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I sit back and laugh at many of these folks who say they are leaving and going to another provider.

While I don't like price increases, what are the alternatives?

Fios? Its only available in very limted areas, and they just announced an 8% price increase.

DirecTV? As I posted yesterday its rumored DirecTV will be soon announcing a price increase which will take effect in March.

Cable? Here in our area cable went up 12%

What is Dish going up? Nothing if you have the Family Package or the AT60 (Now AT100 package) and $3 if you have AT120 or AT180 package. The Everypackage is going up $5 because the cost of premiums are going up (HBO and Cinemax)

I find $3 or even $5 reasonable when you look at how much everything else is going up. Look when gas was near $4 a gallon, people said oh my god gas is so expensive, yet no one stopped using gas and in fact in some areas gas sales went UP when the price was high.

If you want satellite prices to stay the same call ESPN and tell them to stop spending millions and millions of dollars for these sports packages. Call HBO and tell them to stop spending millions on making great shows like the Sorpranos. Someone pays those costs and unfortunately its us.

Thiink about it for a moment, what could you buy for $3? A coffee from Starbucks? (Might be a few cents short) a happy meal at McDonnalds? (That might be more then $3 too... You can't even buy a pack of smokes for $3. So whats $3 for entertainment that you enjoy?

Think about it, yes we are not happy there is another price increase but is it really that bad? And if it really is then what are the alternatives?

Just something to make you think.

They are punishing the High end Hd customers by pushing this $10.00 increase in one year. IF they want more people to go with the most programming and transition to hd receivers then this is not the way to do it. Taking away the $5.00 discount and adding the $5.00 increase in programming pack is going to cause more people to down grade their programming or even churn .

I can not recommend Dish now to anyone I know because of this price increase and because of all their FEES , that hit you if you try to downgrade your programming with an hd receiver.

I will not forget this 7th increase in a row since 2000 since the $10.00 is the highest I have ever heard any cable or satellite company charge in one year EVER. THIS is where I draw the line. I can understand the yearly price increases brought on by the different networks like ESPN etc , but the FEES are all DISH's fault. They need to not only repackage their programming packs , but they need to do away with most of their made up FEES.

The dvr fee- should be per account NOT PER RECEIVER.
The hd enabeling fee- You shouldn't be charged for something you get free over the air on your on damn antenna. THis fee is pure GREED especially if it is charged PER HD RECEIVER.

THe hd pack in itself is not worth $20.00. They should include all HD versions of the sd channels for FREE , just like they do the HBO,Showtime and STARZ premium channels in HD. THey should not charge for these channels if you already have the sd version in your programming packs. IF not then the hd pack will continue to grow in price every year. Placing the hope of hd right out of the hands of most Dish subscribers.

THis combination of high price increases and FEES if you downgrade are pricing DISH right out of the hands of most customers. I have already downgraded to the top 120 + hd (for now) or the Silver pack with locals. When another increase comes next year and it exceeds the $3.00 increase, or if Dish wants to hike the price of HD pack even more , then I will cut that out as well.

Those certainly are different experiences than mine. Over 8.5 years I've had 4000, 4700, 7100, 510, 811, 942, and 622 receivers. None have ever had the slightest repair-related problem. The old 4700 is still in operation. Nearly all of them were in service for 3+ years.

No LNB or switch failures either. I ran my original legacy LNBs and SW21 switches for 8 years.

Never swapped out anything during its original manufacturer's warranty period either. The stuff has been bulletproof.

Scott Greczkowski said:

I find $3 or even $5 reasonable when you look at how much everything else is going up.

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So do I. I think most of the irritation is in the $10 price increase for HD Platnum with no explanation. It's a bit of a slap in the face to their best customers.

I think they could have avoided any backlash if they had just priced HD Platnum $5 higher to begin with. At the time, the HD price increase made sense...they were increasing the number of HD channels dramatically, with the promise of a few more. I mean, from a logical viewpoint, the new pricing makes sense. AEP is already packed with large savings between the DVR fees and premium discounts. There's no reason we should have expected an additional $5 discount on HD. But the fact is, they gave it to us, and then yanked it away a few months later.

Now, they seem to have stagnated. I think they're too comfortable- DirecTV doesn't really seem to be competing with them on National HD channels. There's no real indication that anything new is on the way. I think even something simple like adding Cinemax HD would have made me not notice the increase. But now, I'm thinking "Why am I paying for Cinemax...even if it's only a buck or 2...if I'm not getting HD?"

I'm not going to whine about it, but I am going to consider getting rid of some something. I will likely wind up with a bill lower than it is now. I've had the "biggest" package since the days of DirecTV/USSB. The only thing I've ever dropped is Superstations a few years back. That was indirectly in response to a price increase, but really just because I didn't watch them.

MikeD-C05 said:

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THe hd pack in itself is not worth $20.00. They should include all HD versions of the sd channels for FREE , just like they do the HBO,Showtime and STARZ premium channels in HD. THey should not charge for these channels if you already have the sd version in your programming packs.

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It depends on the contracts AND on the programming content. Since HBO, Showtime, & Starz are direct simulcasts, they are offered for free.

I think you're absolutely right about TNT, ESPN 1 & 2, NFL and National Geographic. If you get the SD channels, you should get the HD versions. I don't know if the contracts are actually structured that way, but they should be.

However, channels like Food and HGTV are actually different than their SD counterparts, so I would expect them to be negotiated differently. Remember when Universal HD was called Bravo HD+? The "plus" was to differentiate the service from Bravo...it was actually quite different.

When they began pricing HD at $20, I assumed it was to allow some breathing room for pricing. Over pricing it a bit would allow them to add HD channels as they came on the air, without raising prices a buck or 2 every few months. But it seems like all the buzz has just died. It's absurd that they aren't carrying MHD, which would really add a lot of value for many of us. (I saw it on Cox in Vegas, and it puts Rave to shame.)

However, at least they haven't been all talk, like DirecTV.

M Sparks said:

However, at least they haven't been all talk, like DirecTV.

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well when dtv puts up new sats at least they work unlike 105 121 and 129
*ish pull your head out of your Ergen!

I dropped the SuperStations last year, along with the RSN Sports package, to offset a price increase.

Now I'm down to only HD-Platinum. Nothing else to trim without breaking up the pack. Could drop down to AT200 and HBO/SHO, which I wouldn't hesitate to do except for losing two channels: NGHD and StarzHD.