new vodafone contracts

spooks_2

hey all great site

just been onto the vodafone online shop and seen they've changed the contracts.

now they give u points to get extras like stop the clock, sky tv, insurance or simply extra texts. plus with better customer service and good retention deals, i think they're better than orange and offer as good coverage as o2.

the only draw back was expensive contracts. No longer the case.

Think this is the best direct deal i can find:
SE K800i with 500 free mins x-net netime, 100 free texts and 1 extra for £35/m
for 12months.

for me this will be 250 extra texts.

what does everyone think?

Reestit_Mutton

Over-complicated, in my view.

FlexT had it about right - why not just have a simple pricing structure and a value-based allowance. Job done.

Infact, O2 used to do this many moons ago (in the late nineties) when you could pay £15/month for your tariff and get £10/month free allowance. Oh...those were the days.

There is nothing stopping any of the networks extending the FlexT approach to more than just texts and minutes. Why not throw everything into the pot and be done with it. I'll tell you why...confusion tactics reign supreme! The networks don't want people to be able to instantly compare their offerings with the competitors. The moment clarity appears on the horizon, the industry risks being commoditised to an extent, at which point the profit margins disappear.

The latest wacky idea from Vodafone is going to be a nightmare to administer for both retailers and price comparison services alike.

From the online retailer's point of view, it's impossible to clearly summarise the benefits of their tariffs in a way that can be instantly compared with other packages on their site unless you list all possible combinations of extras individually (and that would likely run into the hundreds). In reality, retailers are likely to settle on a handful of potentially popular combinations and simply not promote or sell anything outside of this range, which would entirely defeat the purpose of the new Vodafone tariff structure.

From the price comparison engine's point of view, with some optional extras offering increased minutes and texts and one option in particular offering a period of discounted line rental, there is now no way to pre-determine the package of benefits or the total price for the purpose of performing a comparison. So comparison becomes an impossible task. Again, the only obvious way to solve this problem would be to multiply out all the possible combinations of options and treat them as individual tariffs in their own right (each with a clearly pre-determined set of benefits and total cost) - however, this would unnecessarily complicate the landscape and grant Vodafone an unfair percentage of coverage in the database.

Vodafone may have hit upon an interesting concept from the consumer's point of view but I really don't think that they've thought through how their independent sales channels are going to sell the idea to the customer...and, without a willing independent sales channel, there will be very few new customers.

Reestit Mutton

cigar_2

Just noticed something interesting on Vodafone's new price plans (see here)...

The cost of some calls (landlines, other Vodafones, Voicemail) has gone up by at least 20%. On the older tariffs it used to cost 15p/min or 12p/min on some higher tarrifs. On the new plans it is now 18p/min.

Also it is now CHEAPER to call an 0845/0870 number from your Vodafone mobile (15p/min) than a landline (assuming you've used you call allocation). How crazy is that?!

Not to mention the loss of MMS (and maybe data - have seem too many conflicting reports) from the "Extra" packs.

I'm with Reestit on this one - I'm jumping ship and heading over to T-Mobile for unlimited data and £34 worth of calls/texts included in the basic £20 plan (currently only £15/month).