are now taking customers that don;t have a phone line for a fee of €37. if so that is the problem solved. Will report the findings.

Tony

Good luck

MrVostro

Just call them and tell them you'll pay the non-phoneline fee and they should switch it on. Many many people without phone lines these days. sky are going to have to get with the program soon

Mossy Monk

Why is it all of a sudden impossible for Sky+ to work without a phone line? They are money grabbing thieves.

byte

From what I've read, I believe the OP's card was never activated in the first place.

You say you only received free to air channels. What is the message you get onscreen now since these channels were cut off? Free to air channels will work with NO card in the box. Take your existing non-activated card from the box, see what happens.

Or maybe you're referring to the likes of Sky One, etc, which are not free-to-air, but subscription channels. In such a scenario, your card was activated, but since Sky weren't getting their Direct Debits for whatever reasons, you were cut off.

Need clarification on what channels you're on about.

What I can't understand is how the retailer didn't know you'd no phoneline. It's one of the sections to be filled in on the contract!!

kilasser

I use a sky plus box with an Irish sub. In London, have had it for the past three years, never connected to the phone line. Sky activated the card in the plus box over the air when I rang them from London. So they will do an activattionover the phone. But I suppose I bought and installed the box my self with nothing only the card from sky so no need for it to be connected to the phone line. Good luck with it.

denis1501

Bring the box to a m8's house ( a m8 with a phone) and connect it up.
Do a new installation (services, 4 0 1 select - new installation)
wait for callback success message.
Call sky to pair card and box and activate sky + functions.
Sky agent- Do you have a phone line?
Answer - yes
Is the box connected?
Answer - yes
end of story.
regards
D.

Tony

denis1501 wrote: »

( a m8 with a phone) and connect it up.

Mate will need a dish lined up for sky too for this to work

bottomdog

No quite guys, SKY now do call backs every few months to check you are still connected, or so I'm told. Could be BS mind you.

Tony

bottomdog wrote: »

No quite guys, SKY now do call backs every few months to check you are still connected, or so I'm told. Could be BS mind you.

That has been the case up to this point but it seems they are changing policy on this.

richie_rvf

Sky will ping the boxes to make sure they are there - in the case of multi room that is.

I think it is to prevent you using one of your boxes somewhere else.

A mate of mine arranged to have sky hd installed last week, they arrived but wouldn't do it because he had no land line.

Is it true that you can pay extra to avoid this? I would have thought that the installation 'engineer' would have mentioned it?

Richie.

denis1501

bottomdog wrote: »

No quite guys, SKY now do call backs every few months to check you are still connected, or so I'm told. Could be BS mind you.

Only multi-room is being policed in this way.
regards
D.

byte

You can, as of a day or two ago, now install SkyHD without a phoneline. The extra fee is €37.50

bottomdog

Thanks to you all. I reapproached my TV store. It's true, for €37.50 one off fee, I can bypast the phone line demand. SKY dropped it when 1000s of customers willing to buy their premium packages were been dropped or excluded. I refilled the original contract form. They say my new card will be posted in three days. Then call back to the shop for activation. Will let you know if it works.

IT Loser

Mossy Monk wrote: »

Why is it all of a sudden impossible for Sky+ to work without a phone line? They are money grabbing thieves.

If Sky+ is taken as a multiroom option, then it is impossible to run it without a phone line. That is my understanding.

Supercell

And HD, any need for a phoneline for that?

I'm thinking about upgrading to a HD package soon and this would be a major turn off if there are keep alive checks over the phone.

watty

IT Loser wrote: »

If Sky+ is taken as a multiroom option, then it is impossible to run it without a phone line. That is my understanding.

yes. so that you can't sell sub to your mate.


Currently Sky "requires" phone of HD. However 31% don't have phone lines so Sky may change this.

cast_iron

It's unusual for the OP's TV shop to mess up in this manner. They fork out full whack for each system and get reimbursed later by Sky. If it's not activated correctly, they'd lose the full cost of the box/dish.

Tony

cast_iron wrote: »

It's unusual for the OP's TV shop to mess up in this manner. They fork out full whack for each system and get reimbursed later by Sky. If it's not activated correctly, they'd lose the full cost of the box/dish.

That was my initial thought too.

leex

If one says they have no phoneline, orders SKY and pay the 37.50euro, can they order PPV etc if a phoneline miraculously appears at a later stage?

byte

leex wrote: »

If one says they have no phoneline, orders SKY and pay the 37.50euro, can they order PPV etc if a phoneline miraculously appears at a later stage?

Can't see why not.

leex

So if there was Sky sub in house previously is there anything wrong (legally or otherwise) with getting a new sub in say wife's maiden name with a different bank account and paying 37.50 extra so that phone line is not needed.

cast_iron

leex wrote: »

So if there was Sky sub in house previously is there anything wrong (legally or otherwise) with getting a new sub in say wife's maiden name with a different bank account and paying 37.50 extra so that phone line is not needed.

Nothing at all wrong with that.

Danno

Or your own name As Gaeilge.