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Dish Raising TV Rates Starting January 14
Dish Network will join the growing chorus of pay TV providers ringing in the new year with cable TV price hikes. According to a thread over at the satelliteguys forums (hat tip Phillip Swann), Dish will be raising rates on the majority of its programming bundles starting on January 14. Customer channel bundle prices will be bumped anywhere from $2 to $8 depending on your package. Like other operators, Dish is lowering the cost of HBO slightly (from $19 to $15 per month) thanks to competition from HBO's standalone broadband streaming platform, HBO Now.

Most recommended from 16 comments


elefante72
join:2010-12-03
East Amherst, NY

11 recommendations

elefante72

Member

Add that to DTV and AT&T

Only in an environment where 99% of the STB (aka monopoly) can a company advertise $70 and the bill be $140 because of the STB fees. So you have a $50 box, charge $15 a month and count the winnings--and raise the rates every year of a depreciating asset. I think 2016 is going to be a big turning point, and Comcast is getting ahead of the curve (aka "300 GB" flexible to not stream threshold) because they know LOTS of people are really starting to evaluate the "sports" bloat in cable programming. If you guys didn't already get it, but sports is killing cable tv, and already the NFL is double dipping w/ streaming.

Here we come, sports zero rating...

maartena
Elmo
Premium Member
join:2002-05-10
Orange, CA

4 recommendations

maartena

Premium Member

What a surprise!

The media companies rape the subscription TV companies, and therefore the subscription TV companies pass it on and rape the customers. As I have said before, prepare to bend over a little more each year.

And customers are left with no choice to drop expensive sports programming, no choice to pick only the channels they actually want to watch, and very little choice in picking their own equipment so they don't have to pay expensive fees to rent boxes and DVR services. Customers are being hit with "sports surcharges" because sports teams charge high fees to the networks they contract with so they in turn can pay their athletes 8-figure yearly salaries, and are being charged "broadcast surcharges" for networks they can also get for free with OTA (if, of course within range of the antenna) so those networks can pay for their big football weekend and cover the cost of failed shows they will cancel before year's end.

Subscription TV has become a disgrace. Just examine your bill and see what it is you really pay for and whether it is worth it. In the mean time, the US population is growing (which under normal circumstance has always meant an increase in customers), but all TV subscription companies are losing customers. Over a million were lost last year in total, and so far after the 3d quarter that million has already been reached. We'll have to wait and see what the 4th quarter numbers bring, but it ain't going to be good for the cable companies and satellite companies.

This isn't going to change until the cable and satellite companies find a way to offer customers a better choice. And they can't do that until they start standing up against the media companies. As long as the TV subscription companies don't grow a pair of balls and have the guts to tell the share holders that this is going to hurt the short time gain in expensive fights with the media companies, but will be better in the long run......things might change. They will however never change if they just simply focus on short term gains for the shareholders and roll over to the media companies another year, another contract because you are afraid of losing customers.

But if they aren't going to stand up to demands that say: "Our ESPN is $7 per subscriber and we DEMAND it be put in the minimum package, eat it or leave it" - NOTHING will change, and customers will just have bend over a little more next year.

JakCrow
join:2001-12-06
Palo Alto, CA

3 recommendations

JakCrow

Member

Too bad these price increases don't go to paying for quality

It's slightly noticeable when I had a HD TV, but super obvious with a 4K TV, but Dish's HD quality is HORRIBLE across almost all channels. Now that I have a 4K TV, the artifacts, banding, and tearing awful. Youtube videos have better quality than Dish.