The stronger rand appears to have helped MultiChoice keep its annual price increases below inflation. The broadcaster said the price of DStv Premium, its top-end bouquet, will rise by 2.5% on 1 April 2018 — from R789/month to R809/month.
That compares to a price hike of 4% in 2017 for DStv Premium. A year ago, the rand was trading over R13/US$. On Friday morning, it was trading at R11.59.
Mid-tier bouquets, however, will see bigger increases, with DStv Compact Plus (formerly Extra) set to rise by 4.1% from R489 to R509/month and DStv Compact going up by 5.5% to R385/month from R365 now.
Last year, Compact Plus was hiked by 6.5% and Compact by 5.8%.
The lower-end DStv Family bouquet will see the biggest price increase — 6% — with the monthly fee rising from R235 to R249/month.
DStv Access and EasyView remain unchanged at R99 and R29/month respectively.
Those customers on the legacy DStv Select bouquet will see a price rise of 6%, from R235 to R249/month, while M-Net analogue customers will have to fork out 5.1% more, or R409/month from R389 now.
The so-called “access fee” for PVR users will rise by 5.9%, from R85 to R90/month. BoxOffice PVR rentals remain unchanged at R35/title. Decoder insurance remains unchanged.
While the strong rand likely helped MultiChoice offset higher price increases for 2018, the company is also under growing competitive pressure, particularly at the top end of the market, from streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime Video. — (c) 2018 NewsCentral Media