Sky Mobile UK switches to 24-month minimum contract terms
Mobile operator Sky Mobile, which is estimated to be home to around 4-5 million subscribers in the UK and harnesses O2’s virtual (mvno) network platform, will today switch from using 12-month minimum term contracts and instead adopt a choice of either a 24-month or 30-day term for new customers.
Longer contracts typically save new customers more money, at least during your first term, albeit with the caveat that they also lock you in to the service for much longer. Put another way, the end-user takes on more risk, which can be a problem if things go wrong, but the operator gains more economic certainty and so can price lower.
On the flip side, shorter 30-day contracts tend to reverse that equation, which is why they cost more. Admittedly providers like Sky Mobile run so many different special offers that it’s hard to judge the impact from changes like this, due to the difficulty of being able to establish the provider’s true pricing baseline.
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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, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
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Can see the checker Sky Broadband now available 1.6Gbps from Openreach. Before was up to 900Mbps but it now add up to 1.6Gig as option.
https://www.sky.com/broadband
Are you going for it Phil? You seem to be interested in it.
A relative switched to 1.6Gbps package on Monday, the Gigafast+ hub (WiFi 7) is shocking.
Sky’s approach to not letting customers change settings is shocking, devices that used to connect at full speed on WiFi now can’t because Sky block the option to set 160 channel width on 5Ghz so those devices can’t take advantage of the faster download.
The hub also gets very warm round the base even though it’s got complete airflow and nothing surrounding it.
@jack
painful but solution is to shut wifi off and plug an AP into it. Even Asus routers can be put into ‘AP’ mode. I have the GT-BE98 running in such a mode now on Reaper Firmware.
I thought plusnet were paying you for referrals – or did that never happen either.
Ad47uk
No, I ain’t going for 1.6Gig (not with EE or Sky or Vodafone) I just wait for BTwholesales to offer 1.6Gig soon (probably in 2027 now)
@Jack, i presume the router is getting warm because it has a more powerful CPU and no doubt is passive cooled. i have a TP-Link only Wi-fi 6, but it gets warm. I put it on blocks when we had the hot weather to let more air get under it.
I prefer to use my own router these days.
@Phil, why do you need 1.6Gb/s? come to think of it why do you need 1GB/S?
Just asking before anyone gets on their high horse.
If you went for 1.6GB/s, do you have the equipment to take advantage and even if you have, would you get anything out of it?
Again, just wondering
I chat to people online who say about going for faster broadband and after asking them questions about what they use the internet for and how many are using it and what equipment they have, they realise that what they have is fine. A couple came to the conclusion that what they have is more than enough and say they will look at cutting down down when their contract runs out as it will save money.
Okay, so they have the 30 day contract, but would it not be a good idea to keep a 12 month one as well?
I hate these forced long contracts, even the 18 month ones we used to have. Sure I went into a 24 month one for my broadband, but it was my choice and they still have 12 months available and 30 days as well, which is strange for fixed broadband.
Mobile wise I will stay with a rolling monthly thing, it suits me.
heh try 48 month.
Had a pixel 9 pro fold at launch and O2 dangled the golden carrot for me to have it at the same monthly as I was paying for a basic xperia…. if I chose 48 month… I bit the bullet.
2 years passed, I will wait till mid next year then buy it out and get rid of the phone fully.
I’m surprised about the statement that 30 day rolling contracts cost more, that’s not been my experience with Lebara – I’ve been paying £5/month for 2 years now without the price going up.
@Jennifer90s, going into a 48 month contract was your choice, you de4cided you wanted the latest thing going and you are paying for it. That is different that being forced into a long contract.
I don;t do phones on contracts and have not since, mm, a long time ago, when BT had a service called internet everywhere or something like that. They used a system called BT fon where you can use other people routers to connect to the net, they supplied a HTC phone, mine had a sliding keyboard, nice phone, had Windows CE in it I think.
The service was useless for me as most of the places I went there was no one close enough to grab their wi-fi from their routers. Looking at around 2007-2008
That was the last time I had a contract for a phone, bought my own phones after that.
@Big Dave, some 30 days are cheap, mine is, but you get more if you go for 12 months or a cheaper price.
I was thinking of going for a longer contract on Smarty, but then Vodaphone grabbed hold of Three, so I changed my mind and after the issue i had trying to get a signal a few days back at the pharmacy, I am glad I have.
I guess this explains why I couldn’t take out the unlimited data 12 months plan via Sky VIP…. Nice one… Not.
Loyalty to Murdoch is misguided
@simon Sky isn’t owned by Murdoch anymore.
It probably just needs an update but on the VIP mobile deals page, it still says 12 month minimum term until you open up the further details option.
Still no 1.6 for existing customers it seems or at least it doesn’t show for me.
that might be the old Vodafone bug again but this time with sky.
the option may disappear if you have an ont that does not support 2.5gbe on its ethernet port.
Perhaps sky can’t order an ont replacement. (this was my issue with vodafoone and why im with EE).
with vodafone it was checking my ont/line and then not offering 1.6 – staff were utterly useless citing ‘its not in my area yet and that I’ll have to wait’. I offered the solution of cancelling everything and then re-doing it but they refused.
Once i moved to EE – who correctly ordered an ONT upgrade. the option for 1.6 has appeared since at vodafone. For a long while wasn’t available on Zen either but its there too now as is with sky for me.
I had a look at their SIM only plans, but kept in mind that this is still O2: the network I left because of poor quality, in favor of Spusu on EE. I was looking for something that suits me and my relatives, who travel to continental Europe a couple of times a year.
Honestly, I couldn’t find a single reason to buy any of their mobile services. Maybe it makes more sense for their “VIP” customers paying ~£100 for TV packages and broadband, but please…
Agreed.
Just had a look myself, pricing is as messy as ever, for VIP, new and existing.
Additionally, most of them haven’t changed from their 12 month prices while the 100MB one has, entertainingly, gone up (it was £5pm before). Not that anyone in their right mind would pay £8pm for 100MB which is why it stood out, so there’s likely a few more.
Sky have changer their mobile page Now 24 or 30 day contracts O2 terible Network