Batter down your annual mobile costs article Discussion Area

stefano

pickoftheday wrote: »

I reached the end of my 18 month contract with Three and I haggled, haggled and haggled and they wouldn't give in, even when I complained about the terrible customer service I've had off them over term of the contract.

The contract I wanted was the One Plan (because of the all inclusive data) so I got my PAC code for TWO of my accounts and they still wouldn't give in.

I'm now paying £34 a month for the One Plan (the normal price) on a 24 month contract and I feel like I had no choice because no other provider offered a better deal, even though it is a lot more expensive that my previous contract.

Has anyone ever haggled the price of the One Plan down or found a better deal?

I think you just answer your own question. No other provider offered a better deal, which is why Three would not budge. They knew you'd be back.

grumbler

pickoftheday wrote: »

...I'm now paying £34 a month for the One Plan (the normal price) on a 24 month contract

Are you not paying for a 'free' phone as well? AFAIK sim-only "The One" is £25 even on one-month basis.

Has anyone ever ...found a better deal?

This depends on what you actually need in terms of data/minutes/texts.

Richard_Corfield

They are good. They also tell me they're the only people who offer more than 2Gig per month.

The Ultimate Internet plans are cheaper, the main difference being tethering. I don't use the minutes. I figured with a better phone I wouldn't need to tether. I also reduce the amount of stuff in my luggage by not taking the ageing netbook with me.

If you need to tether on an Ultimate Internet plan it's £5 for 1G pay as you go with time limit (end of the month I think). I only used to tether perhaps a couple of times a year, so for me it is cheaper to do that if I tether at all.

anotheruser

O2 don't seem to care about customer any more as they don't give any good deals for staying with them. I was looking at either giffgaff or Tesco as they seem to have good monthly deals at the moment.

I don't expect them to put up a fight when I ask for my PAC.

charlierogan

I still have 18 months of a 24 month contract with 3. My contract is supposed to be £30 a month, but it seems to raise to £45 odd quid when I go over by a fiver (texting america and spending 2 mins on the phone to an 0870 number)

I want to leave 3, but don't want to pay for the rest of the contract. 3 are rubbish, and I want to go with Orange

stefano

charlierogan wrote: »

I still have 18 months of a 24 month contract with 3. My contract is supposed to be £30 a month, but it seems to raise to £45 odd quid when I go over by a fiver (texting america and spending 2 mins on the phone to an 0870 number)

I want to leave 3, but don't want to pay for the rest of the contract. 3 are rubbish, and I want to go with Orange

Texting the US is not part of your inclusive package as neither is 0870 numbers. You may be stuck with 3, as a contract is a legally binding agreement.

grumbler

charlierogan wrote: »

...My contract is supposed to be £30 a month, but it seems to raise to £45 odd quid when I go over by a fiver ....

Something is definitely wrong with your maths.
30+5=35
45-30=15

Texts to USA cost 35p each.
2 minutes to 0870 cost 2*20p or 2*35p depending on your plan.

Faybelline

I just rang Orange, my mobile provider and asked them if they could lower my monthly bill. He explained to me that usually it is not possible but would check.
My monthly bill is £46p/m with 750Mb of data, 1200 minutes and unlimited texts.
I now pay £35p/m with 1Gb of data, unlimited minutes and texts!!
Ask for best price plan, all in 5 minutes

walkerjk72

Got a really surprise when I rang 3 regarding my soon to run out contract.

Having read through all the articles and post on this site I thought it was about time that I got a decent deal from 3 having been with them for around 6 years and got very little from them and currently playing £27 a month.

First time I rang them was offered very little (HTC 8X for £46 a month with very little minutes). The second time I rang I followed the script on what to say to them and eventually was offered the Galaxy S2 for £24 a month with 1000 minutes, 5000 texts and unlimited data. Not bad I thought but decided not to take up the offer.

So with only 5 days to go I gave it one more try but asked straight away for the PAC code to move my number to a new supplier. I was told that this can be done quite easy but had anyone previous mentioned the deal of the day to which I saone no.

They proceeded to offer me the HTC 8X, 500 minutes 5000 text and unlimited data for £34. At this point I hestitated and so they added 2000 landline minutes, 5000 3 to 3 minutes and dropped the price to £15 a month :shocked:

So a big thank you to all on the site and the forum for what turned out to be a very successful outcome.

penguin625

During November I decided to look round and upgrade my phone deal. I rang Vodafone and asked for my PAC Code just so I had the option of moving as my contract had expired. The following day I was contacted and Vodafone bent over backwards to keep me as a customer even though I had not made up my mind to leave. I got a new phone, a better deal on a lower tarriff.

My wife's contract had expired with Orange/EE. In the middle of December I suggested that she should ring and ask for her PAC Code and see if they'd offer anything to keep her as a customer. Upon ringing she was asked why a PAC Code was required, she explained that she had seen a deal on a new IPhone 5 and was considering changing. She was given her Code with not a hint of customer retention. upon looking around and looking at other providers it was decided that maybe she would stay with Orange/EE. Due to the good service throughout her contract. My wife had seen a deal online with Orange/EE which would mean we paid an upfront fee of £30 for the IPhone 5 at an increased tarriff. We went into the shop and spoke to an advisor, we were told that they were unable to match the online deal, but we would be able to contact the call centre and arrange to collect the phone in store. Later that evening my wife contacted Orange/EE, only to be told that the advisor had lied to us as this was not company policy due to data protection! We ordered the new phone at the increased tarriff. We were also convinced to take the 4G option even though it is not up and running in our area. A payment for the phone was taken from my debit card and as far as we were concerned the deal had been done, this was the 28th December. On the 2nd January we had'nt had confirmation of our order. We rang that evening only to find that the chap that initaily dealt with us had not put the order through yet money had be taken from me for the phone. After spending an hour on the phone it seemed that the issue had been resolved, the chap had but a new order through,promised we'd have the phone by the 4th and was bemused by how badly the order had initially been dealt with. It was arranged that a manager would contact us to discuss the issues we had faced. Later that night whilst putting our daughter to bed we missed the call, the message left said they would call back, yet they didn't! This increasinging began tp annoy us as I was buying the phone as part of my wife's Christmas but had prdered when we did because we knew we'd be in the house for the delivery.

The 4th January came and still no confirmation. We rang again only to have the phone put down on us when they were putting my wife on hold to 'investigate' the problem! We rang back again only to be told that the order had been scheduled for the 7th. Not happy, seemed they were quite happy to mess us about. The lady was very matter of fact with us and there was no apology forthcoming even though she could see on the screen the issues that we have had. We asked why we had not recieved a call back from a manager only to be told it was our fault as we had not called back even though we were told we would be contacted again. We eventually managed to speak to a manager who was initially apologetic. She gave many excuses for why we had been treated so poorly including the time of year/skeleton staff/lack of training due to an early release of the new EE network because of the leak to the press!! Strange then why my wife had been encouraged to take up the 4G when the sales assistant didn't actually know how to process the order!! The best she could offer me as way of apology was two weeks line rental free. When asked for a PAC code she proceeded to make my wife feel very guilty about leaving Orange as 'if it was just on principal you should really think again as you'll never get a phone quicker as it could take up to four weeks from another supplier'. Eventually she agreed to give us the PAC code (another 1/2hr on the phone) and refund my card. She then wen off the phone and called back half an hour later....I'm sure to try and make us change our mind! At this point she did not try to keep us and cancelled the initial order again saying we'd be lucky to get the phone anytime soon.

I then took my wife into town and went into Phones4U armed with our PAC code. We sat down and were offered a package with the Iphone 5 on an improved plan and lower tariff with a lower upfront cost for the phone on O2. The assistants couldn't do enough for us!

It's a shame that Orange feel that they can treat individuals so poorly due to their arrogance that they believe that the 4G network will bring customers to them even though it is not rolled out across the entire country. My wife was happy to pay more to stay loyal to the company but there is no dividends for loyalty with 'fatcat' companies!