RE: Sirius XM Radio Dance

Last year renewal was $66....Just got the annual notice for $228.53.... Of course the drill is you have to call them to cancel which I will. Every year I start with cancel, and the come with a better price, but this time I will just cancel period even if $10. Tired of the dance and truly not worth it for me.

Update...after calling magically it was now $99....then no thanks...then $60...still no thanks...

You got me thinking that its been a couple of months since the introductory offer on my Sirius expired. I'm waiting for the call that starts "the dance" ...

I enjoy "the dance". Get me a big mug of coffee, some snacks and have at. I have XM in the house and in the cage and on the bike.

I always get a good deal from "Bob" after I ask him what elephant wash he uses.

It's only once a year and takes 10 to 15 minutes for "Bob" to repeat the spiel for all the radios.

Remember bargaining over price is a way of life over there. I wonder where "over there is ?"

I do this every 6 months. They always offer a 6 months special for $30. Not a bad deal.

Doug

I have a 2016RT, and I would have kept Serius but the sound quality was terrible. I have a Sena set-up and the sound from the music on the memory stick is great.

I did the dance today. 20 minutes for all the bs after I threaten to cancel. Got the $4.95+ taxes and "fleas." deal for

a year . It's a good deal for me as I always have some kind of music on XM, cd's or old fashion vinyl.

I had to do this for three radios yesterday. There is a new $5 a month promotion that is good for a year, instead of the usual 6 months. At least I can call them less often now.

Doug

But it is still not $5 after they add their fees!

I keep holding out until they allow me to buy for a certain time without automatic renewal. They cannot do that they say, so I cannot pay I say.

Per radio or for all of your radios?

Correct. Less than $1 per month in fees. Per radio.

But it is still not $5 after they add their fees!

 

I keep holding out until they allow me to buy for a certain time without automatic renewal. They cannot do that they say, so I cannot pay I say.

Years ago, when they were struggling financially they offered a "lifetime" membership for $300. Seemed to be a real iffy bet so I passed.

I was able to cancel in just under 8 minutes. Told them that I just didn't listen because of poor quality. When listening to news channels, voices sounded like they were in an echo chamber. Music sound was OK, but not great. I listen to my own music on a thumb drive and the sound quality there is great. I was offered the $5/month price (which I already had) but said what's the point? If it was free forever, I still wouldn't listen. 8 minutes!

I was able to cancel in just under 8 minutes. Told them that I just didn't listen because of poor quality. When listening to news channels, voices sounded like they were in an echo chamber. Music sound was OK, but not great. I listen to my own music on a thumb drive and the sound quality there is great. I was offered the $5/month price (which I already had) but said what's the point? If it was free forever, I still wouldn't listen. 8 minutes!

The quality issue is not with the XM, but the Bluetooth on the BMW. I have the factory audio hardwired to my Autocom and the XM sounds just fine. I also have XM in a BMW car and an SUV and it sounds just fine.

I just had an interesting experience with my call to Sirius about the subscription for my 2012 K1600GT. But first, some background on the radio.

I had the bike in for service recently and mentioned to the service manager that the sound quality had never been good and I was only getting 2 of 3 bars. After having seen a thread on satellite radio reception on the K1600 site, I asked if he could take a look at the antenna to see if it could be moved to a better place. When they looked at it, they discovered it did not have the "foil" wrapper on it from the factory that was supposed to inhibit the interference from the GPS and improve reception. They installed that part (no charge for the part or labor) and on the ride home, I got a strong 3 bar signal and dramatically improved sound! So now, for the first time, I am really interested in using the satellite radio.

Currently, I am on a 6 month $30 promo that ends in mid-January. So, today, when I called Sirius to cancel, the first option was to turn it off for the winter and then start it again in the spring (for a fee). No, let's just cancel I said, anticipating another promo offer. After she put me on hold for about 3 minutes, I thought I would be presented with another offer, but perhaps because I was already on a promo offer, none was forthcoming. I guess now I will just have to wait for their promo offers to start arriving after the cancellation.

Randy

Well, they are nothing if not predictable.  A few weeks after my prior 6 month/$30 promo expired and they didn't give me a similar renewal option, the new one came via email.  Same deal -- $5 a month for 6 months.  Why not just offer that up when the cancellation occurs instead of going through this after expiration??

I do this dance every 5-6 months.  And have to go through the same exact script but always come out to about $5 a month for 5 or 6 months.   I am happy to do it in order to get the $5 a month but it must cost them a lot of have folks actually answer the phones and talk to me for 5 minutes.  

I didn't do that particular dance - I just had them cancel mine after a year.  Not because I didn't like the programming, but my commute to work (where I would listen to XM/Sirius 95% of the time) is a winding tree-lined road with lots of dead spots.

For example, I got tired of listening to stand-up on any of the comedy channels and I would hear something like this...

Build up...build up!  build up!!!  BUILD UP!!!  Get ready for the punch line!  Here it comes!!!  <big burst of static>  Audience laughing their asses off.

So annoying!!! 

Not sure if Sirius got smart or I just got lucky but I called today as I do every 5-6 months to cancel my subscription and they did not do the "traditional dance" but rather immediately offered to renew and the same deal I had the past 6 months.   Made of a quick and easy call.   So $4.99 a month for the next 6 months.  

Maybe I should play the lottery today! 

Naww, it's only $550 million.  You should wait.  

Well, it looks like Sirius/XM is finally catching on.  Today I called to "cancel" a promotional subscription on a vehicle ($88/year), as the "regular" price would be going to $18/month. 

I got a new scripted response that: (1) recognized how long we had been customers, (2) would set the prior promotional price to be my regular price for this and all my plans going forward, and (3) would renew at that same price in the future without me having to call and go through the dance.  It took them a while to figure this out!  I wonder how long you have to have been a customer to get this more rationale pricing approach, but it is nice to know I won't have to call in the future other than to switch to a different vehicle or truly cancel.

Now if only the cable companies would catch on to that

49 minutes ago, RandyShields said:

Well, it looks like Sirius/XM is finally catching on.  Today I called to "cancel" a promotional subscription on a vehicle ($88/year), as the "regular" price would be going to $18/month. 

 

I got a new scripted response that: (1) recognized how long we had been customers, (2) would set the prior promotional price to be my regular price for this and all my plans going forward, and (3) would renew at that same price in the future without me having to call and go through the dance.  It took them a while to figure this out!  I wonder how long you have to have been a customer to get this more rationale pricing approach, but it is nice to know I won't have to call in the future other than to switch to a different vehicle or truly cancel.

My dance recital is next month

I just renewed last month and they immediately said they would renew at the same rate.  No haggling.  Easy peasy.  

If I could get it to work on my RT, I would maybe consider paying for it. Oh well, maybe on the next bike. 

Apple Music works without having to modify a very expensive bike purchase to listen to music.

I had Sirius on the bike, boat, cars. I let them all expire due to the dance and auto renewal. I replaced it with Pandora

For some reason the bike  Sirius was really bad sound quality. Pandora through my IPhone is with me for all vehicles and it sounds great on the bike.. sans that not so good volume on SENA. 

I’ve got Sirus XM on both vehicles and the RT … I do the dance 3 times a year.  But at least now they renew for 12 months and I tell them when I call if you can give me the same rate again I’m in if not cancel. So far it’s been working well.

On 2/1/2024 at 4:46 PM, RTinNC said:

I’ve got Sirus XM on both vehicles and the RT … I do the dance 3 times a year.  But at least now they renew for 12 months and I tell them when I call if you can give me the same rate again I’m in if not cancel. So far it’s been working well.

Same here.  Switching from comedy to news to music on long trips is really nice.  Never had a sound quality issue with Sirius.  Its worth the renewal dance for me.  

3 hours ago, simskid said:

Same here.  Switching from comedy to news to music on long trips is really nice.  Never had a sound quality issue with Sirius.  Its worth the renewal dance for me.  

Yes ….. we road-trip a LOT and love the XM.  We probably only need it in one vehicle but so long as it’s cheap I’ll keep it on all 3.  I use it on the RT only on longer solo trips.

On 2/1/2024 at 7:17 AM, RandyShields said:

Today I called to "cancel" a promotional subscription on a vehicle ($88/year), as the "regular" price would be going to $18/month.

That's probably the $5 deal with fees ($7+ per month). But which plan is that? Platinum or Music & Entertainment? They used to offer the Platinum for 5 bucks, but no more. So I canceled the subscription on both vehicles, and was able to try the 3-month promotion for Music & Entertainment for $2 ($2.16 total) a day later. Ha ha. When it ends in about 2 months, I plan to renew only if I can get the M&E for $5 (so $88 year total), since it has all the channels I listen to (I'm not into the other crap, like Stern, etc), which are a few news channels, and maybe a dozen music ones. Based on your story, I'll also ask to have the same deal for both vehicles. Keep in mind that starting in March xx, we won't be able to cancel the subscription anymore until the period expires, even if you sell the vehicle. So might negotiate it for every 6 months instead.

5 hours ago, JCtx said:

That's probably the $5 deal with fees ($7+ per month). But which plan is that? Platinum or Music & Entertainment? They used to offer the Platinum for 5 bucks, but no more. So I canceled the subscription on both vehicles, and was able to try the 3-month promotion for Music & Entertainment for $2 ($2.16 total) a day later. Ha ha. When it ends in about 2 months, I plan to renew only if I can get the M&E for $5 (so $88 year total), since it has all the channels I listen to (I'm not into the other crap, like Stern, etc), which are a few news channels, and maybe a dozen music ones. Based on your story, I'll also ask to have the same deal for both vehicles. Keep in mind that starting in March xx, we won't be able to cancel the subscription anymore until the period expires, even if you sell the vehicle. So might negotiate it for every 6 months instead.

Actually the $5 a month deal costs me $72 per year.  It’s music & entertainment.  But thanks for the tip on cancellation.

I do the dance every year. Used to irritate me that I had to buy several subscriptions for different vehicles. Had a "Roady II" for a while that I had antenna and power connections left in each vehicle. Worked well enough. 

Now I pay one subscription for the Maverick. But that allows me to stream XM from my phone in the RV or other vehicles. You give up a few things streaming, but for some noise to keep you company streaming works well enough since you can usually stream on any highway good now. 

The thing that sucks about streaming on my car, at least for me, is I cannot control the stations with the steering wheel buttons. I'd have to check if I can control it with Siri, which I can while walking with earpods, but not sure if it works with Bluetooth. It might work with Apple CarPlay, but I don't like it, so don't use it. If I cannot get the $5 deal on my other car, which I don't drive much,  I wouldn't renew. But I want to renew on my travel vehicle. And I hope I can stream it on the bike, and control stations with the Cardo. Need to check it out.

33 minutes ago, JCtx said:

The thing that sucks about streaming on my car, at least for me, is I cannot control the stations with the steering wheel buttons. I'd have to check if I can control it with Siri, which I can while walking with earpods, but not sure if it works with Bluetooth. It might work with Apple CarPlay, but I don't like it, so don't use it. If I cannot get the $5 deal on my other car, which I don't drive much,  I wouldn't renew. But I want to renew on my travel vehicle. And I hope I can stream it on the bike, and control stations with the Cardo. Need to check it out.

Yes and the other issue when streaming in the car is at times I would lose the connection and the only way to reconnect is to pull over and get the phone out again.   Hence the reason I prefer to have it loaded on all 3 vehicles.  But as noted if I could not get the $5 deal I would cancel all but our Subaru Outback which is our road trip car and the one we run up the miles on. 

Hey, very good taste in travel cars. Ha ha. We have a '24 Touring XT for that too. My cousin convinced me to try it, and he was right; it's the best travel car we've had. My wife was sold immediately; with any other vehicle, she needed a seat cushion, and was still uncomfortable. Not with the Subie, so got it. Wasn't crazy about a CVT, but it's not bad. And only vehicle with full-time AWD (60/40 all the time), so super safe in winter too.

Yep we’re actually on our second Subaru outback limited XT we bought a 2021 and put 72,000 miles on it in two years which included two trips to Yellowstone grand Tetons. Then with the mileage running up and getting close to our hundred thousand mile extended warranty, we passed it on to our son in August and bought virtually the same vehicle different color and this time was able to get 120,000 mile extended warranty. Absolutely one of the most comfortable vehicles I’ve ever traveled in. The only two things I would change  Would be the CVT which as you noted I’m getting used to and the infotainment system which they finally seem to have gotten the bugs out of and works way better than the first year and a half. We had our 2021. But for the price and comfort, it’s hard to beat with the power of that turbo engine  And the ability to get around 30 miles per gallon on the highway. 

I tried bluetooth streaming on a couple vehicles. Like mentioned above, too many times it would drop and you had to reconnect.

Now I use the USB inputs with a cable. Maybe not so high tech, but I have all but eliminated the "drop" while traveling. Even when I lose cell signal for a bit it seems to keep connection till signal comes back. 

Am I understanding it correctly? You are getting ALL of your vehicles for $5 a month or is that $5 per vehicle monthly?

It's $5 per vehicle, unfortunately. And that'd be only the M&E, if at all. You cannot longer get the Platinum for that price anymore.

Yes the Music and Entertainment (which has ALL the channels I listen to) for $5 a month PLUS tax and fees.  Some out to about $75 a year.