How Grans and kids are getting ripped off on pre-paid mobiles

Pre-pay or bill-pay mobiles: which is the cheapest for occasional users like old folks or kids?

If you're a light user -- five minutes of calls per day and five texts a day -- you would think it's a prepaid phone, right? Wrong. According to Comreg, three of the cheapest five options are actually bill pay deals. Here's how it works out.

Operator         Cost per month    Type         Package name

Meteor             EUR36                pre-paid       'Anytime Plus'
3                     EUR38.50            bill-pay         'Videotalk 200'
Meteor             EUR40                pre-paid        'Leisure Time Plus'
3                     EUR40                bill-pay          'Videotalk + Text 200'
O2                   EUR41.40          bill-pay          'Active Life 150'

(Source: callcosts.ie)

Comments

[dw]

i just ran something similar on a finnish mobile network comparion calculator. 150min + 150sms per month. the cheapest is 20euros per month and there over 30 different price plans that bring it in under the cheapest irish equivilant. (source: vertaa.fi)

most (i think) people here have postpaid bills and monthly rental is as cheap as 66c.

dw.

[Ambrand]

Another rip-off with prepay is in the area of handset "upgrades". These are priced just below introductory pre-pay handsets. Now, one can understand why introductory pre-pay handsets are so expensive (the operator has no gurarantee that their subsidy would be recouped in call costs) but surely loyal customers who wish to upgrade should be embraced with open arms, the operators should say "excellent, we are glad you wish to stay with out network, here have a resonably priced upgrade" and not "please leave"