Anybody going to downgrade services?

[jawilljr]

If enough subscribers would downgrade, that would indeed send a message/"punish" DirecTV. In early 2004 I was paying $37.99 a month for Total Choice Plus without locals. Shortly afterwards it became $39.99...then $42.99...as of March, that same package would be costing me $45.99 a month, had I not downgraded to Total Choice earlier today. That's a bit too much in the way of price hikes for my budget in just two short years...especially for a service that is an optional luxury.
If I watched TV the way I did when I was younger, the increase probably wouldn't mean as much. But I don't, and am having a harder and harder time justifying this type of cash outlay, especially with rising healthcare, gasoline, insurance, and heating prices.

That is also the free market working...

Jerry

 

[obeythelaw]

Well, I may downgrade. Right now I pay 134.92 a month. Obviously, this includes everything with 6 receivers, HD Pak, Premier, etc. With Premier going to $99 a month, it will increase it to a somewhat unreasonable number for television service. I did recently switch to Verizon DSL from my local cable internet connection, so there is 20 dollar savings per month. But, this price increase may forece me to downgrade eventually. I would be inclined to keep the status quo if I knew that Directv was going to be adding some really good worthwhile stuff this year. But I don't think that's going to happen. As a matter of fact, with the decreased of a $1.00 of the HD Package, my concern is that they won't be adding any new HD programming at all, hence the $1.00 decrease.

 

[Lee Smith]

I will probably drop showtime & HBO and go to TC from TC+.
I will also drop the HD package in March.as I now get the HD package from DISH.
The reason I have not dropped the HD package yet is a 1 year commitment that will be up in March.

 

[aec4]

With this price increase I'll be saving money. I'm going to drop Starz. I've never watch it much anyways. So D* increases my rate $3. And I save $9 by canceling Starz. Thanks D*.

I know it's only $3.00 more ($4 - $1 HD Pak), but all these price increases are adding up. Gasoline, natural gas, postage stamps, electricity, taxes, etc all have gone up. Something has got to give. This is a good place to start cutting back.

I did a similar thing. I never thought of cancelling sports pak, but when I saw TC+ going up 4 bucks, I decided to see what TC+ got me. It got me the Golf Channel. . DirecTV told me I needed Sports Pak for that 5 yrs ago. I guess it's not true anymore. I get YES, MSG and FSNY from my locals, so I have no need to watch poker on 100 channels.

+$4 - $1 - $11 = net $8 for me.

Im also contemplating my HBO going byebye for another 12.

If it wasn't for the NFL, DirecTV would be gone.

 

[agsbill]

I dropped the "Sport Package" last month.....I only had it for the "Golf Channel" now included in "Total Choice Plus" .....when did the "Golf Channel" become a part of "Total Choice Plus"??

Bill

 

[PeaceOfMind]

Downgrading Directv

I plan to downgrade from Directv Total Choice to Total Choice Family. Something tells me that Directv knew, ahead of time, that many of their customers would downgrade their packages.....in the end, Directv will make plenty of money off of each of us...it's kind of like herding cattle into the stable that you want them to go into....aka....raise the price of gas to $3.00 a gallon...wait 11 months, then, lower it to $2.00 a gallon....makes everyone seem as if they have been blessed, only to look closer, to find that the object of the game was to get you to be satisfied with the price of gas for $2.00 a gallon....who wins....the guy that begin selling you gas at $1.00 a gallon.....Age old game.....Car salesman have been doing it for years.:up

 

[minorthr]

I'm going to downgrade from Total choice premier to total choice + with hbo. That reduces my bill by about $30

 

[vurbano]

This bologna money pit company and thier garbage PQ will be punted off of my property when FIOS comes to town.

 

[Neutron]

This bologna money pit company and thier garbage PQ will be punted off of my property when FIOS comes to town.

Same.

Tired of the crappy HD pic quality. Tired of the constant price increases.

Comcrap looks better than this.....

 

[joedekock]

why are you downgrading?? to punish directv??
talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face!
try comcrap in pittsburgh, 7% 11.04 , 6% 7.05, 8% 1.06 get the point?
if three dollars is gonna kill you , well...i feel bad for ya!

I agree, if memory serves me correctly, to get channels like The Military Channel, Biography Channel, Fox Reality, Hall Mark, Nick Toons, Boomerang, Fox Movie Channel, Discovery Kids, Discovery Times, National Geographic, VH1 Classic, or GAC, you have to subscribe to Dish's Top 180. That will cost you $47.99 with Dish. With D* our total Choice plus package will be $46.99. (Seems to me that D* subscribers have the better deal there). With locals, the Dish Network top 180 costs $52.99, and for D*, having total choice plus with the locals is only $49.99. (Again, to me that seems like a better deal).

Not only that, but our HD package is now the same cost as theirs. Yes, they have the option to get the VOOM channels for another $5.99 a month, but when I called to price that out, they told me if I want to get the voom channels. I need to pay an extra $200.00 for a separate dish to pick them up.

I guess I don't understand why everyone who is complaining thinks they are getting "raped" by D*. D* still has MORE, and BETTER channel lineups, they are still CHEAPER than cable, and even their other dish competitor. They might be behind right now in the HD movement, but we all know that they will Blow Dish and cable out of the water come next year.

 

[icehckylvr]

I am just waiting for FIOS TV to be made available to me, then I will downgrade down to where I can still get the Center Ice package. Once hockey season is over then I will send my HD DVR back to D* and cancel my service that I have had for 6 years. There is so much more HD being offered on Verizon FIOS for less money than what D* is charging.

 

[aec4]

I dropped the "Sport Package" last month.....I only had it for the "Golf Channel" now included in "Total Choice Plus" .....when did the "Golf Channel" become a part of "Total Choice Plus"??
Bill

No idea, but I feel like DirecTV pulled something over on me because they told me I needed SportsPak for The Golf Channel, and now I do not, and I was paying the 11 a month without knowing.

 

[markd]

This bologna money pit company and thier garbage PQ will be punted off of my property when FIOS comes to town.

Wish I was lucky enough for FIOS to be coming to this area (Memphis). I would jump ship in a heartbeat. All we have is BellSouth. And I don't think they are even talking about carrying video yet.

Heck, I can't even get DSL. Luckly I have Roadrunner through TWC.

 

[damaged]

I am the same boat as you markd, I hear that Bellsouth is instead looking at 'adsl2'[1].

[1] http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/57629

 

[icehckylvr]

Yeah..it sucks here because part of our city has it and part does not. I have had FIOS internet for over a year now (5mb down, 3mb up) and it is really nice. Just wish they would turn on the TV and let me go for it.

 

[jeeptest]

Just drop the HD package..they have crap on those channels. 10.99 for ???

 

[charper1]

Yeah..it sucks here because part of our city has it and part does not. I have had FIOS internet for over a year now (5mb down, 3mb up) and it is really nice. Just wish they would turn on the TV and let me go for it.

Which package is that?

http://www22.verizon.com/FiOSForHome/channels/FiOS/root/package.aspx

 

[agsbill]

No idea, but I feel like DirecTV pulled something over on me because they told me I needed SportsPak for The Golf Channel, and now I do not, and I was paying the 11 a month without knowing.

Me Too!!!

Bill

 

[markd]

I am the same boat as you markd, I hear that Bellsouth is instead looking at 'adsl2'[1].
[1] http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/57629

Oh well. It looks like no FIOS for us Bellsouth customers. Sure wish there was competition here. We do have TWC, but I don't like their PQ on SD channels. Hopefully when Comcast takes over they'll make some improvements to the cable system here.

 

[rad]

Oh well. It looks like no FIOS for us Bellsouth customers. Sure wish there was competition here. We do have TWC, but I don't like their PQ on SD channels. Hopefully when Comcast takes over they'll make some improvements to the cable system here.

Comcast has been busy implementing digital simulcast of their analog channels on a number of systems. Why the PQ isn't the greatest it's at least equal to or a bit better then what I have on D*. An other advantage is that their DVR can now just record the MPEG2 stream right off the cable vs. having to encode it in the box, like the Motorola 6412 had to do. The DVR that I got is the new 3412, it doesn't even have an analog tuner in it. So maybe Comcast will also start that conversion on the TWC systems that they pick up, but IMHO they'll probably be too busy just trying to intergrate those systems into the Comcast way of doing things.

Also, last night I downgraded from TC Premier to just TC. And once the college basketball season and Olympics are done I'll be dropping the HD package. I'm not doing it because of the price increase, hell everything keeps going up in price, but because of their lack of new HD channels that folks want. I didn't see anyone begging for CSUSA in HD but we got it. But no sign of TNT-HD, Cinemax-HD, Starz-HD, etc. Don't give the people what they want and they'll go somewhere else that does.