Thread: Changed from Tata SKy to Big TV

After 2 years with Tatasky, I finally decided to change to an alternate player Big TV.

Tata Sky Background:-

1. Wanted to upgrade to Tatasky+ with HD but no ETA available with customer care.
2. Wiring from terrace to home was damaged and signal had become erratic and the entire wiring thus needed replacement.
3. Tatasky gave an estimate of around Rs.700 + [including technician visit charge and 45mtr cable (12mtr free)].
4. Recent update on Tatasky added an ad box below the regular info menu, and recently started noticing occassional pixellation occuring randomly on channels, an irritant.

Didnt want to get stuck with a bad situation with a new service provider so decided to try with cheap entry level STB packages before I decide on expensive HD/DVR box later, after research found that best picture quality is of BigTV for large LCD (I have 40" Sony LCD).

Currently BigTV offers 25% discount on one of their packages for HDFC credit card holders (check card offers at hdfcbank website) if bought online. It made good sense since for Rs.1340 (including approx 900 worth 4 mth package). I was charged additional Rs. 288 (for 42mtr used -18mtr free), this extra charge was not intimated to me when bought online or when installation guy's called me.

Big TV experience:-

1. With about Rs.300 paid extra it was'nt a great deal but for new STB under warranty and new Dish probably worth it. Net extra cost 1340+300-900(4 mth package free)= Rs.740.
2. Superior picture on LCD with component cable (bought seperately), I was wondering if it's worth any more to go for HD box immediately, may be once the prices drop with DVR.
3. UGLY LOGO is too bright and mostly opaque, but thankfully is at different positions depending on viewing channel inorder to be less disruptive.
4. Big TV STB 3 was a recent model and I did not find any lag in browsing, best I liked the numerous favourite channel sorting I can do in Big TV.
5. Menu interface is not very user friendly and Tata Sky interface is much superior.
6. Myservices portal registration online via bigtv website, details on website pdf docs nd good phone IVR sytem helped do most things without speaking to customer care. But once spoken to them the customer care was helpful but I felt that tata sky reps were little better in their conversation.
7. Lastly the packs are much cheaper with numerous base packs and addon pack options, I save about Rs.50 every month on the same channels watched on tatasky. (I do not have to subscribe to monthly addon pack for colors and NDTV imagine in BigTV). Also I can now purchase recharge card from neighbourhood 'Reliance World'.

Tatasky Followup

1. They deligently called up after I asked for disconnection and stopped recharging.
2. They offered free reinstallation visit + free transfer of ownership + 12mtr free cable + 1 mth subscription discount with conditions.
3. The hardware with dish shall remain in my possession till I transfer or ask for reinstallation. I liked the gesture, I may gift it or sell it eventually.

Originally Posted by liberal

4. Recent update on Tatasky added an ad box below the regular info menu, and recently started noticing occassional pixellation occuring randomly on channels, an irritant.

Would be good if you could just write a mail to T Sky telling them this is one of your reasons for discontinuing your connection. The increase in banner size has been a huge irritant for me... its like the last straw after the other ways they "spam" you with. Unless that goes, I'm likely to change over to something else myself, after our semi-annual subscription expires.

I feel that you made the wrong or hasty move. But if you are happy with BigTV, then no issues anyway.

Although I do find that added banner under the info thing pretty annoying but for some reason it only comes up on the tv with the older box (silver colour box) and I have never seen it on the tv with a new black colored smaller box.. I have no idea how are both the boxes giving different outputs. I agree it is annoying but all you have to do is hit the select button again and it goes away.

You might have made the right decision in your own perspective but from what you wrote I believe you never called up Tata sky telling them about what your issues were! Now thats really unfair on a service provider.. You are very much welcome to write a negative review but Tata sky in your case did not deserve a negative thread when you never complained about the problems you were facing.

Just out of interest, Why Big TV and not Dish tv or Airtel DTH or Videocon or Sun? Is there anything in particular you like about Big TV over all others?

Originally Posted by Raccoon

Would be good if you could just write a mail to T Sky telling them this is one of your reasons for discontinuing your connection. The increase in banner size has been a huge irritant for me... its like the last straw after the other ways they "spam" you with. Unless that goes, I'm likely to change over to something else myself, after our semi-annual subscription expires.

This was an irritant, but my decision to change was majorly impacted by unreasonable charges for tech visit+rewiring coupled with comparatively expensive monthly outgo.

Originally Posted by just4kix

I feel that you made the wrong or hasty move. But if you are happy with BigTV, then no issues anyway.

I waited for over a month researching and mulling before I decided to change. With the reasonable price I paid for new STB with warranty, good installation, the improved quality of picture on LCD and reasonable monthly pack pricing, I think it's a deal and I am loving it.

I do acknowledge the long trouble free experience with capable Tatasky STB & service, but I believe that with other DTH operators sprucing up their customer care, systems & STB, alongwith reasonable/cheap initial & recurring pricing/chgs then the premium chgs of Tatasky may not be justified in many cases.

Originally Posted by Admin

Just out of interest, Why Big TV and not Dish tv or Airtel DTH or Videocon or Sun? Is there anything in particular you like about Big TV over all others?

I found support for superior picture quality of Big TV from online reviews with feedback of improved STB performance with updated software/new STB and seeing the demo of the same at Reliance World, Powai was impressive. Reasonable initial cost was added impetus, though others like Dish and Airtel too had good offers online. Sun & Videocon were not considered at all.

The feedbacks online singled out customer service as BigTV's major drawback, I spoke to customer care before buying and found them to be robots reading scripts, but I did not have to wait on phone to reach a rep and response was satisfactory. Anyways all details are available online & on IVR. I hope for the equipment to continue functioning properly without any fuss so that there is no need for dealing with customer care.

Update, found some major issues with Big Tv.

1. Out of sync voice on some english channels
Seen on Discovery, Zee Studio and Nicklodeon.
2. Info bar (which shows channel.programme details) doesn't get automatically updated when STB is started - I usually find it 'loading...' when changing channels.
3. Not more than 2 days programmes list - in guide menu.
4. Sent 2 emails to customer care to correct the sync issue, no reply... also checked another Big TV setup and it too has the same sync problem.

Thankfully I didn't opt for their HD DVR Box. I shall have to go for HD-DVR from another service provider (preferably Tatasky+HD) when launched.

Big TV is purely a value product with great PQ but not in the league of Tatasky which is overall a much more satisfying product.

Originally Posted by liberal

Update, found some major issues with Big Tv.

1. Out of sync voice on some english channels
Seen on Discovery, Zee Studio and Nicklodeon.
2. Info bar (which shows channel.programme details) doesn't get automatically updated when STB is started - I usually find it 'loading...' when changing channels.
3. Not more than 2 days programmes list - in guide menu.
4. Sent 2 emails to customer care to correct the sync issue, no reply... also checked another Big TV setup and it too has the same sync problem.

Thankfully I didn't opt for their HD DVR Box. I shall have to go for HD-DVR from another service provider (preferably Tatasky+HD) when launched.

Big TV is purely a value product with great PQ but not in the league of Tatasky which is overall a much more satisfying product.

Every service provider, be it DTH, internet, cable, telephone, electricity, et al, will have the pros and cons.

One must do a real in depth study and consider all implications. I always felt that you made a hasty decision. One month is not sufficient. As I understand that you were happy with TS earlier but because of wiring issues your TV/STB reception was poor. You wanted TS to repair the cabling at low cost, preferably free (nothing wrong with that, by the way).

TS wanted to charge you high and you left them with a huff. I felt that you did not negotiate well. You could have sent them a written notice that you feel that they are overcharging for cable repair. You could have then threatened to "defect". This may have brought the desired effect - and it did as you said so in the 1st post itself.

You say that BigTV picture is better and I agree there. But I will say that it is just a shade better. I have seen it at my dealers place - he deals with DishTV, TS and BigTV (and now Videocon). He showed me different signals on a 32" LCD. But BigTV is known to have many customer care issues. And also I think that their logo is too big.

You have now come to the same conclusions that I did many months ago.

I am not trying to admonish you or anything or saying "I told you so". But do consider:

- you will not buy a new vehicle simply because it is consuming more fuel (but you will if it is beyond help)
- you will not sell the house and buy a new one if the roof is leaking (but you will if it is in imminent danger of collapsing)

So let this to be a learning: Don't fix anything that ain't broken or alternately known devils are better than unknown angels.

Originally Posted by just4kix

Every service provider, be it DTH, internet, cable, telephone, electricity, et al, will have the pros and cons.

One must do a real in depth study and consider all implications. I always felt that you made a hasty decision. One month is not sufficient. As I understand that you were happy with TS earlier but because of wiring issues your TV/STB reception was poor. You wanted TS to repair the cabling at low cost, preferably free (nothing wrong with that, by the way).

Thanks 'just4kix' for a fitting summary.

I did not believe that service charges could be negotiated, I prefer having to deal with realistic charges than haggle over them.

Thankfully after reading the feedbacks of Big TV on the forum I decided to try regular STB at discount offer instead of HD DVR which I was contemplating earlier.

Lesson learnt- All that shines is not Gold...

Unfortunately, you have to haggle. That is the fact of life. The other day I was asking DELL for a quote of R-710 mid-range server with the following specs:

- 2 x Intel® Xeon® X5650 2.66GHz, 12M cache, 6.4 GT/s QPI, Turbo, HT, 6C
- 48GB Memory (6x8GB) 1333MHz Dual Ranked RDIMMs
- Integrated Two Broadcom 5709C dual-port Gigabit Ethernet with TOE enabled
- 2 x146GB 15K RPM SAS 3.5 " Hot Plug Hard Drive (RAID 0+1)
- No Keyboard
- No Mouse
- No Monitor
- DVD ROM, SATA
- Red Hat Linux 5.3

I negotiated the price from Rs. 8,43,000 per server to Rs. 6,93,000 per server. Then my procurement team took over and they knocked off a further Rs. 67,000 simply by threatening to turn to IBM or HP.

Originally Posted by just4kix

Unfortunately, you have to haggle.

I understand bargaining to buy a product, but never thought could bargain on service charges as an individual, shall give it a try next time around.

Incidently, I bought a laptop last week, Since 2 laptops of Dell (From US) are already in the family, I had called Dell India for a better price (Inspiron 15R) and received no discount, finally I bought Acer 5740 at a good price.

Update: Big TV software update today reduced the loading time drastically of the info bar programme details and only occurs randomly when accessing the channels via the favourite menu.

Originally Posted by just4kix

I feel that you made the wrong or hasty move. But if you are happy with BigTV, then no issues anyway.

It was a right decision to move away from Tata Sky

They dont provide any support after an year..you are completely on your own after 1 year..no support ..yes paid support is available but why would you pay? What are you paying for? being a loyal customer?..you show loyalty and they stab you after an year!