Sky UK Confirms Annual Broadband, Phone and TV Price Hikes
Customers of Sky’s (ISP Sky Broadband) various UK broadband, phone and Pay TV products are now being notified of annual price rises, which as per usual will be introduced between 1st April 2022 (internet and TV) and 1st May 2022 (phone). Letters are now going out gradually, with the last one due to be issued by 25th March.
According to Sky, the average price increase for impacted customers will be £3.60 per month (or 5% – that’s below the current level of inflation). Sky’s annual increases are not additional to the current spiralling level of inflation like on so many other providers (many of those have hiked by 9-12%), but some specific packages and products will still see a similar sort of increase from the operator.
The latest increases are fairly common because operators are busy adding all sorts of new services (FTTP, Sky Glass etc.), developing new systems, facing higher charges from suppliers (inflation etc.), implementing costly new Ofcom rules and consumers are gobbling significantly more data every year. Inevitably, such cost increases will get passed on to customers.
A Sky spokesperson said: “We know price increases are never welcome, so we aim to keep prices as low as possible while still delivering the content customers love, the flexibility to choose the right package, and our leading customer service.”
Summary of Sky’s Key Price Changes for 2022
➤ Sky’s Essential broadband package increases 10% to £27.50 a month.
➤ Sky’s Superfast broadband package increases 9% to £30.50 a month.
➤ Sky HD (TV) will increase by £1 to £8 a month
➤ Sky Mobile will reintroduce roaming charges of £2 a day for UK customers who visit Europe after 3rd May 2022.
➤ UK Landline and Mobile Call Rates – The charge for non-inclusive calls to UK landlines and mobiles will increase from 20p per minute to 22p.
➤ BTSport will increase by £1 to £28 a month (this is less than last year’s £2 hike)
➤ Sky Signature TV will increase by £1 to £27 a month
➤ Sky Cinema TV Pass will increase to £12 per month
Some of Sky’s hikes are so big that existing customers should be able to make use of Ofcom’s rule against mid-contract price hikes (i.e.the ability to exit your contract penalty free within 30 days of receiving Sky’s notification letter). Alternatively, you could try contacting them to haggle for a lower price (Retentions – Tips for Cutting Your Broadband Bill). Just remember, most of the other major ISPs are also implementing price hikes.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook and Linkedin.
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I am not sure how Sky can claim the average is only 5%. Nearly all the increase given below are around 10% of about twice the rate of inflation
That’s just the short summary of key changes, but they’ll have different increases across hundreds of products and product combinations. But I do agree, I’d quite like to know exactly how that average is calculated and whether it’s unduly influenced by products that few people take.
That’d be “pretend” inflation Bob, not the real figure.
The increase to Sky HD (TV) is over 14%.
Interestingly Sky seem to be charging new customers £25 / £27.50 for their essential / superfast packages. Presumably these prices aren’t subject to the hike? I guess this is the classic “loyalty tax”.
New and existing customers don’t always see the price change at the same time due to how contract changes fall, but in the end such rises usually hit everybody.
i can confirm apart from virgin, as my contract is up in Feb, anyone i go to will price increase in march or April (depending on provider), taking out a new contract or renewing. as they’ve stated, it’s being applied to all (existing & new).
virgin are the only ones saying new (not existing customers renewing) customer 18 month contracts won’t see a price increase that I’ve come across.
Yes and with a lot of fibre being rolled out I suspect many will as why pay more for an inferior Broadband product
Sky are the biggest con and rip off as far as I know them. But people’s still using SKY TV. Madness but true.
It depends entirely on your priorities. For me, Sky is an affordable luxury. I work a lot and I’m away with work a fair bit so stuff like Sky Go is essential. I’m not interested in the non legal routes to watching our football, cricket and F1 teams. I’ve not been in a while but I’d imagine you could quite easily eclipse the cost of sky after a night or two in the pub.
No one can be surprised. They have always done big increases every year. For me in 2009 it got to the point where it wasn’t worth what they wanted and I cancelled Sky and the TV licence. Never missed it.
Yep me too. Isn’t the world a better place without it?
I’ll be leaving penalty free when I get my notification, drop down to tethering for a month or two while wait for Zzoomm to actually start connecting us in Sandhurst
Sky TV are the worse keep repeating all times! Worthless in my view. I am glad I left Sky a long while back with Sky+ HD with 75% discounted for 12 months.
that’s why i switch between the streaming service (NowTV (sky entertainment & cinema), prime, Netflix etc).. i never run them all at once… a month at a time or until i can’t find anything of interest.
I think it time for OFCOM to act to stop mid term contract price hikes and put capped at CPI Plus 3.9% (no more!) and banned if above it.
They did ban it, so all the providers then just wrote it into their contract that they will increase it every year, something that’s become very clear on the checkouts of all these companies sites.
If you want the services then you agree to the contract and therefore agree to the price rises, nothing much you can do about it.
What they really need to do is ban any in-contract price rises (apart from tax changes) – stopping firms putting automatic price rises in their t&c.
or at least on the anniversary of the contract, not like what is about to happen to me, my contract had ended (Feb) and any new contract i take up with my existing provider or a new provider is subjected to a price increase in March or April.
Give me FTTP and I’ll cancel the lot.
My package consists of Sky HD, Q, Signature (their basics package), Movies and 40/10 FTTC.
My last bill was £130.
Never been given a deal to the level I hear about.
Give me FTTP and I’ll be happy with my Netflix/Amazon Prime.
I’ve just renegotiated mine today as it’s up in April and FTTP was activate in my street a month or so
You need to have a scout online for a good deal for internet, go back to them with it and ask them to match it – it nearly always works. If you live in a Virgin area you can also play their prices off against them
That’s the issue Jazzy.
Sky effectively have a monopoly where I am and they know it.
Play them off against themselves!
If you’re not interested in having a Sky box for recording then get Now TV is only £24.99 a month including entertainment + Movies + HD
Hook yourself up with any cheap FTTC provider and you’ll probably cut your bill to less than £50 a month
Reply to JmJohnson – My Zen FTTC connection is 26/6 and we can stream Netflix HD and Prime HD in 2 different rooms at the same time plus casual surfing with no issues.
So you don’t need FTTP speeds in order to ditch Sky!
Been onto Sky today as my contract is up in April and my street went FTTP in January
Managed a really good deal
£22 for Sky Signature
£13 Multiroom
£5 Netflix
£32 for FTTP Ultrafast 500MB
Total £73 – FTTP being installed in 4 weeks
I’ve just re-contracted through their app saving £20 but I can see that £8 of it has been erased by this increase. They’re even charging me £2 for UHD now which used to be free with the ultimate package; I’m tempted to ditch the broadband but hyperoptic is installing to all my neighbours in my street except us for some unfathomable reasons ( I signed up, waited for a feasibility check then engineers never showed up, day after the check date they had cancelled my account ).
G.Net is drilling currently so I signed up my interest when available…I honestly don’t want to switch and end up worse off with another FTTC as FTTP isn’t happening at the moment. 5G broadband isn’t an option in my area as the masts aren’t being upgraded and they have always issues no matter which network ( trust me I tried them all as a fall back with my current connection….it’s a mixed bag of erratic fast speeds with atrocious latency ). Also with Sky my ping is 7-9ms so I guess I’ll stay put.
May be their records are just wrong. They usually just run the fibre along the street so if it passes your home you should be able to get it
nowtv broadband top package is £20/mon, my mother has it and it’s sky broadband, re-badged sku q hub router, only 12 month contract. check the referral link via here.
or exercise your 30 day right to leave and watch them wipe the increase off (they normally do)
Thanks Neil, I completely forgot about Now broadband ( I used them in the past ). I’ll wait for the letter mentioning the increase and give retention a call then.
Bob, I know and that’s why there’s something wrong about them saying the engineer not being able to run the cable up to the first Floor ( where my flat is ); I have the feeling that they’re looking for 500mb plus customers maybe me wanting the lower priced plan at 150mb wasn’t viable for them? I even managed to sign up to 3 months free deal, I was gutted when they cancelled my order.
If you live in a flat, then the landlord or building management company needs to request Openreach to run fibre into the property. This will then enable you to order FTTP (from Sky or any Openreach based provider) and have an engineer run the cable up to your flat and install an ONT.
I personally live in a communal building and both FTTP and Virgin Media is available all down my road, but my building is the exception.
100% nothing Sky can do here as it’s Openreach that will supply the connection to the network. Sky simply provide the service.
Well sky gave me ultra hd for free about 12 months ago i didnt ask for it they just added it to my package and now they want to charge me for it.
So after reading this post i have cancelled it today along with multiroom and netflix!
What with food,energy bills going up its time to make cut backs!
Got rid of Sky years ago. I’d rather watch YouTube and Freeview than pay Sky a fortune each month.
nowtv, sky on the cheap without contract… toggle on or off, payg month at a time. if you haven’t got a stick or cannot get via your tv, get a roku box for about £20.. better than the slow fire stick (i have both).
there are always half price deals with NowTV.
I’m quite happy with sky to be honest. Been with them 25 years. Currently pay £17 month for sky signature and sky q mulitroom. Each time my contract is up I call up sky, cancel my contract and wait for them to call me back and either honour the same price or I’ll just cancel my account. So far sky always call back and end up giving me the same deal. I used to also have broadband with sky, but it truly wasn’t worth the price since the quality really wasn’t great compared to my current Zen connection. Between internet and TV I pay less than £50/month which I think is quite reasonable. The trick with sky is to play them at their own game. If you let them then they’ll walk all over you and charge you crazy prices. Usually the retention teams will offer huge discounts to keep you as a customer after multiple calls within your 30 day cancellation notice.