Orange PAYG to monthly contract - questions

latecomer

After some advice/knowledge about changing from PAYG to contract - I konw nothing about PAYG so you'll have to excuse the daft questions

My Mum phoned last night to ask about my latest upgrade deal and says she thinks she might be worth going back onto a contract. She's currently on PAYG with Orange and has been for years. She wants to stay with Orange but get a new phone and go onto a monthly contract. Main reason is her phone is starting to die

One minor complication is that she has accumulated £30 in the "phone bank" which I gather is something that PAYG users get to put towards a new phone.

Also I dont know her monthly usage althougn I believe she tops up £20 or so every couple of months.

So questions:


1. Presumably first port of call is Orange directly to see what they can offer?
2. Is it possible to upgrade from PAYG to contract from 3rd parties like Phones4U?
3. Would a better option be to buy a new phone and then go sim only or continue with PAYG?

Jon_01

Any money in your phone fund is set against your bills until it runs out.

I'd call them up and ask for your pac code (to move to another network), they'll offer you a good/great deal to stay. I did that for my wife last month and got her 100 minutes, unlimited texts and 500gb of data on a sim only 30 day contract for £5 a month. You can then go a buy a phone she likes and just put the sim in that.

grumbler

latecomer wrote: »

...
Also I dont know her monthly usage althougn I believe she tops up £20 or so every couple of months.

At 25p/min it's about 40 min per a month.

So questions:


1. Presumably first port of call is Orange directly to see what they can offer?

I don't think they will offer anything good to a low spending PAYG customer.

2. Is it possible to upgrade from PAYG to contract from 3rd parties like Phones4U?

I think it is possible. I think deals for new customers are better and generally it is possible to port the old number to the new contact in two steps via another network free PAYG sim.

3. Would a better option be to buy a new phone and then go sim only or continue with PAYG?

It is very likely, but depends on what you want. What handset?

latecomer

grumbler wrote: »

At 25p/min it's about 40 min per a month.
I don't think they will offer anything good to a low spending PAYG customer.

thats what I was thinking but certainly worth a call. I would expect a maximum of £10/month. that said they did recently have a month at over £100 - would that influence things i.e. do they take average spend into account?

I think it is possible. I think deals for new customers are better and generally it is possible to port the old number to the new contact in two steps via another network free PAYG sim.

Would rather avoid that if possible.

It is very likely, but depends on what you want. What handset?

No handset in mind at all.

latecomer

Jon_01 wrote: »

Any money in your phone fund is set against your bills until it runs out.

I'd call them up and ask for your pac code (to move to another network), they'll offer you a good/great deal to stay. I did that for my wife last month and got her 100 minutes, unlimited texts and 500gb of data on a sim only 30 day contract for £5 a month. You can then go a buy a phone she likes and just put the sim in that.

Thats sort of deal that would be great - did you phone up on 150? (presuming Orange number is the same for PAYG?)

grumbler

latecomer wrote: »

No handset in mind at all.

Then just buy a cheap new one for £10ish from CPW/e2save/osps/mobiles.co.uk (it will be unlocked) and use with the sim-only contract with Orange that you'll be able to negotiate after you request the PAC and they try to stop you from leaving.

latecomer

No handset in mind but might not get away with the cheapest - will need to be able to show pic messages of her grandson in reasonable quality or else

Jon_01

latecomer wrote: »

Thats sort of deal that would be great - did you phone up on 150? (presuming Orange number is the same for PAYG?)

450 from a payg acc. Tell them you want your pac and see what they offer. Say no, which gets you to retentions who have the better offers and see what they can do.

Coming from payg it 'seems' they can't do a lot if you want a 'free' phone but for sim only they do some amazing offers!

latecomer

For the right sim only deal I'll happily sort out a handset of some description. Anyone know if I can get her to phone up and authorise them to speak to me about it? And can I phone 450 from a contract phone?

Jon_01

You can call 450 from a contract phone, no problem.

Yes, she can set you up as a third party on the acc. She has to call, clear security and tell them that. Then they speak to you and you setup your own password ect for the acc.