New Mobile Contract after leaving Three

digifreak

Hello everyone,
I am planning to ditch Three after their price hikes on the PAYG. In less than a year they've changed the all in one plan that had 200 minutes + 3000 SMS + Unlimited Data from £15/Month to £25/Month.
And to be honest I think that's too much to pay. Also I never got myself a contract because PAYG is easier to control my spending... but I think that now it's time to bite the bullet and finally get a mobile contract.

But here is where my problem start... because I am very undecided between two plans and don't know to which one should I turn, so I would like to hear some of your opinions if possible.
So my undecision is between an O2 plan and a BT Mobile plan. Where I live both operators have roughly the same coverage.

And the plans are:

BT Mobile 20Gb plan for £20 - 20Gb of Data + Unlimited Texts + Unlimited calls
I have BT at home so I get the £5 discount, hence the £20 instead of £25.
As a perk on this one is the offer of an £80 voucher for Amazon, free access to BT Wifi hotspots and maybe £35 cashback from Quidco.

O2 16Gb Plan for £19.60 - 16Gb of Data + Unlimited Texts + Unlimited Calls
I have a friend of mine that works for O2, so I can get the 30% off friends and family discount, hence £19.60 instead of £28.
As a perk on this one I have the O2 priority, free access to O2 Wifi hotspots and maybe £60 cashback from Quidco.

I do quite a few calls, some of them for Europe destinations, and normally use between 12-14 Gb of data every month.

And my question is... if you know both networks, for which one should I go? I am not sure which one is more reliable, have better speeds/coverage, etc, so any help would be welcome. :D:o;):p

Thank you in advance,
Digi

HappyMJ

The answer really depends on where you live.

You need to look at coverage checkers and find out if you get 3G or 4G coverage in your area. Both at home and at work and anywhere else you visit regularly.

When I'm at home though I use the wi-fi and when I'm at work I use works wi-fi. When I'm out there tends to be free wi-fi almost everywhere I go and if there isn't then I choose not to watch HD video streams. By doing all of that my data usage is very low.

I pay £0 per month with 3 and get 200MB per month which is more than enough for the odd Facebook update when I'm out of range of a wi-fi hotspot.

Texts you can use Whatsapp, Messenger etc instead which uses data to keep in contact therefore very few are required.

How many mobile minutes do you actually use?

O2 Priority and O2 wi-fi can be obtained by getting a free SIM and putting the verification codes in your phone. There's no need to top up.

If you've BT at home you've already got free access to BT wi-fi hotspots.

digifreak

Thank you for your help, I use about 600-800 minutes per month.
Humm well... I use normally internet to stream music while driving, I also have the GPS getting live data when I drive and so on... so I end up being a fairly heavy data user.

HappyMJ

digifreak wrote: »

Thank you for your help, I use about 600-800 minutes per month.
Humm well... I use normally internet to stream music while driving, I also have the GPS getting live data when I drive and so on... so I end up being a fairly heavy data user.

There's ways around that. You can download podcasts in advance to listen to whilst driving. You can download all the maps before setting off so that data is not required. GPS does not require the data setting to be on. If you want traffic updates that hardly uses anything.

If you could get your data down to 3GB per month then there are some much cheaper plans with enough minutes for your use.

My partner pays £5.50 per month and she gets 3GB of data, 1,000 minutes and unlimited texts.