Beware If You Pay Your 'Three' PAYG Mobile Credit By Direct Debit!

Bojangle16

Many people who pay their rolling month by month Three price plans by direct debit may not be aware, that since last year Three have imposed two large price increases on its customers. The first one ( and I will illustrate this using their All You Can Eat Internet, 300 minutes of voice Calls and 3000 texts PAYG Add On Plan...which I know intimately) took the price initially from £15.00 to £20.00. A pretty substantial increase by anybody's reckoning. The plan itself remained unchanged, as before, with a 300 minute voice calls allowance, 3000 text messages, and AYCE ( All You Can Eat data ) internet allowance per month.

Their chosen method of notifying customers of this increase ( was subtle...some would say 'on the quiet' ) was by a text message, which many people tend to ignore because text messages from companies are usually spam advertising of some sort. So it went through fairly quietly. I'm sure that many Three customers probably weren't even aware of it.

This month they have again imposed another increase in the tariff...using the same means of communication ( a text message ). The plan has this time been tweaked, to make it less obvious and less easily comparable to the previous plans, but the size of the increase cannot be disguised.
The bottom line is that if you wish to continue with your AYCE ( All You Can Eat ) internet access your choices are these:

1) ALYE data + 200 minutes voice call time ( down by 100 per month ) + All You Can Eat Texts... for £28.00 per month ( £23 if you opt to pay by direct debit ).

This is effectively an increase of 53% on the April 2015 prices: if you choose to pay by direct debit. And 65% if you do not pay by Direct Debit. With 100 less minutes of call time!

2) ALYE data + 600 minutes voice call time ( up by 300 per month ) + All You Can Eat Texts... for £33.00 per month ( £28 if you opt to pay by direct debit ).

This is effectively an increase of 45% on the April 2015 prices: if you choose to pay by direct debit. And 53% if you do not pay by Direct Debit. With 300 more minutes of call time!

3) ALYE data + AYCE voice call time + All You Can Eat Texts... for £38.00 per month ( £33 if you opt to pay by direct debit ).

This is effectively an increase of 39% on the April 2015 prices: if you choose to pay by direct debit. And 45% if you do not pay by Direct Debit. This time with AYCE call time!

The variation in percentage increases is caused by the blanket £5.00 discount which is given to anybody paying by direct debit, no matter how much their plan costs. The actual variation in percentage increases without the 'Direct debit' factor, seem to be quite arbitrary. With such frequent and massive price increases it is not difficult to see why Three are keen to sign customers up to Direct Debits!

The critical factor here is that to take advantage of the lower rates, you must sign up to a Direct Debit. But by doing so, you will probably be totally unaware of the excessive price increases which they are now imposing quite frequently. ( just considering the two increases during the last year )
These increases which I have detailed are specific to the PAYG monthly Add On Plans only. But are not in line with RPI rate in ANY way. It is for those who are on different plans to investigate their plan prices and increases themselves. Do not just sign up to a direct debit, and then trust in 'Three's' good faith! When these prices are imposed...shop around! There are far better terms to be had...I assure you.

Finally, on a more personal note regarding the Three Indian Call centre. Although Three ( who have farmed out their customer support to Indian call centres ) employ staff who may be able to speak 'English'...after a fashion, they do not employ support staff who can actually 'understand English' and converse fluently in it. The result is hours and hours of wasted time trying to explain in simple English what your problem actually is, followed by lengthy and time consuming correspondence with 'senior customer support staff' to try to resolve the issue.

What I have detailed are my own personal experiences, and facts which relate to my own use of 'Three Mobile' services, which I share in the hope that it will at least cause some Three customers to check what they are actually paying, make some easy comparisons for themselves...and make informed decisions about which company you feel can best serve your interests!

System

All very interesting but do 3 allow you to top up their pay as you go services by 'Direct Debit'?

mikegahan

Three are ramping up their prices, the Pay as you go equivalent to what you refer to - with AYUCE data & some minutes - has gone from £15 to £25 in a year. I do find that their 4g data is very good in the London area

711david1974

mikegahan wrote: »

Three are ramping up their prices, the Pay as you go equivalent to what you refer to - with AYUCE data & some minutes - has gone from £15 to £25 in a year. I do find that their 4g data is very good in the London area

What was All In One 15 became All In One 20 last August, with the data allowance then cut to a max of 12GB last month.

The All In One 25 with AYCE data is a long standing tariff which included(s) 200 minutes more than the ex All In One 15 tariff which once had AYCE data.

But clearly if you really do need in excess of 12GB of data now on PAYG, you are just going to have to pay more. 12GB of data per month for 20.00 and AYCE data for 25.00 per month on PAYG are still great value for money, provided they don’t keep hiking the prices of both tariffs every few months, and in the case of the ex All In One 15 tariff, they don’t further reduce the amount of data on offer per month.

Bollotom

Don't GiffGaff do an ayce for £20? :cool:

ic

Heng_Leng wrote: »

All very interesting but do 3 allow you to top up their pay as you go services by 'Direct Debit'?

I think the OP is describing changes to a 30 day rolling contract. So has received notification that the price is changing, and isn't happy. PAYG can only be paid by top-ups, Three don't offer an auto-top.

cheesetoast

Bollotom wrote: »

Don't GiffGaff do an ayce for £20? :cool:

Yes, but it doesn't matter what the price of an all-you-can-eat buffet is when they're serving up inedible crap.