MSE News: iPhone 5C price plans launched: Is it worth it for you?

It's ridiculous. The iPhone 5c is a rebadged iPhone 5 with a plastic back. Yet every single contract is over £35pm+ with an upfront cost. If you want a high usage contract you're looking over £40pm+ with at least £30-£100 upfront.

You can get an iPhone 5 for much much less than that. If these are the iPhone 5c prices i don't want to see how much people are going to pay for the 5s.

Avoid a bundled handset and service contract, particularly with iPhones. It's nearly always cheaper overall to pay full price for the iPhone (from Apple) and to get a cheap SIM-only contract for £10 to £15 per month.

Why has MSE focussed mainly on acquiring subsidised handsets? I'm totally against the practice of subsidising handsets through inflated monthly service charges because it:

• Encourages consumers to acquire handsets they cannot truly afford through an unhealthy "buy now pay later" consumer debt culture.
• Distorts competition by disguising the true price of the handset and of the service, as opposed to a SIM-free handset and SIM-only service.
• Encourages wasteful acquisition of new handsets because consumers mistakenly believe they are receiving the handset for free or for very little.
• Necessitates long contract durations in order to spread the cost of the handset, which inhibits competition by preventing consumers from switching networks.
• Causes consumers to continue paying the inflated monthly charge even after they have paid off the subsidy of the handset, unless they remember to take action at the end of the minimum contract period.

Subsidised handsets are usually SIM-locked which:

• Inhibits competition as it makes it more difficult to switch networks.
• Prevents consumers from using local SIM cards abroad, allowing UK networks to impose unreasonably high roaming charges by excluding foreign competition.

NFH wrote: »

Avoid a bundled handset and service contract, particularly with iPhones. It's nearly always cheaper overall to pay full price for the iPhone (from Apple) and to get a cheap SIM-only contract for £10 to £15 per month.

Why has MSE focussed mainly on acquiring subsidised handsets? I'm totally against the practice of subsidising handsets through inflated monthly service charges because it:

• Encourages consumers to acquire handsets they cannot truly afford through an unhealthy "buy now pay later" consumer debt culture.
• Distorts competition by disguising the true price of the handset and of the service, as opposed to a SIM-free handset and SIM-only service.
• Encourages wasteful acquisition of new handsets because consumers mistakenly believe they are receiving the handset for free or for very little.
• Necessitates long contract durations in order to spread the cost of the handset, which inhibits competition by preventing consumers from switching networks.
• Causes consumers to continue paying the inflated monthly charge even after they have paid off the subsidy of the handset, unless they remember to take action at the end of the minimum contract period.

Subsidised handsets are usually SIM-locked which:

• Inhibits competition as it makes it more difficult to switch networks.
• Prevents consumers from using local SIM cards abroad, allowing UK networks to impose unreasonably high roaming charges by excluding foreign competition.

Everything this person said.

If you have to buy the device and pay monthly, then an "anytime upgrade" style plan is the only way to do it, at least that way you know how much the tariff and phone cost, and you can pay off the phone if you wish.

Anyone think it is a little weird O2 pitching the Refresh handset cost of the 5C as £600? The way they do this is by selling the handset as a credit agreement stating the up-front cost with 0% interest for 24 months. Someone with a bit more knowledge in this will have to help but are they allowed to inflate the cost by 30%? To me it just looks like they have added the interest into the total cost at a large rate and positioned it as 0%. What happens when they then start selling the PAYG model side by side for under £500?

I was under the impression the Refresh Airtime plans were lower than SIM only prices because they were spread over 24 months. I definitely think it is worth just buying an iPhone outright and enjoying much lower bills.