This caught my eye just moments ago from the T-Mobile UK Official Twitter account:
Superb phone for #business: #HTC Desire, unlimited texts, unlimited Calls, unlimited internet for £20 per month: http://bit.ly/d9k021
“Wow!” I thought, “20 quid a month? For a desire? How are they doing that I wondered?”
Here’s what I saw:
It’s not 20 quid a month. It’s 35/month but there’s a discount for the first 3 months.
This offer itself is perfectly fine.
It is, however, patently RIDICULOUS to advertise the phone at 20/month.
The website even says: £20 a month (24 months) in bright T-Mobile branded purple.
That tells me the offer is £20 per month for 24 months, right?
No.
Because there’s more clarifying text underneath saying “(for the first 3 months, £35 thereafter)”.
Absolutely ridiculous. Completely and utterly ridiculous.
Do they think our heads button up the back?
This demonstrates yet another further erosion of the English language when it comes to mobile operators.
“Unlimited?”
Oh it’s unlimited. Until you hit the limit.
Or it’s ‘fair use’. Until we decide that fair use means a 500mb limit. (I’m looking at you, Vodafone). So you can have unlimited data. On a 500mb limit.
How long before T-Mobile starts running TV adverts for the HTC Desire at ’20 pounds per month’ with a disclaimer saying that 20 pounds actually equals 35 pounds.
They didn’t even say in big letters on the HTC Desire special offer that it’s “20/month 3-month special offer” or anything like that. No. Ridiculous.
Shove that, you coming to Mobile Geeks tonight Marlow boy?
They may not be accurate about their pricing, but they're insistent that that color is magenta, not purple or pink…
As annoying as it is, doesn't practically every communication based company do this? BT advertise their broadband as the discounted price and then add underneath the full cost after the 3-6 month period, Plusnet do exactly the same. They advertise as £5.99 and then add on the end “for the first 3 months, £18.99 thereafter”.
Standard practice now unfortunately.
Still not as good as the deal 3 did – £17/month for 24 months for a Desire, 100min/texts & internet. I think they shifted a lot of handsets with that offer!
The tweet doesn't specify any contract length at all, which is a far bigger crime IMHO.
good point!