Sky subscription

[md 600 driver]

blue cards

all sky blue cards have been deactivated and replaced with white ones , they should not work with any sky box you dont need a card to watch bbc1 2 itv c4 when you take a blue working card out of a box it may still work on channel 5 untill the power is removed then it normally doesnt work

i spend my free time traveling to my little spot in the algarve to keep me sane, in the uk i am a director of a uk nation wide installation company specialing on comercial aerial/sat installations i dont want or am able to carry out any installation works for anyone in the algarve [my installation days stopped 20 years ago ]
but i will give anyone any free advise that i am able to do also i can advise the best places to purchase any tv recieving equiptment ,i may also be able to supply certain equiptment normally not available in the algarve without the purchaser having to pay over the odds for this equiptment

the majority of people that want help want help with uk tv .i know every way around that problem

you should not pay in advance for sky subscriptions your seller cant pay sky in advance he will have to pay monthly its one of the biggest potential cons out

take a random unsrupulas seller that takes your subscriptions upfront he signs up 10 people per week 520 per year total turnover say £60 per month full package 60 x 520 x 12 £374,400 all this money stays in his bank account untill he makes your monthly payment after a while the money burns holes in his pocket and wham hes gone you cant complain to anyone espesially sky as you are not even their customer here is my advise dont pay upfront !! arrange to pay on your own bank account or get one of the family in the uk to pay for you

in the uk most sky subscribers can get either free or grately reduced skyboxes ive seen new hd boxes selling here for over £300 and companys wanting £250 per year just to look after your subscription people need to wake up and smell the mateus rose they are getting ripped off . the only extra you should be paying is maybe postage of your box from uk to portugal there is a small profit in selling them in the uk

my post may anger some sellers i am sorry if they get upset but there are some good guys out there unfortunately there are more bad ones than good ones

anyway i am back in the uk now, its guess what "raining" but the cup of tea always tastes nicer but wait do we have an expert on tea ???


still cant spell for toffee tomorrow my secretary can do all my letters

[md 600 driver]

As we and many others have reported it is the new Cards which are the problem. Once married to a Sky box they will not work on another Sky box which is a pain for those who used to bring a card out with them, Either in their own villa or on holiday to a property with a Sky box

NOT TRUE
emm
please read my post again if you bring a white sky card to the algarve the only channels you wont get are the premium channels ie sky sports and sky movies you will get the majority of others , if your card in the uk had the recording funtion that will also work as well except for the premium channels ie sky sports and sky movies ,if your card had the hd function that will work also except for the premium channels ie sky sports and sky movies [obviously you would need to have the correct sky plus box or skyhd box connected properly with 2 feeds like you have in the uk ]

[Skyrealm]

In response to md 600 driver


The problem is this, in the U.K. SKY will install for you a SKY box for free if you take a subscription out with them, if you dont take a subscription out with them theres absolutely no reason for them to give you a SKY box for free, sadly they are not running a charity, in addition to this you will find in the small print of the contract they do their best to have you connected to a U.K. landline. This is why SKY equipment has to be purchased and therefore sold when no contract is taken out. Compare it to this, you go into a Vodafone shop, you sign a 1 year contract with them, they will then give you a very posh phone for free, go into the same shop the next day tell them you dont want to take a contract out with them and ask them if you can still have a phone for free, all of a sudden they want 300 euros for that phone. You see my point. Basically all the SKY installers here have to buy the equipment in the U.K. import it to Portugal, deliver it to your door and guarantee it, now show me a company that will do all that for nothing. By the way as far a SKY cards go we always recommend you try to get your own card in your own machine at your own address in the U.K.

I do however agree that there are a few bad eggs in this profession as there are in all, after 10 years in this business and covering the whole of this country from top to bottom with many many satisfied customers, including foreign embassies in Lisbon, I can say that most of the companies in this game here are pretty good.

You need to bear in mind that all the companies you see in the paper have to pay advertising fees, the cost of running vehicles, staff wages, all the cost associated with running a business here etc etc. Its easy to run companies down when you are anonymous.

If anyone wishes to contact me my name is Mark and I own Skyrealm. My number is 918887775

I

[shanagarry]

This is why SKY equipment has to be purchased and therefore sold when no contract is taken out.

Mark - not wishing to confuse people any further - I do not understand the sentence above?

I have brought my entire SKY HD set-up (with my TVs) here with me and it works perfectly - but is not connected to a telephone line (obviously) and I do receive all the premium channels.

From what has been written previously - my interpretation is that it shouldn't work - or have I got that wrong

[Skyrealm]

In reply to that yes you can get around the phone line connection, but the main point is that if you just wanted to purchase for instance a SKY HD box without a subscription then SKY dont let you have them for free and we all have to buy them, hence they can be quite expensive. This is not companies here trying to con people in any way.

What you have done is exactly what we advise our customers to do, ie get their own equipment set up in the UK from SKY for free and bring it out with them, that way the high cost of buying the equipment separately is avoided.

Hope this clarifies things.

[EMM]

WE all know that it is an infringement of the Sky contract to receive their signal out of the UK, and those companies that provide you with a SKY card in Portugal are infringing the SKY contract.
This is why should SKY find out they can and will disconnect you.( This has been done )
The companies that provide the cards must somehow have a UK billing address otherwise how do they get the cards.
This gives them the opportunity to charge a " premium monthly rate plus enhanced connection charges ". What happens if your provider stops paying SKY. You will lose your SKY service with no recompense.
MD600 and I ( and many others )will have to agree to disagree. Once the new card is registered and NOT used in its parent box you will lose ALL the channels that you pay for including the basic SKY package. ( Dave, Living etc etc etc ).
You do retain FREESAT which , still gives you all the main channels. BBC , ITV, C4, C5 plus another 80% of Islamic, shopping , hindu and numerous other tacky channels.

[steve]

To test what is being said I have just taken the white card from my Sky plus box in the lounge (normal channels plus Movies and Sport) and put it in my Sky box in the bedroom which has no card and runs as a free to view box. Much to my surprise the box in the bedroom then gave me many of the Sky channels but not Movies or Sport where a message appeared on the screen to say that this was not the correct card for this box. On this basis you could obviously bring your card to Portugal plug it into a Sky box and get more that the basic free to view service on a that box. It still leaves open to clarification as to whether Sky would extend the coverage on your UK subscription card to operate on a second box as well. If they will anyone who has a full subscription in the UK could bring their card to Portugal and get the same service here on a box for which no subsciption is being paid.

[bruce]

We have the full Sky package and when we rented the villa in Cvo last month the owner told us to bring our Sky card and we could get the same channels over in Cvo. Ours is the white card but it would not work all we got were a couple of ITV and BBC channels.

[EMM]

Thank you Bruce , you confirm what I and many others have reported.
We no longer tell guests that they can receive SKY but instead tell them that they will get the basic UK channels which seems to satify most and avoids any complaints.

[shanagarry]

Just to be clear - as long as I never telephone Sky from a Portuguese phone, pay them and keep my UK address - I will continue to receive all the Sky channels I subscribe to - have I got that correct?

[EMM]

Be carefull with the internet as well. We pay our lottery by monthly direct debit, when in Portugal we had a message to say we had won ( a very small amount ). Going on line to see how much we got a message along these lines.

We believe that you are not in the UK . are you aware that you cannot play the UK national lottery ( paying by direct debit ) if not resident in the UK. Please call this number etc.

Clearly if they want to they can see where we all are and rather like calling SKY from a PT phone your internet location can also be identified as that is also via a phone line.

[md 600 driver]

Bruce
you also need sometimes to unplug your box from the mains as the box remembers its last geographical information[itv region] from the card and unplugging and plugging back in with a new card will reset this

the engineers in my workshop use only one card to test all boxes without any problems its just a standard subscripion card

2nd cards
in the uk you can get what is called a mirror subscription which means sky will give you a extra or second card for a extra payment {£11.50 per month AFAIK ] which will allow you to watch a second box[or more ] in your home

This option is not generally available in portugal to qualify for this offer sky insist that every box is connected to sky via the same phone line as the original box, so that they can confirm that the 2 boxes are working at the same property , when sky do a test every month to see if both boxes are connected together if they find they are not they will send you a letter saying you must have both boxes on the same line or they will start charging you for 2 full subscriptions however this does take time so if you are over in portugal for a month or so you tell them that you are out of the country on holiday the electric is off at home and your boxes are unplugged for safety reasons

[bruce]

Hi md600driver, yes we have two sky cards at home as we don't like the same tv programmes, i.e. I like Coronation Street he likes the History Channel
We did unplug the sky box - the guy from the rental management called by and he told us to do that but to no avail. Wasnt a problem to us - he only missed a couple of rugby league games.....

[EMM]

As previously suggested have tried unplugging etc when using the new card, also with no effect.
Clearly those clever sods at Sky new albout those who in the past " have Sky card will travel ".
Until SKY negotiates a new agreement with the satelite broadcasting authorities will will have to put up with these anomalies.

[steve]

Shannagary
You are correct. You do not need to keep a UK address -but not necessarily your own - from which the Sky subscription is paid.

Clearly there are anomolies in the way some Sky boxes work because what md600driver described worked exactly when I took the card from my Pace Sky+ box and put in my 5 or more year old Panasonic box. Perhaps others could try this and see how they get on.