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Sky’s the limit for reader fined by company for doing what he was told

Pricewatch: ‘I am a long-time customer of Sky and am appalled by their attitude’

Sky’s latest wheeze uses the internet instead of old school satellite dishes to bring all of the providers channels on to your TV. Photograph: iStock
Sky’s latest wheeze uses the internet instead of old school satellite dishes to bring all of the providers channels on to your TV. Photograph: iStock
Conor Pope's picture
Conor Pope
Mon Nov 13 2023 - 00:00

A reader called Des switched to Sky Glass a few months ago and, all things considered, he was pretty happy with his life choices.

Sky’s latest wheeze uses the internet instead of old school satellite dishes to bring all of the providers channels on to your TV and includes a swish looking television into the bargain.

So far so good, you might be thinking.

So the new TV was delivered to Des handily enough but the person who did the delivering was “merely tasked with doing just that and was not expected to take back old equipment”.

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As Des had heard nothing about what he was supposed to do with the old kit, he rang the company to ask what was to be done with his old Sky Q box.

“The person at Sky said packaging to accommodate the return would be sent to me. Not unnaturally, I then put the matter out of my mind and waited for the packaging,” Des writes.

The packaging never arrived but a text message did and it was not a welcome one.

It was from Sky and it was “threatening to charge me for not returning the box. I immediately rang them to tell them what I had been told. This person at Sky told me to wrap the box in plain paper and bring it to An Post”.

So Des did as he was told and, having wrapped the item, he planned to bring it to his local post office the following day.

“Before I had the opportunity to do so, an An Post driver came to my door and took the parcel away. Crucially, as it turned out, he did not give me a tracking number,” Des says.

“Sky have now charged me €124 for failing to return the box and despite my explanations, in two separate phone calls, are refusing to refund my money unless they have a tracking number.”

Des also contacted An Post and “they tell me the instructions to collect the parcel must have come from Sky. I am a long-time customer of Sky and am appalled by their attitude”.

We highlighted Des’s concerns to Sky and in a statement the company said “We have spoken to the customer in question and apologised for this incident. We have also provided the customer with a full refund.”