Sports On Telly

News and updates on UK sports rights broadcasting deals and fixture scheduling.

Sky

TalkTalk offers Sky Sports and Sky Movies for £20 a month

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talktalk_brand_shot_900TalkTalk is offering three months half price on its Entertainment Extra channel package and Sky Sports and Sky Movies combined ‘Boost’ available until 19 February.

The promotion is the ISP’s latest attempt to boost the number of subscribers to its TV service who take add-on and premium content as part of their package.

TalkTalk’s Entertainment Extra Boost offers over 60 channels, including Sky 1 and Sky Living and is available ￡5 a month to TalkTalk Plus TV homes and £7.50  a month to TalkTalk Essential TV customers.

The Sky Sports and Sky Movies Boost is available for £20 a month for three months. 

Both packages are available on a monthly contract with no minimum term.

BT adds Sky Sports to YouView boxes & finally withdraws Vision+ boxes

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bt_youview_hubBT says its TV customers will be able to add Sky Sports 1 and 2 to their YouView set top boxes from today.

The channels were at the centre of a four year legal dispute between the ISP and rival Sky which had declined to wholesale them to BT.

In November the Competition Appeal Tribunal ruled that an Ofcom ruling forcing Sky to offer the channels to rivals applied to BT’s newer YouView boxes and not just to its ageing Vision+ boxes.

The absence of a deal to offer the channels via YouView had forced BT to continue selling the less capable Vision+ devices to anyone wishing to add Sky Sports.

However it says it will now withdraw these from sale.

Today’s announcement means BT YouView customers are now able to enjoy the full range of Barclays Premier League football games, 116 of which are aired by the satellite giant.

However customers will not have access to Sky Sports 5 which was recently added to Vision+ boxes.

BT will offer Sky Sports 1 and Sky Sports 2 for £22 a month or £16.50 a month for one or the other of the channels, allowing customers the flexibility to opt in and out of the Sky Sports channels with 30 days’ notice.

Delia Bushell, managing director of BT TV and BT Sport, said: “This is a pivotal moment for our ambitions in TV.

“We are delighted to now be able to offer a stronger range of premium sports programming on our YouView boxes, adding to the recent launch of Netflix.

“The ability to bundle together great content on our most advanced set top box will underpin our aim to sell BT TV to more of our broadband customers and to accelerate the number of our customers who take a triple play bundle from us.”

BT says existing customers who already pay for Sky Sports 1 and Sky Sports 2 will usually be able to swap their Vision+ box for a YouView+ box for just £35 at the end of their current contract, provided they already take, or upgrade to, its Infinity fibre broadband service.

Half price Sky Sports and Sky Movies for TalkTalk customers

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TalkTalk_TV_player_2TalkTalk is offering its growing TV customer base the chance to enjoy Sky Sports and Sky Movies half price for three months.

The deal means households can enjoy some of the latest Hollywood hits, including Frozen, The Lego Movie and Marvel’s Captain America, plus top sporting action over Christmas without stretching their budgets.

Customers can also add TalkTalk’s Entertainment Boost of popular channels from ￡2.50 per month when they sign up for six months.

TalkTalk TV is half price for 12 months with its Essentials TV package just ￡4.25 a month plus line rental, while its Plus TV is ￡9.25 a month plus line rental. 

BT Sport pub subscriptions ‘have overtaken Sky Sports’

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bt_sport_studio_400BT has claimed to have overtaken Sky in the number of UK pubs subscribed to its sports channels.

According to a survey of 1835 pubs conducted by Evalueserve/Amethist, the BT Sport and ESPN channels are now in 30% of pubs, ahead of Sky’s portfolio of channels by 1%.

Pubs can add a BT Sport subscription to their existing Sky box or, if they don’t currently have a Sky subscription, have a free box installation carried out by BT. Prices start at £62 per month.

Bruce Cuthbert, Director Commercial Customers, said: “For BT Sport to have become an established feature of so many businesses in just 15 months is a tremendous achievement and reflects our underlying desire to show premium sports without the premium price.

“To overtake Sky who have been in this market for 20 years, in our second season, is astonishing.”

“Pubs and hotels up and down the country that were previously priced out of the market are now able to offer their customers access to some of the best live sporting action, without having to change their core customer offer.

“From August 2015, BT Sport will offer exclusively live midweek, top flight football action from the UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League, which will help our customers drive even more business throughout the week.”

Court’s Sky Sports ruling leaves broadcaster with a difficult choice

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Sky is one of the UK’s most successful companies and, while content has played a big part in that being true, the reason many people stick with it is the almost Apple-like commitment to customer service and experience.

Whether you’re a Sky customer, or someone who subscribes to its channels on a rival platform, the firm wants you to have the best experience possible while watching its content.

But this commitment to customers, even those it has only an arm’s length relationship with, could leave it with a major headache following yesterday’s ruling that BT is allowed to offer Sky Sports 1 & 2 on YouView until Ofcom’s order forcing Sky to wholesale the channels to rivals is reviewed.

Buried in the transcript of evidence to the Competition Appeals Tribunal is this statement from Sky’s lawyers explaining why it agreed to let BT offer Sky Sports 1 & 2 over broadband IPTV instead of aerial (DTT) to Vision+ boxes:

“I think that is right, remembering that subscribers to BT’s Cardinal platform who 
had BT Sport – Sky Sports, would originally have taken them over DTT, so if BT wants to move it to IPTV then if Sky were not prepared to ensure distribution by IPTV, that would have involved cutting off existing customers, which is not something that Sky wants to do.”

Yet if Ofcom’s wholesale order is eventually overruled, Sky will face a choice between cutting off BT’s YouView customers or continuing to supply the channels despite its court win.

The second of these seems more likely but would represent, at best, only a partial victory for BT.

Sky could still refuse to sell BT the remainder of its channels, leaving the firm lagging behind TalkTalk and Virgin Media in the sports content it can offer.

And then, when YouView is finally able to support for the full NOW TV experience, Sky could market the heck out of the service and sell direct to BT’s customers.

Customers are clearly winning but, when this row is finally over, it may be hard to say which is the victorious company.