Satellite Price Hike
 

I just got notified in the mail that my subscription is going up $5. Not that big of a deal I guess, but have to ask those of you who have been around as long as I and remember the days when there was no cable/satellite available. TV was free because of the commercials. Well, I don't subscribe to any premium channels (to expensive) so that being said everything I watch has commercials. Why do we have to pay so much when we are basically getting the same thing that we got for free years ago. Yes, I know more channels are available, but they still have commercials. Maybe the TV stations are ripping off the cable/satellite co's? Anyone else out there find this frustrating? I may just have to dump TV altogether. Being on a fixed income is tough when prices keep going up.

I totally agree with you. You may want to look into Roku, Apple TV or Amazon fire. With so many channels wanting to provide viewing of their shows on the Go, I think these devices sometimes rely on the apps from your tablet or phone. I can't get satellite TV signal from my porch which faces north so you are paying a little less than what I have to fork out.

You could look into a simple antenna for local stations, like we used to get. There are still commercials, but once you buy a relatively inexpensive antenna you can watch for free. Mine looks like a sheet of paper, and it goes indoors - but I just use it on my computer with another gizmo. I'm planning on putting one on the tv in the guest room. don't need to pay for a device to sit up there unused until company comes. We are still happy with our service on the main TV but we are on the introductory two years. After that will regroup and maybe switch providers for their introductory two years.

For Apple TV, once you buy the device, don't you have to buy the programs from iTunes? And netflix has a cost too. Cheaper than cable/satellite, but I guess the only free way is the antenna.

I too am in this conundrum. We just got notice that our cable is going up again and I won't tell you how much I pay for this.

My problem is trying to watch sports. My DH and I are both avid English Premier League football (soccer) supporters and I love Olympic sports. While I could get some weekend coverage of Olympic sports with local coverage available by antenna, there is no easy/inexpensive access to English Premier League football.

My TV cable/internet went up $9.88! per month. I called & complained. Was told certain prices are Government controlled & out of their hands. We have to pay for sports stations & some kind of transporting/converting fees, we never use. We do not watch sports period! I still kept complaining. We're also on fixed income. I eventually got a discount of almost $30.00 off a month for 1 year. My one neighbor calls every year, complains & gets a 1 year discount. Never hurts to call & complain.

I also called my heating oil company & got my locked in price reduced.

I don't ever remember cable TV being free. We had to pay for the cable to be connected & monthly service fees. Antenna TV was free.

My friend is another who is diligent about making notes in her calendar and calls all appropriate vendors/suppliers requesting...and usualoy getting...senior citzen discounts. Virtually all give her discounts every year or renewal period. I can't claim the fixed income justification, unfortunately. Hubs has managed to get our cable/phone/internet bill reduced a couple of times but it's still ridiculously expensive. We still have all old tube tvs, so can't use the digital antenna yet. Hubs wants a new tv but I've always been of the mindset as long as it still works there is no need to replace it. He is usually like minded but he's getting whiny about the weight of the existing one when it comes to rearranging the house for Christmas decorating.

Catsden, I have had the same thought about paying to watch commercials! I'm sure that back when the big push came for cable TV we thought the commercials would go away, maybe that was "hoped". It seems like there are more commercials than ever and sometimes I just turn the TV off, especially near the end of a show when it seems there are 5 minutes of commercials then 2 minutes of the program. We have cable and pay a high price for it, much of it for our kids and grandkids to watch so don't want to get rid of it. Oh well, I sound like an old curmongen):

Lately the programs on both regular tv and cable channels are not worth watching.......and some of the programs are really old.....

You can get a converter box for your old analog tv's and then add the antenna for local stations. That's what I'm going to do at some point--maybe when the winter is gone! My big problem is that my email address is tied to my cable, email comes thru the cable web site so I have to set up a different email host first and then can let go of cable and phone and just keep internet for now.....later maybe find just an internet isp cheaper. and go with antenna tv.

DH put up an outdoor antenna when our bill went over $100 for the middle package with 2 tvs. We get about 30 channels on the antenna and it cost about $75 to put up. We also purchased Netflix back in Sept. and love it. We've almost quit watching regular tv except for the news and PBS. I never thought my DH would give up tv as he is one who can zone out in front of the set from morning til night and is also a sports nut.