HTC Desire Vodafone 500mb Fair Usage Policy

330d

If you do video streaming then its very easy to use a large amount of data

bym007

After my message to the web relations team regarding clarity of policy on this issue, here is the reply receieved a short while back:

Hi xxxx,
Thank you for your email regarding data usage. We will notify customers when they are approaching their limit and also after they have gone over by a set amount, which is considerably more than the fair usage policy.
If you are notified three times that you have gone over then we will contact you to discuss moving onto a different price plan. If you don't change your price plan then you'll be charged for going over the fair usage policy at the standard rate. Further information can be found on our Mobile Broadband page.
George
Web Relations Team
Vodafone UK


We're always looking for feedback on how we're handling queries for our customers, so if you want to leave any comments on how I've handled your query today, then you can pop on here and complete the quick survey. I’d greatly appreciate any feedback to ensure that I’ve been offering the best service I can for our eForum customers.

I wonder if they would give me all the options at that time, including the option to cancel the package altogether without ETF.

N20Y1D

mabr_82 wrote: »

having spent the last 25 minutes reading this thread im bemused by the data that people are using
---
Are some people getting confused with the download speeds of kbs/mbs (kilo/megabits per second) rather than the actual amount of data in KB/MB (kilo/megabytes of data)?

laughable if thats the case :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

I'd suggest spending another 25 minutes in that case, as there is no mix up with the data amounts.

N20Y1D

bym007 wrote: »

I wonder if they would give me all the options at that time, including the option to cancel the package altogether without ETF.

I think we all know the answer to that one

Notsram

mabr_82 wrote: »

Can anyone confirm if this has been done?

It will be interesting to see what the figures are for a selection of users.

Would it be possible for you (Vodafone Company representative) to record some actual data from HTC Desire users and the amount in MB that they use, i realise you cant put customer sensitive data but to try and settle/close this ridiculous thread it would be beneficial?

Cheers

I very much doubt they'll do that, because if they do then (assuming they don't 'selectively' pick users from the very lowest end of the scale, the figures will in all probability show that most people use a hell of a lot more than 100MB a month. (I should probably point out here that I don't have a Desire, I have an Xperia, but I'm in exactly the same boat as you guys).

ruggedtoast

mabr_82 wrote: »

Can anyone confirm if this has been done?

It will be interesting to see what the figures are for a selection of users.

Would it be possible for you (Vodafone Company representative) to record some actual data from HTC Desire users and the amount in MB that they use, i realise you cant put customer sensitive data but to try and settle/close this ridiculous thread it would be beneficial?

Cheers

Hammering a Desire and using only 100mb of data a month is just not feasible.

A single (non mobile) web page will easily be 1 to 2 megabytes of data, especially if there is video and flash ads on the page. The Desire will download all of this as is.

The Desire's browser does not do a particularly great job at caching so every click forward and back is redownloading a lot this.

Having the default location services on, as it is out of the box, will cost you 500k to 1.5mb per hour.

With a 500mb limit you have 16mb a day to play with. Most of which can be eaten up just by walking around a bit and checking the Guardian a few times.

These phones have been flying off VFs shelves in the last couple of months. Most people buying them wont have a clue how to check their usage, what the difference is between opening bbc news on Opera Mini or watching 30 minutes of Youtube on their way to work from the preinstalled app (which is now 'unfair' use).

I suspect a lot of these people are going to be unpleasantly surprised to learn that, unless theyre on wifi, they wont be able to use their phones for what they got them for for the duration of their 24 month contracts.

All this ill feeling could be solved by three things

1) Stop misselling people non existent data tariffs ; and then making out like 10 megabytes of data is some inexhaustible amount on a device that can use this in a few minutes.

2) Raise the FUP to 1 Gigabyte and do away with hard capping.

3) Give people the option of throttling rather than paying if they go over data limits, like Orange do. Vodafone are supposed to have the best network in the UK. Time to prove it.

This is what customers actually want. It remains to be seen what Vodafone will do.

bym007

ruggedtoast wrote: »

Hammering a Desire and using only 100mb of data a month is just not feasible.

A single (non mobile) web page will easily be 1 to 2 megabytes of data, especially if there is video and flash ads on the page. The Desire will download all of this as is.

The Desire's browser does not do a particularly great job at caching so every click forward and back is redownloading a lot this.

Having the default location services on, as it is out of the box, will cost you 500k to 1.5mb per hour.

With a 500mb limit you have 16mb a day to play with. Most of which can be eaten up just by walking around a bit and checking the Guardian a few times.

These phones have been flying off VFs shelves in the last couple of months. Most people buying them wont have a clue how to check their usage, what the difference is between opening bbc news on Opera Mini or watching 30 minutes of Youtube on their way to work from the preinstalled app (which is now 'unfair' use).

I suspect a lot of these people are going to be unpleasantly surprised to learn that, unless theyre on wifi, they wont be able to use their phones for what they got them for for the duration of their 24 month contracts.

All this ill feeling could be solved by three things

1) Stop misselling people non existent data tariffs ; and then making out like 10 megabytes of data is some inexhaustible amount on a device that can use this in a few minutes.

2) Raise the FUP to 1 Gigabyte and do away with hard capping.

3) Give people the option of throttling rather than paying if they go over data limits, like Orange do. Vodafone are supposed to have the best network in the UK. Time to prove it.

This is what customers actually want. It remains to be seen what Vodafone will do.

You are on the money there!

essex_chris

It was inevitable IMO that the focus on this would die over time.

Just going to have to wait and see if Vodafone actually try and charge anyone. I suspect it will only be people who then don't question it, or if they do will be offered the other tariff with a larger allowance.

ruggedtoast

If they only started it in June, it'll be august before people start getting their last warnings.

Fullspizz

Wait until the charges start kicking in, the crap will start hitting the fan again then.
Voda appear to be trying the "divide and conquer" method with this, as people will all start to get warnings at different times.