Recordings will now expire after 60 days

[Alcott]

If I have recordings older than 365 days, (or more than 320 hours), will they all suddenly disappear?

This is a drastic change that most people probably don’t know about. 
TV isn’t essential of course, but I still have some old stuff I’d like to watch.

[AlexS]

UPDATE: I received my bill yesterday and see exactly the same notice! MLGB! Meanwhile, Vidéotron's Helix TV comes with 100h of storage, $3/mo for 200h and $5/mo for UNLIMITED and would expire until 365 days!

Anyone from the maritimes has received the same notice?

Now I understand why Bell was willing to offer me 3 Gbps+alc 5+time-shift and 12 mo. of Crave+Starz with $200 prepaid Visa for merely $50 after taxes last summer during the Hollywood Strike hehe. It's definitely not merely because of lack of new US productions hehe.

Residential services in Quebec are very cheap though and looks like the cost-effectiveness is still the best in the country. But how come Bell is willing to reduce services to such a low level?? Is it planning to exit live paid TV service just like Telus and follow US Charter/Spectrum's step?

[AlexS]

Hehe it could be lots of users claiming that them only use the app, which is same as the website only allowing to play recordings within 60 days, and someone higher up in Bell didn't catch the "7802 box is too bad" part, or they over thought about their posts and inferred these implied the users rarely rewatch anything after 60 days. I always mention or imply exclusive functions on the DVR when someone complains about the DVR on all kinds of forums though, including being able to watch recordings older than 60 days.

[LittleLamb]

This is not a surprise, Bell is the major player in Canada, others will follow. Unfortunately, Canadian customer has no choice. 😢  

[Malvern]

I got tricked into changing to this PVR cloud ,almost tempted to get rid of bell and go back to Rogers

[Sia1]

The issue is that not only will the recordings be removed from the cloud PVR after 60 days, but with the new box VIP7802, there is no option to transfer the recordings to an external hard drive! This is absolutely unacceptable! 

[AlexS]

I believe only certain old satellite DVR officially allows to transfer recordings.

[Sia1]

That is not true, my parents have bell VIP2263 Fibe TV receivers and cloud PVR and they can easily transfer their recordings to an external drive. I made a mistake, I should not have switched to the newest receiver.  

[AlexS]

Sorry, my families and I never used any old equips prior to the 5662.

[Sia1]

My point is bell should either give the option to transfer the recordings or keeping them on the cloud PVR for longer period!

[AlexS]

Ok I thought you were upset that I'm not familiar with 2263 box. But the 5662 box was rolled out in 2016, so it's been quite a while. And Bell plans to cut 1 billion expenditure in 2024 & 25 due to the CRTC decision on Internet. I'm aware that there are already massive layoffs, less fiber expansion, no more 8 gbps plans, shorter customer service hours, 4 simultaneous recordings instead of 6 for 5662 box. I guess the shorter expiry of cloud recordings is part of the cut and coordinated move with other telcos as well. 

[Sia1]

Yes, I understand that cloud PVR probably costs them a lot, but why is there not an option to download and transfer the recordings to an external hard drive or, at least, a pay-per-use system for cloud PVR? That's my point!

[Insanejester]

Welp might have to go back to using other means for shows and sports like online "stuff".   I went from the home pvr to the fibe pvr mostly because I watch a lot of sports.   But with work and kids it hard to watch them all.  So I record them all and watch them when I can. Sometimes this doesn't happen until a month or two later  Same with Nascar and other events.  I just got my notice of changes by email today.   60 Days is way to short 6 months should of been there offer if anything.   I do agree it is probably because to much stuff is being stored and the cost of holding all that stuff really adds up.  If they are going to implement this they should offer a way for us to transfer our records to an external storage device.  I got lots of external hard drives and with encryption keys it would still be locked to my device.   Again if device dies you lose it all but if there device dies have the key tied to your account not to the fibe device.  The bell device authenticates with the bell server everyday anyways to verify account standing and to verify that you are at your home address using your router with your dynamic Ip that they provided you.  More and more they just want to be a Internet company only not an all around provider of telecommunications.  What next our home phones are going to only store voicemail for 1hr???  Or you can have a home phone number but it has to be forwarded to a cell phone for all calls incoming and outgoing????

I myself will be contacting retention depart of bell and fighting to either have it put back up or they will be offering me a 2 year discount on my service for this inconvenience or it will be dropping them.  Many "Free" services out there for your shows and sports and movies.   Just got to look reedit has a long list of them.

[PdH114]

I received the following via e-mail on March 19, 2024:

As of May 1, 2024, the storage of your Fibe™ TV recordings on your Cloud PVR will be reduced to 60 days. Existing recordings that are older than 60 days will also be deleted as of that date.

If you have any questions or would like to cancel or modify your services, please call us at 1 866 310-BELL (2355).

Sincerely,

Faye Katsaros Vice President I agree with other forum members that 60 days is too short.  I also think that if each subscriber is allocated 320 hours, it should make no difference how old the recording is.  If they want to maintain this policy, they should allow us to download recorded programs to our own storage devices.  It makes me miss the days of the VCR.

[Ak75070]

You would think if the goal is to free up and/or reduce storage space, the better approach would be to reduce our allocated space and leave the max time at 365 fays. This would allow us to at least manage our storage and decide what we need /want to keep.

[LittleLamb]

I like this idea, just says reduce the storage to 90 hour and customer can make a choice to delete older content and keep some recordings for one year. Hope Bell management can listen and make this offer.