Dish Programming Changes (Effective August 1st)

[vtjman]

What's the DVR advantage? Sorry, I'm a new subscriber as of July 4th

DVR Advantage is the plan mentioned in the beginning of this post, it basically allowed you to bundle your local channels in HD and one DVR fee into your basic package. Initially it saved you a few dollars from not bundling, but now I think it is down to a $.98 savings. BUT a good feature is that the dvr advantage pack gave you a discount for the more premium packs you added on, 2 was $22, 3 is $31, 4 is $40, so on. Also the HD pack could be counted as a "premium pack" and so could adding the AT 250 pack (gold pack). This way even if you only subscribed to HBO and Showtime, if you have Dish HD you would get the 3 premium pack discount and it would only cost you $31 instead of $10 (dish HD) + $15.99 (HBO) + $12.99 (Sho).

Wow after typing all that I realize how convoluted this crap is.

 

[tomcrown1]

Dish marketing department needs to go!!! These folks are idiots. The best way to sell dish is KISS. Dish should only have four packages and each package does include HD.

If dish does not keep it simple they will continue to loss customers to Direct TV OR CABLE, which has simply programs.

 

[PHXHoward]

AEP never seemed like a good deal to me because Cinemax is available for a penny. It seems to be bundled into AEP at full price. Am I missing something?

Classic Gold 57.99 + 50 (HD, DVR/Locals, HBO, Showtime, Starz) + .01 (Cinemax) = 108
AEP 97.98 + 20 (HD, DVR/Locals) = 117.98

I wonder how it will work out with the new prices?

 

[empiretc]

i'm waiting to find out

 

[TheFid2]

DVR Advantage is the plan mentioned in the beginning of this post, it basically allowed you to bundle your local channels in HD and one DVR fee into your basic package. Initially it saved you a few dollars from not bundling, but now I think it is down to a $.98 savings. BUT a good feature is that the dvr advantage pack gave you a discount for the more premium packs you added on, 2 was $22, 3 is $31, 4 is $40, so on. Also the HD pack could be counted as a "premium pack" and so could adding the AT 250 pack (gold pack). This way even if you only subscribed to HBO and Showtime, if you have Dish HD you would get the 3 premium pack discount and it would only cost you $31 instead of $10 (dish HD) + $15.99 (HBO) + $12.99 (Sho).

Wow after typing all that I realize how convoluted this crap is.

How do you take advantage of this?

 

[Rob052067]

I should probably save some money and just give up the premium channels anyway. I can always catch there good series programs on DVD thru my Netflix rentals. I rarely watch movies on the premium channels, but they do have great series (HBO and Showtime, anyway).

 

[TheFid2]

figured it out.

Upgraded to Silver now. I don't really care about any of the Platinum channels. I had them on Time Warner for about a month. Realized they're from a time when there were barely and HD channels at all and a lot of their worth was purely novelty

 

[M Sparks]

• PlatinumHD Add-On No Longer Available – Effective August 1, 2009, the $10.00/mo. PlatinumHD add-on package will no longer be offered to new or existing customers upgrading to HD. Existing customers subscribing to the PlatinumHD add-on through July 31, 2009 may continue to receive the PlatinumHD add-on package until they elect to change their programming.

I called it.

And I don't see why everyone is so confused. If anything, they are simplifying things quite a bit. Their marketing plan just went from an F to a D+.

 

[DodgerKing]

no habla dish-panol

 

[mitchflorida]

I'm betting that the new HD + Platinum pkg that is now $10 a month will cause people to change their plans. Knowing Charlie, he will jack up the fee to $12 next March and you will have lost your HBO or Showtime discount.

Can someone explain to me how the DVR fee is being changed, or is it staying the same????

 

[ehren]

I have Gold HD along with the AT 250 package.

Will the platinum HD channels just get turned on for me on August 1st? Maybe I will have to call.

I am gonna add HBO and SHOWTIME for $22 before then as well. Hung on HBO, Nurse Jackie, Weeds and Penn & Teller B.S. are keeping me subbed.

 

[DodgerKing]

Dish finally, for the first time in a long time last year, comes out with a good creative commercial on Turbo HD and shortly dismantles those packages.

Now Dish comes out with another good set of creative commercials comparing their prices to DirecTV for the same programming and now they change these programming packages again.

Does this mean that the comparable packages will still be less than those on Direct? Or are they simply changing packages in order to make them less expensive or appear less expensive than Direct for even more subs?

Or are they going to increase their package prices making the differences even less apparent?

It seems that every time they do something creative in advertising that will attract subs, they soon follow it with something stupid that will only further confuse them when they actually go to sign up.

 

[rajmarie]

Dish pricing is getting ridiculos. If they want to increase the price....they can simply increase the price of the package...rather then changing the package every 6 months....allowing having grandfathered package customer...who will then never get any new channels addition.

dish pricing was 1 of the biggest reason I switched from cable to dish...but dish is now becoming cable tv themselves

 

[M Sparks]

I'm betting that the new HD + Platinum pkg that is now $10 a month will cause people to change their plans. Knowing Charlie, he will jack up the fee to $12 next March.

This is what I've been saying for a week (except I said $13-$15), but people keep saying "It's not fair, they should change our package automatically." If you honestly don't care about the channels in Platinum at all (as most people claim), then you should stay grandfathered in at $10.

Me, I love HD Net Movies, and will be happy to keep it without that $10 saying "sucker" at me every month. If it goes up a few bucks in the spring, it will still be a better bargain for me.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Guys, I am not 100% sure here...

But I believe these changes only effect NEW customers not existing ones.

Hopefully we will hear more soon. If something is out of bounds here Dish has my contact info and I will post what they tell me.

 

[MikeD-C05]

First you had the dvr advantage pack go up by $8.00 last February and you only saved .98 cents over traditional programming. Then they offered us a $3.00 discount for having the dvr advantage:through the "end of the year" for being a dvr advantage customer. Looks like that only lasted for 6 months. So most likely now you will see the "with dvr " pack go up by $3.00 with no more discount fully implementing the full $8.00 increase last February. Since you won't be able to bundle the add on packs and save money the more you add, no more advantage. So the new name "With DVR" is appropriate , since there is NO more advantage at all.

Today you can bundle premiums and save;
2 premiums - 22.00
3 premiums - 31.00
4 premiums - 40.00
5 premiums - 50.00

So come August 1st If only one premium is chosen you will pay full price of each premium whether you bundle with other premium movie packs or not?
15.99 -Hbo ( 2 premiums / hbo and any other premium =28.98)
12.99 -Showtime ( 2 premiums /Showtime or Starz=25.98)
12.99 - Starz (3 premiums Hbo and two other premiums=41.97)
12.99-Cinemax (4 premiums Hbo and any other three premiums 54.96)

IF there is no more savings by bundling the premium movie packs, like DIRECTV still allows, I can see where Charlie hid the price of the Platinum + HD pack price decrease. That and eliminating the $3.00 dvr advantage monthly discount . I suggested that DISH no longer charge for the hd channels that come with the regular programming packs . They look like they did that and will only charge for the platinum hd channels by bundling them with the hd pack. BUT as usual even when DISH looks like they are simplifying the programming packs and pricing structure, they complicate and try to hide more price increases in plain sight.

DISH needs to explain a few things on this or they will be just causing more subs to jump ship. Surely to GOD , even Charlie isn't this stupid to not allow subs to bundle premium movie channels and save money?

 

[GordonR]

As talked about in the Retailer Chat, will we need to drop our current HD package before August 1 and then sign up after August 1 to get the new 'HD + Platinum ' package?
After reading all the replies, I don't think this was answered.

Thanks!

 

[tigerfan33]

Guys, I am not 100% sure here...

But I believe these changes only effect NEW customers not existing ones.

Hopefully we will hear more soon. If something is out of bounds here Dish has my contact info and I will post what they tell me.

• PlatinumHD Add-On No Longer Available – Effective August 1, 2009, the $10.00/mo. PlatinumHD add-on package will no longer be offered to new or existing customers upgrading to HD. Existing customers subscribing to the PlatinumHD add-on through July 31, 2009 may continue to receive the PlatinumHD add-on package until they elect to change their programming.• PlatinumHD Add-On No Longer Available – Effective August 1, 2009, the $10.00/mo. PlatinumHD add-on package will no longer be offered to new or existing customers upgrading to HD. Existing customers subscribing to the PlatinumHD add-on through July 31, 2009 may continue to receive the PlatinumHD add-on package until they elect to change their programming.• PlatinumHD Add-On No Longer Available – Effective August 1, 2009, the $10.00/mo. PlatinumHD add-on package will no longer be offered to new or existing customers upgrading to HD. Existing customers subscribing to the PlatinumHD add-on through July 31, 2009 may continue to receive the PlatinumHD add-on package until they elect to change their programming.

I don't know Scott. I see the words "existing customer" a lot here.

If we are confused now wail til a Dish csr get a hold of all of this info.

 

[Rangers484]

This is what I've been saying for a week (except I said $13-$15), but people keep saying "It's not fair, they should change our package automatically." If you honestly don't care about the channels in Platinum at all (as most people claim), then you should stay grandfathered in at $10.

Me, I love HD Net Movies, and will be happy to keep it without that $10 saying "sucker" at me every month. If it goes up a few bucks in the spring, it will still be a better bargain for me.

You the man!

Just ask our turbo HD friends how being grandfathered is working our for them.

 

[KAB]

He asked why DISH keeps treating their customer so poorly. I simply answered and gave another recent example (in addition to this new one) of poor treatment.

I know. You are like a fish that bites at all the bait.