When Upgrading Actually Saves Money - Well, Okay Then
After some consideration, today I called our cable company to find out how much more having HD service would be. Since we now have a HD television thanks to my parents’ generous gift, I thought that if it wasn’t too much more, maybe we would consider working it into the budget at some point in the future when we’re out of non-mortgage debt. Currently, we have our extended basic cable television, home phone and cable internet bundled into one package. I was hoping that maybe because we had a lot of services bundled together, it might not cost as much to upgrade.
When I called, the salesperson looked at our service and crunched some numbers, and then told me some startling news. When we first got our service at our house, we got an introductory price for the first twelve months, and then a few months ago, the price went up about $30 a month to the regular price for the three services bundled that we have. Well, right now at least, switching to digital and HD service from our extended basic service, and keeping our other services, we are eligible for another 12 months of an introductory special, which is about $20 less than we currently pay right now. And it includes the HD box. After the twelve months is up, the price goes up to $7 more a month than we currently pay for extended basic.
So upgrading now saves us $20 a month off our cable bill for the next 12 months.
So I signed up. I mean, I just saved $240 over the next year for upgrading my service. That is the kind of deal I will be happy to live with. We can reevaluate what we want to do a year from now and see if we want to continue with the service, but for now I found another $20 a month snowflake.
This week is becoming slightly surreal. 
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July 11th, 2008 at 9:21 am
Wow, I guess I’ll have to check with our service provider. I think they just count on noone ever calling to check if they can get an additional deal once they are set up. . .
July 11th, 2008 at 9:44 am
Excellent. I am glad it is working out for you. Honestly, if you complain a little bit in a year, they’ll probably knock it down to at least what you were paying before the upgrade. At least I hope so. The HD service *is* really nice.
July 11th, 2008 at 10:00 am
Wow, that is fantastic! You’ll have to tell us if the HD is really that much more spectacular than normal television. I have been hearing for a few years that new televisions would be required to accommodate HD, but then I heard on the news just a few days ago if you already have a service like DirecTV, your regular television will continue to work. I was relieved to hear that. Although I rarely watch television, the rest of my family are avid viewers.
July 11th, 2008 at 11:35 am
AS is always advocated–and what you did: call. We’re just coming off a 6 month promotional (had cable for years and just called and asked) which saved us $30/month. Instead of snowflaking, I just halved the difference and kept paying that amount, so we’ll be paying less for ’bout a year. I plan on calling back and asking again at that time. The promo was for “trying” Showtime, etc. ‘Course I had the date marked on my calendar and cancelled the day before the promo ended.
So, good move, and in a year maybe you can try the “I’ll try your advanced package” tactic!
Congrats!
BTW, HD is more than just digital-which is what everyone will have in a few months: you’ll have wide screen and great sound. It would be interesting to see if there’s any other difference once it’s all digital. maybe won’t be worth the price diff. then??
Enjoy!
July 11th, 2008 at 12:20 pm
dont for get to put it on your calendar on when to call back and change it or to make it fit into your budget.
I recently found your blog and have enjoyed reading what is working for your family.
July 11th, 2008 at 2:14 pm
Interesting the power a little phone call can have, isn’t it? Congrat’s on the new $20/month snowball you found!!!
July 11th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
Yay! And all you had to do was ask!
Just so you know, I swear I wrote my post yesterday. LOL
July 11th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
It’s not surreal; you are being rewarded for your non-stop snowflakes! Congratulations!
July 11th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
Wow, what a nice surprise!
July 11th, 2008 at 3:36 pm
Hey, congrats … a phone call just to check can yield some neat surprises.
I called my local cable company last month to angle for a better deal. They politely told me no, I’m getting the best price available for the stuff I have … and unless I downgrade to slow internet or TV minus the good channels, I’m paying what I’m paying. I said, hey, it doesn’t hurt to ask, huh?
July 11th, 2008 at 3:48 pm
This means that if you didn’t upgrade to HD and threatened instead to cancel because of the non-intro price, they would give you the original intro price again or better… This is yet another example where asking for a discount would have payed off. Just put in your calendar that in 12 months you need to call and tell them you want to cancel because you can’t afford the non-intro price, and they will give you another intro price.
July 11th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
How cool is that? You got the super incredible gift from the folks and now you actually get to save money on the upgraded bundle!
Regardless of what happens a year down the road, you have a whole year to enjoy it *and* save money at the same time!
July 11th, 2008 at 11:06 pm
Wow, what a wonderful surprise! Good for you!!
July 12th, 2008 at 4:29 pm
Very cool! For 6 months it was cheaper to have both tv & the internet than just the internet. We’re looking into ways to get that back again.
July 15th, 2008 at 12:58 pm
I recently found that our promotional deal with Comcast ran out and our bill spiked WAY up. When I called to downgrade our services, I found out we could get the exact same package for $75 less! I think I need to call them more often…
July 17th, 2008 at 1:15 am
That works out pretty good! Of course by the time a year is up, you won’t want to get rid of the HD, but by then perhaps they will have another special that you can take advantage of!
August 26th, 2008 at 4:37 pm
Great! Stick ‘em to it though…..my cable company told me that TWICE (moved out of and back into area within 1 year) and screwed me over with a higher bill than before, and when I called back, the person who told me that deal mysteriously “never worked here” and “that deal never existed”. very frusterating….good luck!