By Susan Edmunds of RNZ
Customers who feel they have not been given enough notice about their Sky TV contracts rolling over should ask for a refund or cancel, Consumer NZ says.
RNZ was contacted by a Sky TV customer who said he was upset with how his automatic renewal was handled.
He said he was an annual Sky Sport Now subscription holder, with annual rollover, autorenewal and auto payment clauses in the contract.
But he said he did not receive any notice of the automatic rollover this year. Last year, Sky TV had got in touch a month ahead of time.
He said the annual subscription price rose by 50% from a promotional $365 to $549.
The broadcaster also offered an active promotion of $399 but would not apply it to him, he said.
“I emailed within two hours of our card being charged yesterday to see if they would offer us the promotion, but they have not and are sticking to charging us the full $549.
“I am particularly concerned regarding the price aspect here, and whether an annual rollover is fair when the price of the contract increases by 50 percent. We can’t find any notice of that price increase either.”
Sky TV has not yet responded to requests for comment. The $399 offer was a Black Friday deal.
On Facebook, other customers expressed similar concerns. One advised other users to log into their accounts and deactivate automatic renewal.
Consumer NZ said it thought any term that allowed a business to roll over a contract or subscription without adequate notice or the ability top cancel was likely to be a breach of the Fair Trading Act.
“An automatic renewal clause is less likely to raise concerns where a customer is provided with reasonable notice that the contract is about to renew, a reasonable period in which to stop the renewal, and the ability to exit the contract without penalty.
“If Sky TV did not provide adequate notice to the customer, we think it should either allow the customer to cancel their subscription or offer a refund of the difference in price.”
