Virgin TV customers with Sky Sports and Movies are facing a price rise this summer – £2 more a month for sports and 50p extra for films.
The cable company is writing to let its customers know about the change in prices which take effect from June 1, 2015. This will see the total price of the Sky Sports bundle climbing to £29.25/month and the Sky Movies Collection going up to £20/month.
If you’re taking the Sky Movies 1 or Sky Movies 2 bundle of channels, currently priced at £14.50/month each – these will go up to £15/month each as well.
The £7 premium you pay to get channels in HD on Virgin will not be increasing.
Related: Virgin Media survey finds supporters struggle to afford football on TVBrigitte Trafford, Virgin Media’s chief corporate affairs officer explained the reason for the price increases. “This price rise is entirely due to the increase in charges we have to pay Sky to offer Sky Sports and Sky Movies to our customers,” Trafford said.
“As we have made clear to Ofcom any increase in the value of the Premier League’s live TV rights eventually ends up hitting the pockets of fans. This is why we are arguing so strongly for a change in the way those rights are sold.”
Virgin Media has been calling for an investigation into the way broadcast rights for Premier League games are sold, arguing that fans are being ripped off. Despite TV subscriptions for live games being the highest in Europe, UK football fans arguably have the worst deal, as the Premier League doesn’t let British TV companies show 3pm Saturday games. European broadcasters however face no such restrictions.
Back in March, Sky announced that was putting up the prices of its TV packages, just weeks after it was revealed that it had paid £4.2 billion for rights to the majority of Premier League games for the next three seasons.
As well as increasing its Sky Sports and Movies packages by £1 and 50p respectively, Sky also increased the cost of its Variety and Family Bundles of channels by £2 and £3. The basic Original Bundle remains at £21.50/month.
In the same auction, BT shelled out £960 million for rights to just 42 games per season for the next three seasons. BT has yet to announce any price rises for its BT Sport channels – also available on Sky and Virgin – although the services of a former Jedi Knight can’t come cheap.
Virgin TV customers can currently get all BT Sport channels for £15/month. This includes BT Sport in standard definition and HD. There’s currently no SD-only option.
BT Sport costs £12/month on Sky, or £15/month if you want BT Sport in HD. Alternatively, BT Sport in SD is included for no extra cost if you take BT Broadband with your Sky TV package. You can get BT Sport in HD this way by paying an extra £3/month.
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