BT Sport free for 'BT' customers

[#1]

I, for one, continue to be surprised by the calls for PlusNet to provide BT Sport.  The fact that PlusNet and BT Retail are owned by the same group is irrelevant and they operate as completely separate companies. 
BT Retail have a TV product as a differentiating feature of their service and believe that they have a competitive advantage in doing so.  That's their prerogative (of course) and PlusNet may well lose some customers to BT Retail as a result.  Equally, PlusNet don't have to make the necessary capital investment for IPTV and, arguably, would see a net benefit as the use of streaming video may decrease.
For those that insist on lumping BT Retail and PlusNet together, what's the net result for the BT Group?  Nothing, because a PlusNet customer who jumps ship is still a customer of the BT Group!

[#2]

I suspect this question is asked more in hope rather than as a result of rational reasoning.
We football fans, we happy breed, are becoming more fervent as the new season approaches.
In the past, I've taken little interest in the coming season during the summer months.
However, the arrival of BT Sport has excited me beyond all measure:
I've been scouring th' Internet for any news on BT Sport plans, fixture lists, TV schedules and the like.
The lure of 'free' football is a strong one.

[#3]

Quote from: pwatson

I, for one, continue to be surprised by the calls for PlusNet to provide BT Sport.  The fact that PlusNet and BT Retail are owned by the same group is irrelevant and they operate as completely separate companies.

Quote from: CaptainFantastic

I suspect this question is asked more in hope rather than as a result of rational reasoning.

No, I ask the question because it seems to me, at least on one level, to make business sense. BT Retail and Plusnet still exist as separate companies within BT Group because they are different value propositions and draw different types of customers to the BT Group. This is a common telecoms strategy these days -- e.g. Telefonica with O2 and Giffgaff.
I would argue that televised sport would be attractive to both groups (customers of BT Retail and Plusnet) in equal measure. Sport, particularly football, has a large audience across all demographic groups.
If only BT Retail offers BT Sport, significant numbers of customers may well migrate from Plusnet to BT Retail. If both BT Retail and Plusnet offer BT Sport, both propositions are strengthened and BT Group should then look forward to a substantial net gain in customer numbers. BT Sport is a game changer for sports fans looking at the value of their broadband contract. BT Group could easily encourage shared use of IPTV technology. Companies operating under an ownership umbrella are only as separate as they are allowed to be.
There are, of course, other very good strategic reasons why BT Group might choose not to offer BT Sport through Plusnet. At a guess, I would say BT Group might want to widen the gap between the product offerings -- BT Retail as the "premium price with all the extras", Plusnet as the lower price, value, bare bones offering.
Still worth asking the question...

[#4]

You're preaching to the choir as far as I'm concerned, jdlk.
I really want BT Sport!
I can see pwatson's point about BT Sport being an attractant toward BT Broadband, and therefore moving customers from PlusNet to BT BB creates no net gain.
However, I believe there is a wider point.
BT's corporate pride might dictate that BT Sport must be seen to succeed and for that, subscriber numbers would be key,
In that scenario, offering BT Sport to PlusNet becomes more attractive to BT.
[quote=pwatson]Equally, PlusNet don't have to make the necessary capital investment for IPTV and, arguably, would see a net benefit as the use of streaming video may decrease.
BT could arrange it such that PlusNet could offer BT Sport though a Sky box only at first, which would have no impact on PlusNet's network but would boost subscriber numbers.

[#5]

My concern is that if/when Plusnet do supply BT sport that we will end up with increased costs as a result. All I want is basic cheap broadband at a reasonable cost, I don't want telephone calls, TV, movies and certainly not sport etc. and despite there probably being a different 'package' to choose to get 'free sport' (nothing is ever free) the basic costs for broadband will most likely rise to offset and make the 'Sport' package more appealing. The main reason I would never have Sky or Virgin are because I cannot choose exactly what I want without paying for a 'package' usually at a high cost.
Sadly I expect Plusnet will eventually go down this road In order to stay competitive, I hope not.

[#6]

Having BT Sport would likely attract subscribers to PlusNet who would not touch BT due to its poor reputation.
More customers equals more profit (I would hope).
If, as I said, PlusNet customers could be signed up for the Sky delivery option, for which I believe BT has paid a fixed fee, the cost to BT and PlusNet would merely be the admin. which would be negligible.

[#7]

Quote from: rja66

My concern is that if/when Plusnet do supply BT sport that we will end up with increased costs as a result.

Same here.  One of the reasons I left Talktalk was because of their tying their top broadband package to Youview boxes.  I have a youview box and like it as a PVR and streaming services box, but the huge quantities of Talktalk branded youview boxes I see turning up on ebay and in second hand shops says that their are a lot of them being subsidised by people being chainganged into a sevice when they have a perfectly good alternative or get it just because it is available.  That is how I got my basically new Talktalk Youview box for £60 instead of the £250 a retail box will cost you.
Of course even if the service is separately "costed" add-on to a package - there is still no guarantee that all the costs are included in those charges and a commercial decision isn't taken to hike pricing for the rest of customers to make those packages more attractive.  There are timing issues too - initial costs of deploying what will be a large number of boxes from initial takeup will have to be funded somehow, so I imagine some of the more generous signup offers might dry up a bit (I got mine with £10 off for 6 months).  Of course I have my discount so it doesn't affect me directly.
I'm also pretty sure that the launch of the Youview service on Talktalk came hand in hand with a reduction in the quality of their service - yet another reason I left.
To those that say Plusnet will become unattractive to customers without TV - there are plenty of ISPs without TV services.  Are they all doomed?  It will be a sad day if that happens as only the vey large ISP's have anywhere near the scale required to offer TV services economically.

[#8]

Quote from: jimbof

Quote from: rja66 My concern is that if/when Plusnet do supply BT sport that we will end up with increased costs as a result. Same here.

As I detailed above, BT Sport could be supplied for negligible cost to PlusNet with no pressure to increase prices.

Quote from: jimbof

To those that say Plusnet will become unattractive to customers without TV - there are plenty of ISPs without TV services.  Are they all doomed?

No-one is saying that in this thread.

[#9]

Quote from: CaptainFantastic

As I detailed above, BT Sport could be supplied for negligible cost to PlusNet with no pressure to increase prices.

Hrmm.  I can't see the product managers at BT going for that.  "You know what would be a great idea; let's keep all the cost for this new BT Sport against my BT Retail profitability and give it to Plusnet customers for free"...
My experience of such content licensing deals is that they will often be specific about the retail brands under which the content can be resold; which makes perfect sense really.  Otherwise BT get a "fixed fee" service and then resell to the world+dog for a knock-down price. 
One way or another it will get accounted for as a cost against Plusnet if customers get the benefit of the service, and then there will be on overwhelming urge for that to be recouped from customers.

Quote from: CaptainFantastic

No-one is saying that in this thread.

You're right, there was another thread which was much stronger in that direction, I was a little confused.  But all this talk of free sport gets my goat if I'm honest - it is only "free" to the people who want it, to the detriment of those who don't.

[#10]

This might be of interest. See the attached photo of my TV screen.
Infuriatingly it looks like yet another chargeable service which makes a mockery of the name Freeview.

Quote

There are no current plans to make BT Sport available on Freeview. You may have noticed that BT Sport 1 and BT Sport 2 are now listed on your Freeview programme guide (channels 58 and 59). This is because BT TV delivers its channels through the Freeview platform. You’ll only be able to watch the channels when they launch on 1 August if you have subscribed to BT Sport and have either a BT TV and broadband package or a Sky box.

[#11]

Quote from: jimbof

...all this talk of free sport gets my goat if I'm honest - it is only "free" to the people who want it, to the detriment of those who don't.

That's the only bit I dispute.
To me, it's an assumption which ignores a basic fact of business:
products are a means to make money;
I don't believe PlusNet would offer a TV service if it were to the detriment of existing customers.
I also don't believe it needs to be to the detriment of existing customers: increasing subscriber numbers could cover any cost in setting up and running the service.

[#12]

Quote from: Strat

See the attached photo of my TV screen. ...another chargeable service...

Indeed, I was warned on a Humax forum to hide these channels as they could crash my Humax HDR-FOX T2.
Something to do with IPTV, apparently.

[#13]

I hear what you are saying, and while all of it could turn out to be true the plan might equally be that they'd be happy not winning "value" broadband seeking customers if they are replaced with smaller numbers of premium service consuming ones.  It could also turn out to be a miss-step with subscriber numbers insufficent to cover the base costs of the service (I believe that BT's youview service runs on a different network to plusnet and the rest of ISPs).  So at a technical level it will be interesting to see if the Youview service comes onto the plusnet network (possibly reducing network quality for the rest of us) or TV-seeking customers end up on the BT network.
The Talktalk boxes (thought to be lower cost than the Humax ones BT supply) were I believe discovered to cost TalkTalk around £150 each, and that is before taking account of contributions to Youview themselves.  Talktalk group's own Annual report shows very hefty contributions to the Youview joint venture: http://www.talktalkgroup.com/~/media/Files/T/TalkTalk/pdfs/reports/2012/talktalk-ar12-web-ready-v2.p...
"At 31 March 2012 the Group had committed to pay £13m (2011: £14m) to YouView TV Limited payable over the period to 31 March 2014."
No doubt somewhere calculator buttons are squeaking furiously as there are undoubtedly a lot of costs involved in setting up a service like this.  In my opinion the only reason Plusnet could offer such a service is because of the tie with BT as they are far too small otherwise - the only providers with TV currently are the "Big 4" of BT, Virgin, Talktalk and Sky.  Anything below that is uneconomical.  You really need millions of subscribers and not hundreds of thousands.
I think we probably agree to disagree on who will pay for this after all.  I'm glad Plusnet has a policy of "locking in" historic tariffs as I am set then; I think if a TV service does come online it is safe to say they won't get any cheaper at least...!    I really do hope the performance isn't impacted though (like has happened at Talktalk)

[#14]

I don't entirely disagree with your analysis. 
The only 'safe' way, economically speaking, to deliver BT Sport is via the Sky satellite platform.
Any TV service greater than that could impact PlusNet as you fear it would.

[#15]

Surely bearing in mind the tremendous start up costs for BT Sport it makes sense to offer Plusnet customers a discount to access the channels on the Sky platform
As both Setanta and ESPN have shown subscriber numbers are key to success or failure
Costs to do this would be minimal, would save churn from Plusnet to BT, and would capture Plusnet customers who wouldn't subscribe to the sports channels at full price
No brainer!