Pie in the Sky

Sky's excellent satellite television broadcasting; wonderful customer service and cutting-edge technology all make for a first-class reputation. That's why we've had Sky for years and it's been a really positive, value for money experience. So when Sky announced, in the summer, that they were going to introduce a broadband internet service - I was at the front of the queue.

Alas, now I have left the queue and don't plan to return anytime soon. I registered my interest back in July and by August I'd received an invitation from Sky to get my broadband from them. I called them on 24th August and did the necessary which included giving Sky my migration (MAC)code from my existing supplier - BT. A week later I had a letter from Sky saying there was a problem and to give them a call.

I called Sky on 4th September and was told that my MAC code had been rejected. I offered to provide it again but was told I didn't need to - it would be submitted and everything would be fine. I was told that there were problems getting the routers (like modems) out to people. Again, this would be fine as it would be chased and I would receive it soon. Great.

By the 1st October, I was becoming just a teensy bit cheesed-off as I'd neither received or heard anything in the past 4 weeks. I rang Sky. It transpired that after my call on 4th September, nothing had happened to my order. Nowt. Zero. Nil. Zilch. Bugger all. It also transpired that the reason my MAC code had been rejected was because it had been entered in lower case instead of upper case. This should have been known by the staff apparently. The router was never chased.

Surprisingly I decided to cancel my order - well, my non-order. I also asked if the forty quid I'd forked out for the privilege of getting Sky broadband, could be given back to me. The chap on the phone admitted that they were having problems with people's orders and that mine had been "a catalogue of disasters". Encouraging.

So I'm still with BT, who, I must point out, have always provided a great broadband service for me. The only reason I wanted to change was due to cost. £15 a month from BT versus £0 from Sky. So Sky were offering broadband for free. However, as they say: "You get what you pay for" and I sure did.

Sky's broadband cost nothing and I got nothing.