Cheapest iPhone discussion

tj2010

With O2's £15 a month 12 months SIMonly deal it would actually be cheaper to buy a PAYG iPhone and O2 SIMonly than to sign up for an 18/24 month deal. Anyone know of any downsides to this?

Anyone know if you can use an O2 SIM directly in a Tesco iPhone without unlocking? Hopefully you can as Tesco uses the O2 network they might not distinguish between the two SIM card types and Tesco give 12 months buy now pay later and clubcard points so its even cheaper!

tj2010

robram2 wrote: »

Does anyone out there know where the best place is to get THREE iPhones?

Surely someone will be prepared to do a deal on three iPhones? Or do I just upgrade the two on orange, and then get a tesco one for my business partner?

No - tried to get a deal on buying 2 iPhones but seems your better negotiating them separately.

thecasementkid

tj2010 wrote: »

No - tried to get a deal on buying 2 iPhones but seems your better negotiating them separately.

I ended my minimum term contract last week and spoke to 02 retentions. I was given a one month contract deal, 600 mins and 1200 texts per month plus unlimited internet for £20 per month which is better that Martin was quoting in his article I believe.

owen-b

Hi all,

I'm about to end my 18 month contract with O2. I have a 3G and pay £35 for 600 minutes, 500 texts and unlimited data. I understand they now have new tariffs which are worse value. For £35 a month I'd get 300 minutes, unlimited texts and data, but have to pay 20p a shot for MMS (whereas currently they use 4 of my SMS allowance, but that's been stopped with the new tariffs).

I asked about upgrades and was given three options:

1) Take a £150 credit on my bill and keep my phone. I had to stop myself laughing, that's an *appalling* con.

2) Move onto a 1-month rolling contract with iPhone Simplicity 20, which is £20 per month for 300 minutes and unlimited texts and net - but presumably also cost me 20p per MMS message, then come back to a contract when the new one comes out - see below.

3) Upgrade to the 3GS for another 18-24 months - well, I know there's a new one due to be announced at this years WWDC as has been the case for the last 3 years, so I had no interest in that.

However, it was listening to the 3GS upgrade route that I realised he was offering me the same prices and tariffs that new customers buying a 3GS get offered. I asked him when he was going to offer me an actual upgrade as opposed to just selling me a new customer deal. He said O2 don't control prices, Apple do. I said that I thought they only controlled the handset prices, not the tariffs. He said that Apple dictate BOTH the handset prices and the tariffs.

Is that true?

I asked him if he could confirm to me that there is no benefit whatsoever to me to remain a loyal O2 customer (been there since the BTCELNET days) and he just repeated that Apple control the prices. I asked him why the upgrades he offered aren't in any way better than the new customer prices, and how, therefore, he could possibly call them upgrades with a straight face. I asked him what happened to the days of offering a loyal customer an incentive to stay and he repeated that Apple set the prices. I asked him why O2 couldn't find some other way to keep my loyalty and he said he could give me some vouchers for money off high street stores.

Literally, that's the only thing he offered that remotely represented an incentive to stay. There are NO upgrades at O2.

So, I did some sums to see what costs less. I looked at going onto an 18 month 3GS contract for £35 a month, and going onto a Simplicity 20 for iPhone and buying a 3GS outright and using that for 18 months. Turns out going on contract is cheaper by over £100 in total.

I'm guessing there's a better PAYG option out there but can anyone spell it out for me? I must have missed something!

RCarling

Hi Owen

I think you've been misled. O2 can offer upgrades, I got offer the £40 a month contract (on the website for new customer - 600 mins, unlimited web and messages) for £35 with a 3Gs refurb, with no up front cost on the phone, for new customers the cost is £90 i think so they definately do upgrades.

If I was you I would bypass upgrades and go straight through to cancellations team - it's where the offers are to be had ;-)

In short - apple do not control the pricing policies

tj2010

owen-b wrote: »

So, I did some sums to see what costs less. I looked at going onto an 18 month 3GS contract for £35 a month, and going onto a Simplicity 20 for iPhone and buying a 3GS outright and using that for 18 months. Turns out going on contract is cheaper by over £100 in total.

18 months at 35 = 630 + 149 for phone = 779

But going on Simplicity for iPhone 12 months is cheaper:
18 months at 15 = 270 + 449 for phone = 719

Assuming a 3GS 16gb.

INT1

Or buy a cheaper phone off Ebay-Do yur research to ensure your buying from a reputable seller.

mcvj

As per owen-b's experiences with O2.

Thought I would mention that I had exactly the same from Orange, both upgrades and cancellations, even when i asked for my pac code, they remained firm that apple control prices and couldnt do anything better to keep my business.

I'm not due an upgrade until june, when hopefully a new iphone will be released, but i thought i'd see what i could get now. Basically a full buy out of current contract and then the same deal as new customers, despite having been with them for over 10 yrs and on a contract with 10% off due to that loyalty. Apparently this cannot even be carried over to any of the iphone deals.

I only really want to stay on orange because of the coverage.

fyfestuart

As far as I'm aware the money off deals are only available on the refurbished handsets. Which are currently out of stock. If you want a brand new handset you have to take the "apple controlled" price. Whether apple actually control it or not I don't know but thats what O2 are saying
Has anybody called to see if they have any 3Gs refurbs today? I called last night but they were still out of stock

daggy

owen-b wrote: »

Hi all,

I'm about to end my 18 month contract with O2. I have a 3G and pay £35 for 600 minutes, 500 texts and unlimited data. I understand they now have new tariffs which are worse value. For £35 a month I'd get 300 minutes, unlimited texts and data, but have to pay 20p a shot for MMS (whereas currently they use 4 of my SMS allowance, but that's been stopped with the new tariffs).

I asked about upgrades and was given three options:

1) Take a £150 credit on my bill and keep my phone. I had to stop myself laughing, that's an *appalling* con.

2) Move onto a 1-month rolling contract with iPhone Simplicity 20, which is £20 per month for 300 minutes and unlimited texts and net - but presumably also cost me 20p per MMS message, then come back to a contract when the new one comes out - see below.

3) Upgrade to the 3GS for another 18-24 months - well, I know there's a new one due to be announced at this years WWDC as has been the case for the last 3 years, so I had no interest in that.

However, it was listening to the 3GS upgrade route that I realised he was offering me the same prices and tariffs that new customers buying a 3GS get offered. I asked him when he was going to offer me an actual upgrade as opposed to just selling me a new customer deal. He said O2 don't control prices, Apple do. I said that I thought they only controlled the handset prices, not the tariffs. He said that Apple dictate BOTH the handset prices and the tariffs.

Is that true?

I asked him if he could confirm to me that there is no benefit whatsoever to me to remain a loyal O2 customer (been there since the BTCELNET days) and he just repeated that Apple control the prices. I asked him why the upgrades he offered aren't in any way better than the new customer prices, and how, therefore, he could possibly call them upgrades with a straight face. I asked him what happened to the days of offering a loyal customer an incentive to stay and he repeated that Apple set the prices. I asked him why O2 couldn't find some other way to keep my loyalty and he said he could give me some vouchers for money off high street stores.

Literally, that's the only thing he offered that remotely represented an incentive to stay. There are NO upgrades at O2.

So, I did some sums to see what costs less. I looked at going onto an 18 month 3GS contract for £35 a month, and going onto a Simplicity 20 for iPhone and buying a 3GS outright and using that for 18 months. Turns out going on contract is cheaper by over £100 in total.

I'm guessing there's a better PAYG option out there but can anyone spell it out for me? I must have missed something!

I think you're being bit ureasonable here....
o2 do offer genuine upgrades to customers on the iPhone, but they can only do this on the reurbished iPhones that Apple send them.

Apple fix the price on handsets, so if anyone offers a discounted handset they could lose the iPhone contract on their network.

Not sure if they fix tariff prices, for apple to do this would surely be in breach of some competition laws?

o2 will upgrades you on other phones obviosuly.

I think it's only fair to blame Apple, as it's their price fixing that is causing this.

I think people are buying their iPhone of eBay, perhaps thats why the PAYG deal is cheaper?