DISH VS TATA. Review on Dish TV

I have DISH TV in my home and TATA at my parent’s and I manage them both. Having used both the services for 2 years now, I am struggling to make choice between the two.

Packages

This is where DISH TV scores hands down. One can get ALL the channels for 300 bucks on DISH TV. Whereas I am paying 320 bucks on Tata Sky with NO Sports Channels (another 65 bucks dent), 2 Hindi Music Channels (only MTV and Channel V). One needs to pay 45 bucks to watch a basic channel like Colors. None of their package offers Colors or Real. I am paying 385 bucks to get necessities like COLORS and SPORTS channels.

To get all channel one needs to pay 5000 in one go which means 420 bucks for a bulk buy. Whereas one is happy by paying 300-350 bucks on DISH TV and that too. We bought annual package of ALL channel on DISH for 3600 last year. This is a HUGE SAVING. The basic packages of DISH TV are pretty meaningful and gives one a wide and intelligent choice. Whereas TATA is crook.

Online Interface:

TATA SKY: Tata Sky scores very high on this one. Making payments is much easier through Tata Sky’s Telephonic Credit Card Payment. But one just can’t log onto their site for online payment (have been trying sincerely for many months).

DISH TV: They don’t have telephonic service for recharge it seems. I recharged online through my credit card. WAsn’t a cake walk, but was okay experience. The worst was that till evening my account wasn’t recharged. Also, when I called Customer care they refused to acknowledge my Mobile No. (the same number where I had got the recharge confirmation message). That was annoying.

CUSTOMER SERVICE

DISH TV: Extremely annoying. They love to say ‘NO’ and ‘WAIT’. I think these people are incentivized to close calls, so they end up lying. One has to end up shouting at them to get things done. However, I didn’t have to suffer too much. We had bought Annual package last year and this time I paid for 3 months in a go (took me some effort and pain though). Dish TV has made no investments in this front it seems.

TATA SKY: These people are expensive. A single visit by their Engineer cost you 350 bucks and these guys are so fast in charging you and cutting your connection. At the same time they get you the connection back in seconds, i.e. once you pay them.

Simply put, Tata Sky provides better service and charges US to do so (obviously) by making us pay a lot for basic channels. Dish TV provides more channels for our money and cuts on the hygiene value services.

Now I am contemplating how much value can I put on the hygiene services, which TATA provides better. Can the savings made by switching to DISH TV commensurate this cost and that of the heavy installation charges (NON-REFUNDABLE) that I have paid. It’s a tough one. I was better off with my Cable wala who used to throw some pirated movies every week.