By Phillip Swann
The TV Answer Man – @tvanswerman

Even when you’re as big as Google, every penny counts. Apparently, even if it’s just 600 pennies.

YouTube TV, the live streaming service owned by Google, yesterday quietly reduced its promotional discount for each of the first three months of service from $10 a month to $8 a month. The monthly promo price for the first three months is now $64.99 instead of $62.99 which it had been since March when YouTube TV raised its non-promotional monthly price from $64.99 to $72.99.

The TV Answer Man noticed the reduced discount today, but a check of the Internet Archive/Wayback Machine found the change was made yesterday. On Monday, the old $10 monthly discount was still available.

Google has not said why it has reduced the promotional price by $2 a month which will put an extra $6 in the company’s coffers. But it blamed rising programming costs when it raised the regular monthly price in March.

“As content costs have risen and we continue to invest in our quality of service, we’ll be adjusting our monthly cost, after 3 years, from $64.99/mo to $72.99/mo, in order to bring you the best possible TV service,” YouTube TV said in a statement.

Google last December agreed to pay $2.2 billion a year for the rights to the NFL Sunday Ticket, starting with the 2023 season. The package of out-of-market games will be available as an add-on plan on YouTube TV and as a separate subscription on YouTube Primetime Channels.  The company last month revealed the 2023 pricing for the Ticket and, with one plan exception, the rates were significantly higher than what DIRECTV had charged for the package. (See this article for more pricing details.)

Today’s Promo Price:

And the Old Promo Price:

The YouTube TV three-month promotional price is now the same as the pre-March regular price. Prior to the March increase, YouTube TV also offered $10 off the first three months, bringing the price from $64.99 to $54.99.

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— Phillip Swann
@tvanswerman