So I’m anybody’s bitch — in the context of mobile phone service supply. I’ve been browsing around.
I feel that I need to have a ‘proper’ mobile. I’m missing out on cool things. I’m not able to be normal when I’m using the T-mobile MDA Pro. Reasonably good device, but you know, it lacks a certain style when the girls are looking at you.
It’s not what you’d call a sexy phone. It doesn’t have a decent 2 megapixel camera either, unlike almost any Sony Ericsson.
I’m hunting for a phone and for ‘service’. I’m bending toward Vodafone as it’s always been a reliable service supplier, however looking at the service plans… they must think my head buttons up the back.
I simply object to paying 12 pence a text.
You know what, it’s not even 12 pence!! It’s FOURTEEN point ONE pence: 14.1 pence per text on Vodafone including VAT.
The ‘stop the clock’ offering is pretty neat. On their highest standard tariff you’re still blowing 40 pence a minute to call another mobile. 40 PENCE A MINUTE. Seriously, a few extra pence and I’m sure calling my mate Tom on Orange would be little different from calling a premium adult telephone service. (There are jokes I could throw in here, but for the sake of sanity, I won’t).
Picture messages? Well they set me back 36 pence each. That’s 42.3 pence including VAT.
Video message? 60 pence each or 70.5 pence including VAT. It’s the VAT that’s the killer for the consumer, it really is.
Prices remain the same if you commit to 18 months on 75 quid ("anytime 1000"). You get a few pence savings on your fixed line and other mobile network calls.
Normally I wouldn’t care — I wouldn’t notice — because I just get the bill, look at the total cost, look at the VAT, think bad things to myself, then get on with the grizzly task of paying. Or better still, it’s zapped out of the account by direct debit so I don’t notice it.
Since I’m browsing though, it’s extremely clear to see just how screwed we are as consumers in the United Kingdom.
Why can’t Vodafone just say, "Look, make it 100 quid a month and we’ll call it quits" with some sort of fair use clause? Well, simple. For someone who regularly used to pay hundreds and hundreds of pounds per month to them, I didn’t have much of a choice. That’s the cost………
Bring on the unlimited messaging service plans.
I might screw it all and just get the new Blackberry on a tenner a month from T-Mobile and refuse to call anyone citing "get a life, stop using last century’s technology and GoogleTalk me instead" as the reason. I’ve done this with business cards. Anyone who asks for my business card, I apologise and say I don’t use them any more. 😀
Your "business card"? What, you’re wanting a piece of paper from me? A piece of paper with my digits on it? Come on, fast forward from Gutenberg and the 16th Century and give me your email. Or your Google ID. Or your Skype. I might let you all go and play with your Mobileglu’s and your BuddyPings while I’ll just read about it, safe in the knowledge I am not being nailed to the wall by Britain’s coven of mobile operators.
Honestly, why has no one looked at the Mobile Data Association’s 100 million texts a day statistics and said, "yeah, look, hold on… that’s nothing to be proud of when we’re still whacking consumers for 14 pence a text after their bundle evapourates"?
Oh, woe is me, woe woe woe. The lament of the mobile nomad hunting for a mobile service. Won’t somebody PLEASE wi-fi the place? PLEASE?