MARTIN Lewis’ MoneySavingExpert.com has revealed the exact date in days Disney+ is hiking the price of two of its plans.
The consumer website said the online streaming platform is upping the cost of its Standard and Premium bundles by up £24 a year from October 17 for new customers.
Meanwhile, existing customers will see prices hiked from their first billing date after November 21.
Disney+ is raising the price of its monthly Standard bundle from £7.99 to £8.99 from next Thursday – £12 more a year.
The package lets viewers watch their favourite programmes ad-free, stream through two devices at the same time and watch content offline.
The monthly Premium package will be hiked from £10.99 to £12.99 – £24 extra a year.
The bundle also offers ad-free viewing and customers can watch content offline, but lets you watch on four devices simultaneously.
For those paying yearly instead of monthly, the bundles will go up in price by £10 a year and £20 a year respectively.
Disney+’s Standard package with ads is not changing in price and customers will continue to be charged £4.99 a month.
New customers can go some way to beating the upcoming hikes though, MSE revealed.
New customers can sign up for an annual Standard or Premium subscription by 11.59pm on October 16 and lock in the lower price for an entire 12 months.
The consumer website said the trick should work for existing customers switching from a monthly plan to yearly plan too, but that Disney had not confirmed this was allowed.
If you are planning on doing this, it’s worth contacting Disney first to see if you can lock in the lower price.
Customers looking to save a little more should also check if they can make the most of any cashback or discount offers too, MSE said.
For example, Monzo and American Express are both offering 15% cashback on Disney+ bundles worth up to £16.50 off a year.
There are no guarantees this will work though as offers like this are personalised.
MSE also said customers new to Disney+ can combine these two cashback offers with a separate cashback deal from TopCashback or Quidco worth up to £11.55.
The latest announcement from Disney+ comes after the streaming platform started cracking down on users sharing passwords.
Since last month, it has started charging customers who share Disney+ accounts an extra £4.99 a month on top of their existing price plan.
The change, costing £60 a year, impacts those sharing their account with a friend or family member who doesn’t live with them.
All-in-all, the two changes from Disney+ could cost you an extra £84 a year.
Disney+ is not the first streaming platform to enrage customers with price changes in recent years.
Amazon Prime had streamers angry after adding adverts to the platform and charging £2.99 to customers to have them removed in December.
Netflix made a similar change in the UK in July last year.
The Sun asked Disney to comment.
Consumer reporter Sam Walker reveals how you can save money on your streaming costs.
Check for cheaper alternatives – there are plenty of streaming services available out there and prices start from just £3.99.
Paramount+ costs £6.99 a month while Channel 4+ is £3.99 a month.
Make the most of introductory offers – some streaming services offer new customers free trials.
Amazon Prime Video gives you 30 days free while Apple TV+ and Paramount+ offer you seven days.
Just make sure you cancel your membership before the rollover date if you don’t want to carry on using the platforms.
Switch up your platforms – rotate between different streaming services so you’re not paying for more than one at a time.
It’s easy to end up signed up to everything when you might only watch the bulk of your programmes on one platform.
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