Team-BHP (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/)

-   Gadgets, Computers & Software (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/gadgets-computers-software/)

-   -   TRAI announces major overhaul of DTH pricing (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/gadgets-computers-software/205988-trai-announces-major-overhaul-dth-pricing-8.html)

I just checked for my mother's Tata Sky STB which has an add on connection also. Based on channels selected, the price came to just above 400 and for the addon it showed 300.

When I reduced a channel or two and got the price to under 400, the addon TV price got reduced to 200.

I am on DEN Network.

Nearly 400 channels are available for viewing at present. After carefully scrutinizing them, we have realised that only about 100 of them are useful for us: i.e, we have previously viewed them and would like to continue doing so in the future. After factoring in discounts available as part of channel packs and assuming that it would be possible to include all the pay channels in the base 100 and therefore be free of paying additional NCF, we have zeroed in on 70 channels (discarding the rest 30 unwillingly) that we wish to retain, and for this, my monthly outgo will be 40% higher than present.

But if the LCO insists on force feeding his own choice of base 100, I will have to pay additional NCF for my chosen channels and therefore the new payment will be 70% higher.

IN MONETARY TERMS

Present: ₹250 for 100 useful & 300+ useless channels

Future: ₹350 for 70 useful & 30 uselss channels OR ₹425 for 70 useful and 100 useless channels

It is as yet uncertain what our choice is going to be.

On a side note, the LCOs are demanding reduction of GST to 5% from 18%. No idea whether the Government will take note or play deaf!

As a long term Tatasky customer, and with Inertia to move out it. I was one among you waiting for Tatasky to release the charges as per TRAI guidelines.
My monthly expense was INR 735 per month till then. I selected only a few channels and i got a screen which said my monthly charge would be INR 291 month. I rue that moment because i forgot to screenshot that screen. Today my recharge was getting over and i recharged with INR 400 as a test case half expecting that Tatasky would consider this only as recharge for half a month. Unsurprisingly, the app shows the recharge valid only till 15th Feb 2019.

There might be others who might be in similar situation as this. Just keeping them aware before they get similar surprise.

I tried using the a la carte option. I got more than 1000 rupees per month. I think it might be taking some channels and adding the package price and duplicating it. Is that the case ?

Ala carte channels are deliberately priced much higher. You will find that many of the channels that you picked ala carte are also available as a bundle that costs a fraction of what you are paying now.

Ok. Here are a couple of pointers. If it is indeed not going anywhere with 0 balance in the account you have two ways to handle it.

1. Recharge Rs.10 into your account. It is not going anywhere. You only will use it but it will immediately let you select the channels which you are not able to do. Don't think of recharge as a few 100 bucks

2. If you do not want to charge even Rs.10 into the account then wait for Feb 1st. Your TV will go on the blink :D and you will have money in your account IMO as the subscribed pack will cease to be in force and the remaining amount on pro rata basis will come back into your account. You can then start picking the channels that you want


Now about selecting the channels, I found some issues with their website when you select from a computer

1. The logged in session expires midway through your selection process and throws you out. And you are forced to start that circus all over again from scratch

2. The channels in the bouquets and their prices do not always match with their alternate option listing/tool


So airtel has an alternate option which is actually much easier to use. Go to channel 998 with your remote. It will open a channel selector tool for you. This one has no session expiry issues etc. Take your time. The prices shown here are at times less (may be because it does not factor in the NCF or the GST, not sure why) but shows the channels in the bouquet correctly. It gives you a nice summary of charges and their break up in the end. When you submit it then it becomes your latest choice that they will start using from Feb 1st.


For everyone, here are some thumb rules that will help keep the costs down.

- First look at the broadcasters' bouquet. If you find one that has 60-80% channels of your choice in the bundle pick that up instead of ala carte. It works out way cheaper than picking up only the ones that you wanted

- Sometimes you will find that the same broadcaster has 2 different bouquets but the one with lesser channel costs more than the one with more number of channels (with both bouquets having all the channels that you are looking at). Don't always be tempted to pick the one with higher number of channels at a lesser cost. Remember, every additional but unwanted channel in the bouquet will still dock one channel quota (and 2 if it is HD) from your 100 free channels entitlement. Also the NCF and GST will add some more burden

- Ask yourself a serious question when you are at the horns of a dilemma in choosing a channel. How often do you watch it? Is it similar to another one that you have already picked? Which reference programs you have in both channels that you think you like? Are they broadcasted at different times or do they overlap? When I did this exercise I managed to get rid of many similar type of channels which I realized are merely there for feel good but rarely ever get watched. Zee Hindi channel got dropped from my list because it turned out parents (the main viewers) always watch something else on a different channel when the 1 or 2 they could name on zee get broadcasted. Similarly, in music channels, one old musics channel, one contemporary bollywood and one english is the max I felt I needed

- Channels can be added at any point in time. At max you may lose some 5-10 bucks if you decide to add a one-off channel in the middle of the month that you dropped earlier. However, once you add a channel you may realize that before you can go and remove it again you may end up paying a good few months of fee for it

Your mileages may vary but the thumb rules should still hold good in most cases.

These are really very good tips. Another couple of them:

- Remove all unwanted channels from the basic 100 channel pack. Only DD channels are mandatory, means you can select 74 other paid or free channels. You will save on the NCF for the paid channels.

- For multi TVs (parent's room/kids room), go for multiple connections instead of Multi TV connections from same account. If the DTH operator refuses to do this, then go for multiple DTH operators (New connection + Activation charges are capped at Rs 500/- only).
Multiple connections have other advantages:
a. You can really fine-tune the channel selection - for e.g. all religious channels are FTA.

b. Restricting kids' room TV to only kid-friendly channels, so they don't watch inappropriate content accidentally.

You really can get down to just 40-50 watched channels per TV.

One interesting development to look forward to in the next few months is the fate of weak channels. Earlier broadcasters/cable operators/DTH operators can combine the weak channels with the strong ones and sell as bouquets. Since subscribers have the option of selecting a la carte + discounts for bouquet pricing are capped + subscribers are forced to rationalize number of channels, we may see a situation where weak channels are poorly patronized. Then the options for the broadcaster are improve the quality/content of the channel, go FTA, promote the channel heavily, or shut down the channel completely. I am surprised at the number of previously FTA channels made pay channels in an optimistic manner - and likely include ads as before. If the channel is not even reaching the screens, then not only they lose subscription revenue but also ad revenues. We may not know the previous vs. new subscribers data; however, broadcasters will be forced to act. My sense is the strong, flagship channels such as ZEE TV, Sun TV, Vijay TV in GEC and in other genres such as movies and sports will do well at the expense of weak channels because subscribers are being hawkeyed in channel selection to keep costs in check.

I have selected my channels through a la carte at Tata Sky. There are some channels costing only Rs. 0.30 or 0.50, still I have not selected them and I will not select them even if they are free, e.g., my selection does not have any English news channel because I never liked them - earlier I was force-subscribed to them because of the bouquet business.

For those who have selected that channels on Tatasky, do you know where we can see our channels selected.

I initially opted for the Curated packs but when I saw the broadcaster packs, they were not only cheaper but also have the channels I wanted. On the tatasky portal I do not have any input other than the confirmation message that new selection will be active from 1st.

Actually multi TV connection cost doesn't consider NCF on primary TV. So for your case the content price (i.e. without NCF) of primary TV would have been between 251-400.

This thread has good clarity on the new Tata Sky Packs/Rules etc.

I for one am happy with the new rules and I am actually able to save some money. My expenditure will come down from 835 to somewhere around 550-600.

Had called up the call center after making my selection to ask them how I will know my channel selection. Would there be an email from them.
Call center said that the channel selection will go live on 1st Feb and no email will be sent regarding the package we have selected.
Expecting TataSky Call Center lines to be totally jammed on 1st Feb.

OT - Today is the last day to call up the call center to remind them to cancel your additional connection.
Despite informing them much in advance about cancelling my additional STB, the lady at the call center asked me to call again on 31st Jan and reconfirm.

Need a help. I have subscribed to annual packages for my DTH connection. It's prepaid till Oct 2019. Should I be required to make this channel selection? I tried calling customer care but could not get through.

I am in the same boat - I renewed my annual pack in Dec '18 and I really want it to continue till it expires in December.

This is what I read yesterday. Honour commitment on long duration packs

There are too many instructions from the TRAI some of which seem confusing and may not have been implemented by the operator. Will wait till tomorrow 1/2 and then talk to Tata Sky's helpline.

I had just called up Tata sky helpline and found the customer support executive to get irritated with my queries. At one point the guy said that if I wished I should continue or exit Tata sky. When I asked about the refund of the long duration pack which I had bought in Sept 2018, the chap asked to me cancel the connection and check the cancellation process for the refund.

Surely Tata sky is suddenly acting pricey. I checked reg the TRAI's ruling that customer will have an option to continue with the long duration pack, Tata sky customer guy told that Tata sky is yet to receive any such circular from TRAI.

Is TRAI playing both ways here?

Thanks for the feedback. I will wait and see how it pans out over the next few days

There is lot of confusion.
The customer service lines will be busy the next few days. The poor guy who talked to you would have been tired of answering hundreds of calls, that too without giving any satisfactory answers to the callers. You can only sympathise with him. These things are not in his hands and he is the guy who faces the customer.
Give it a rest for a couple of weeks. Things will become clearer.