Agonising over whether to switch from Orange OVP

BellyButtonFluff

I'm agonising over getting a new moby & contract at the moment, and would appreciate a 2nd, 3rd, 4th.... opinion. The nub of the issue is: am I mad to be considering transferring from OVP or has it finally been overtaken these days?

Mrs BBF and myself have been on Orange Virgin Promise (OVP) for umpteen years, orange customers for ~12 years. We pay monthly, ~£15 for our 2x standard, nokia phones. We live in an urban area. There are no bundled mins/texts; the costs are

10p texts, 35p/min to moby, 15p/min elsewhere (first 5 mins) then 5p/min
free voicemail, and 10p/min -> customer services

Some consider this an attractive deal, it is long gone, never to return. We have to buy phones every few years. data usage (email) is unclear in terms of 3G, amount, speed etc. Orange dislikes people on OVP by most accounts, and doesn't apparently offer much in terms of upgrade paths ( I understand why ). Had conflicting advice in the shops.

Due to change in 9-5 job, and opportunities elsewhere, my usage is starting to rise. It would be highly advantageous for me to have email and web whilst away from the house. Mrs BBF's usage should stay the same. My phone is the lead number on a/c.

I'm considering moving to either Blackberry Bold or new HTC Desire. Oddly, I have an iPhone from the 9-5 job, but I am reluctant to use this for other opportunities for obvious reasons.

I realise I will pay a bit more than now, but that should be of value to me. I don't wish to get locked into a £30-ish pm contract - I don't think I would use it. But I do need data. T-Mobile appear to be able to sell me a £165 HTC desire and a £10pcm contract with 100 mins / 100 texts / unlimited data.

So once again: am I mad to be considering transferring from OVP or has it finally been overtaken these days? We've had our numbers for 10+ years so reluctant to start again with new ones. I don't really want to carry 2 phones about.

PS Still building up to the trauma of calling Orange Customer Services!

BillScarab

T Mobile have dropped the £10 a month plan for the Desire. The equivalent plan is now £15 a month and £157 for the phone over 24 months.

Jon_01

You 'may' have problems getting data to work on a OVP sim any way. I use to work on the data support line at Orange and OVP and data just didn't get on. The sims are so old that sometimes (and only sometimes) they just wouldn't work with data products. I'd send hours trying to get them go and sometimes they just wouldn't. Orange won't change the sim on a plan that old.

So if you decide to stick with the OVP sim try it in another phone that has web ect first to see if it works. . .

KEM

My husband has been on Virgin OVP tariff for years and usually only had bills of £3 ish per month as he is only a light user. We always felt that when we went abroad it was useful to have a phone we could use in an emergency and know there was no effective credit limit (ie if necessary we could make a call and not risk the £20 credit or whatever running out whilst mid call).

Last month his bill came to £12 so we looked into it and have decided to transfer to Asda PAYG as this will work out way cheaper than the OVP tariff for his calls and will be much the same when roaming (2 weeks per year when 4 of us in the family will each have phones with us with £15-£20 credit loaded ready for an emergency).

At 8p/min for calls in the UK, 4p per text and 20p/Mb for data we reckon Asda mobile will take a lot of beating as he is such a low user (20-40 mins per month).

We will be porting his number across to Asda as soon as we can get it all sorted as he doesn't want to start again with a new number.

Not sure about a contract but for light users I do think that the Virgin OVP tariff has had its day.

Just spotted Jon01's post - 18 months ago hubby got an upgraded handset from Orange (had to pay £40 for a Sony Ericsson W595 I think) and it came with a new SIM card so he could use it for data - at Orange's extortionate rates.

HTH

Alison_B

I am also on an OVP plan with Orange. My usual bill is around £5 per month and I am billed for calls only with no rental.

I have changed my phone several times since being on this tarrif but have been told that all the features of the new phone will not work with this plan. Not sure I can justify going onto an X amount of money per month though.

Fire_Fox

Do you know how many minutes and texts you each make a month? £15 PLUS paying for all texts and calls doesn't seem that great of a deal to me! Have you then compared your usage to SIM only deals or contracts elsewhere? It is very easy to port your number to any other network, you just ask for your PAC and give it to the new network so that is not a great reason to stay with OVP.

BellyButtonFluff

@FireFox; sorry for perhaps not being clearer. The ancient OVP tarriff is a little unusual in that there is no monthly charge, and no free minutes. So you pay for what you use, billed after the period. So we use £15 quids worth of text/call per month and no fixed charge.

@KEM; this is really good info, hadn't considered Asda to date. Thanks for the pointer.

@Jon1; we have had new SIMs over time (one died, one was lost, and to support things like MMS many years ago). But I agree it is still hazy about data usage, 3G. It def. does GPRS. I think you are right in that if it is not 3G enabled already they are never going to give a new SIM on OVP for that.

BellyButtonFluff

@KEM (again), I think you are right, Asda is better than OVP these days, especially for mobile to mobile calls, it is a no brainer. 8p vs 35p. You lose free voicemail, which is hardly a dealbreaker at 8p a minute as well (probably only use it once or twice a month)

I think my wife can go on that immediately, I am inclined to do so as well. I may wait and figure out my best future option for data (I can wait a few weeks for now), then call Orange and get the PAC codes and see if they say anything (not likely given our low usage and if what i have read in other posts is true in relation to OVP)

Like for like, Asda wins.

However I reckon that if you were getting towards 100 mins / 100 texts per month that would be about £12 and you can get contracts for £10 for that sort of thing so a bit below that would be the tipping point

Once again thanks for highlighting the useful info.

mchale

Personally I would keep 1 of your OVP sims, as you know it doesn't cost you anything if you don't use it, I use mine as a emergency back up when on holiday, as KEM said you don't have to worry about topping up etc, you could put a answer phone message on it advising people of your new number

KEM

If you've not already gone onto Asda Mobile it would be worth looking at Tesco PAYG because of the free credit they add when you top up. At first I thought Tesco wasn't worth it but as you can register 5 favourite numbers, calls and texts to those are 10p/min and 5p/text so not much different to Asda plus you get the benefit of a month of "free" credit when you top up.

The downside of Tesco is the data charge of £4/MB (vs Asda 20p/MB) or you can pay £2 for a weeks usage (Monday to Sunday) but if you opt in you have to remember to opt out.

I just got hold of a free Tesco PAYG SIM (ordered it through the website) and the covering letter states that when you top up for the first time Tesco will give you an additional £10 credit.

I go round and round in circles trying to decide the best option - whatever it is I don't think it is the Virgin OVP tariff anymore.

cally6008

Tesco triples their credit now, top up £10, get £30 credit