Which mobile operator should I go - or should I stay - with?
Look, here I am, about to be unencumbered by my contract with Orange, which is coming to the end of its 18-month run. I don’t spend a lot per month - about £15 on contract, which usually comes out to double that. I rang Orange the other day to find out what I could get, and they offered - on a one-time offer only, for the duration of that phone call only (yeah, nice try on the corner-the-customer negotiation, guys) a deal for £12.50 per month which would give me a huge number of talktime minutes and 100 texts free. Plus free calls to landlines. “At evenings and weekends,” the guy said, though I had to remind him of the latter when he was summing up the list at the end of the call.
I didn’t bite. I have until the end of the week to decide which network to go, or stay with.
Here’s me.
- I stick with contract.
- I need a phone that gets very good coverage because I live rurally and travel on trains.
- I don’t do a lot of data (yet; might change if I got a Blackberry or similar).
- I don’t want a long long contract (18 months counts as long long; 12 months doesn’t) because it’s clearly a way to tie you in to bad packages (yes, I’m looking at you, Orange).
- I’d like a Sony Ericsson, please, because that plays nice with my computer, and that’s very important. An iPhone might do the business, but they ain’t on any shelves I’m seeing.
So, what’s your advice? Twiddly stuff like editing your own videos, ringtones, watching TV, watching videos, slicing cucumbers, and finding lost kittens aren’t important. I just want something pretty low-cost that lets me yak a lot in many places and isn’t too restrictive. Suggestions?
(This is filed under “Chocolate teapots” and “Scams” because that’s how mobile operators feel a lot of the time if you’re a customer.)
- These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
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- Mobile TV isn't a turn-on; and how about cinemas where you exercise? (17 January 2006; score: 37.59%)
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July 29th, 2007 at 11:49 pm
Charles, in terms of functionality I would ignore Three. They are doing some cool things with their X Tariff and supported applications like Skype, but I’ve had serioius problmes getting reception.
T-Mobile has good data tarrifs and you can have access to wi-fi hotspots to your phone bill. Vodafone has priced themselves out of the market. I cant really speak about O2 at the moment.
In terms of phones with Mac OS X 10.4.9 Nokia phones are now better supported. Nokia.com now has iSync conduits for new phones for download on their website. I use a Nokia e61 with BlackBerry Connect software (that comes with the handset). Personally I would prefer using the phone as a pull client direct to my IMAP email account but T-Mobile won’t facilitate this.
If you go with Nokia, download the lite version of the Opera browser and MetrO which is handy for public transport rout e planning.
July 30th, 2007 at 12:04 am
I can’t live without my RAZR’s built-in cucumber slicer and turnip masher, but to each his own.
July 30th, 2007 at 3:04 am
Phonewise I think it depends how many contacts you’ve got. I use an orange pay-as-you RAZR phone when I’m traveling around Europe as the US travel plans generally aren’t very good (even T-mobile’s plan is pretty expensive if you travel rarely to europe). For seven pounds per month anyone can call me without any charges on my side, and there’s a flat rate under 45 pence per minute to call out (cheaper when in the UK obviously). However, because I accidentally told the phone to sync all the contacts from my mac, I now have 1400 contacts on the damm thing, which hasn’t got the best search filters. The battery life of the RAZR is surprisingly good (don’t get one with the metal keypad though, it doesn’t like bright sunlight). The Motorola Q on the other hand is exactly like that old sketch about look how tiny my phone is, and having to wheel a luggage container around for the batteries. Generally everyone I know that has one has to charge it every five minutes (ditto with the treo 680). The new blackberry that is about to come out, has Wifi, which might make it an interesting bet, as if you were with t-mobile (which has good worldwide wifi coverage) you could see about installing skype on the phone and keeping your bills small that way.
July 30th, 2007 at 8:04 am
O2 has pretty good reception around our area, though Orange used to be clearly better. It is very much less of a ripoff than Orange when travelling abroad. This is useful to know in case of domestic emergencies. Even so, I keep an unlocked Nokia around for a second phone with payg sims in foreign parts. I got offered — when I wanted to leave — a deal about twice as good as the one I had had — 12.50 a month for 200 minutes and a lot of texts, I think. That was on an eighteen month contract, but you might be able to talk it down. Also, a “free” sony ericsson k800 which is OK: a damn good music phone if you care about that; with a couple of 2 gig memory cards and a pair of expensive headphone it has replaced my creative zen. Tolerable snapshot camera — instamatic substitute, more or less. Decent battery life. Light.
I would definitely prefer O2 over orange, if you can get the reception out on the range. They run Tesco’s network, too. And now back to work :-)
July 30th, 2007 at 8:53 am
Curious as to why you want to stick with a contract? I’ve not been on a contract for seven years and it’s liberating, and I’m sure it’s saved me a packet over the years.
Scott.
July 30th, 2007 at 9:42 am
I’ve been with T-Mobile for a good ten years now, and every time I’ve faced the choice of whether to switch to someone else, I’ve found their plans offer good value. No problems with coverage, and the Web n Walk tariff is good value compared with everyone else’s data plans. You’ll almost certainly find that if you get a phone with a decent browser, you’ll use it a lot more - 3G makes a lot of difference here.
As for choice of phones, can’t help you much there: the last Sony Ericsson I had was about four years ago, so I’ve no idea how they compare to Nokia etc these days. I currently use either a BlackBerry Pearl (fantastic for anything text-oriented) or a Nokia N73 (really nice camera, 3G, better browser), both of which I’d recommend.
July 30th, 2007 at 11:15 am
I (or my wife) have had contracts with everyone except 3, and T-mobile is the best of a bad bunch. The tarifs are the best and the customer support isn’t too awful. Recepion is also good, which is important for me as I frequently visit the Lake District and other difficult reception areas. My only gripe would be T-mobile locked me into a 18-month contract with a phone that only had a 12 month warrenty. That is just very dishonest, locking you into a contract for a phone that you potentially can’t use.
July 31st, 2007 at 3:20 am
If your old phone’s still fine, I’d stick with it, on Orange or someone else’s cheap no-phone contracts. These tend to be shorter term, anyway - all the operators are trying to get away from 12-month contracts, cos they don’t make much money on them, but if there’s no phone to supply it’s almost all profit. And wait it out for the 2G iPhone (Q2 08?). Yer basic phones have barely changed in the last year - they can’t get smaller, there’s been no leap in battery life, the screens can’t get bigger without taking off the keyboard (oh, hang on), and the cameras are good enough for what anyone’s going to use a phone camera for. Smartphones are a different story… but really, do you want to have to charge the bugger every day?
August 3rd, 2007 at 12:26 am
I’d have to disagree with Scott; there’s nothing liberating about the charges you pay if you don’t have a contract. But then, I use my phone a lot. The deal I have with Vodafone gives me 1000 texts and 500 minutes of talk time (to mobiles or landlines) for £35. The texts in that bundle alone are worth around £100 I think.
I don’t know about foreign charges, but for the UK, I’d recommend Vodafone. I find their reception’s good, their customer service is good (and they usually pick up pretty quickly which is always a plus) and they will match tariffs on other networks if you make noises about leaving.
However I bet you could get a better deal out of Orange by speaking to the customer retention team. It’s always best to go to them because they do the best deals, whether you’re trying to wangle a better handset upgrade for free or get more included in your contract.
August 3rd, 2007 at 10:21 am
You make good points, Anne. However, I was merely asking the question — why stick with a contract for the sake of it? For light users, a contract is very likely a waste of money — and a big waste of money, at that. My monthly PAYG bill — for calls, data and texts — rarely goes above £5. On the odd occasion that I’ve used more data or sent more texts and the bill rises to, say, £20, my eyes widen.
August 4th, 2007 at 10:04 am
Hi Charles
Based on the requirements you have, I’d recommend you get a contract phone with Vodafone. They have the coverage you need, good for data if you need it, will sell/give you a no-nonsense phone or BlackBerry. In terms of customer service, they are the best of a pretty rotten bunch, and I’ve been round them all recently.
My work mobile number (the one I give out to the industry and which is on my business cards) has been with Vodafone for about four years (previously with Orange). Really haven’t been able to fault them.
Just do yourself a favour and don’t go with T-Mobile!
Chris
August 10th, 2007 at 6:36 pm
I worked with Vodafone, O2, Orange and TMo every day for 3 years before I moved to Canada and none of them are as clueless as Rogers. Or as expensive. But before I’d experienced Rogers, I would have recommended Vodafone for their flexibility and O2 for the fact they understand things like BlackBerrys. In fact, I’d go with Vodafone. The other two are largely unhelpful, useless and expensive. Especially Orange. I have no experience of 3. Or MVNOs like Virgin.
August 13th, 2007 at 11:50 am
I suppose it all depends how much you use the phone - I have a “contract” with Orange for which I just pay for what I use and that’s it. It’s some kind of Virgin equivalent or something and I got it years ago because I threatened to go to another supplier. Now, I don;t sue the phone much so my bills are around 2 or 3 pounds a month - probably wouldn;t work out for you.
As to customer service, they all seem terrible, but O2 and Vodafone are by far the worst in my experience.