Ok, I'm posting a continuation of the Data Plan analysis thing I did, but this time I included calls and caps etc. so it though I'd post another thread since it's not the same thing. If a mod wants to merge the topics then that's OK I suppose.

This time I looked at $49 caps on the same 5 carriers I did the data thing to ($45 cap for Virgin) and added $20 of Data. So I looked at what you get on a $49 cap while spending $20 on Data.



I might go through and tweak the numbers to make versions for different caps and less or more on data, just to see if the winner is the same for all price points.

as i posted in your other thread, there are ways of getting around tel$tra's piracy pricing for their Same G network. I am paying about $45 for 1Gb of data on a prepaid USIM using credits purchased on Feebay.

Whoops, I have Optus's call rates wrong. Will update in a few minutes.

EDIT: Ok, done.

Vodafone and Optus are about to release new data/voice plans to go with the iphone. No firm indication yet, however they will be better value that what is available on the market at the moment.

I'm well aware of the fact they will probably have iphone specific plans, and I have a Numbers document to compare all the carriers when the iPhone is released, I just need to put in the numbers when the iPhone is released, so hopefully people can use it to get the best deal.

What I'd like to do is program a little app (flash or web, I don't know any OSX programming) so people can put in what they want, how much they're willing to spend, and output the best plan.

Nice work (again).

I really hope 3 announce they will have the iPhone.

Done in Numbers?

Yeah.

I've done another version comparing what you get for spending $40. When you combine $30 cap with $10 of Data Virgin is by far the winner, I had to leave Telstra out because they don't have anything cheaper than $49, and Optus is done with a $20 cap and $10 data, because Optus goes $19 cap to $49 cap, no $30 cap.

Ok here it is, one for people who don't want to spend $70 a month, this covers $40 a month, the rankings don't change much expect Virgin soars to the top, mainly because of its $10 for 300mb, it's calls are still pretty bad though.

Yeah Great stuff again NeoRicen

Fcuk a duck, do you not have a day job!?


Great work! Thanks from me.

It really doesn't take long, and I spread it over a week or so.

Putting my hand up.... please sir... I don't have a clue what all that means!

But then I'm totally and utterly screwed by all the advertising regarding mobile phone services here. I hear stuff like 389 dollar value for 69 dollars. What the hell does that mean?!

I admit to having it easy previously - I worked for Virgin Media (who own Virgin mobile in the UK) so was given a staff rate - for me I was on a pre-pay (I knew I was leaving so no point in a contract) and for every penny I spent on calls I got half of it back in credit at the end of the month.

Alas Virgin in the UK at the time did not do data.

So.. care to explain the dumbest terms what exactly all this stuff is going on about?

For clarity sake for Virgin Mobile UK calls cost15p per minute flat rate to call UK mobiles and landlines. That's on pre-pay. (no contract)

For contract you can get £20 150 mins any network and 150 text messages - adding data is costly.

I explained it as much as I could in the actual image, but if you're just wondering about caps In general I can help.

A Cap plan basically means you pay a certain amount (in my fist example it's $49) but you get more value. Basically you pay every 30 seconds for a call, the rate varies for each carrier (you can see the rates in the tables in the analysis under "call rate".

Australia doesn't do 'minutes' plans where you get a set amount of minutes per plan, instead you just Pay as You Go (at the per 30 second call rate and a connection fee for each call called flagfall). A cap means you just pay for your calls as usual but once you reach your 'cap' (A $49 cap means once you reach $49 worth of calls/messages) you stop paying. So say you make enough calls to spend $80, you only have to pay $49, however once you hit the cap peak (different carriers have different peaks, if you look at my first example, a Telstra $49 cap has a peak of $200) you start paying again.

From the 3 Cap FAQ:
On a $49 cap with $200 included value:
$35 worth of calls, messages etc. you pay $35
$49 worth of calls, messages etc. you pay $49
$80 worth of calls, messages etc. you pay $49
$120 worth of calls, messages etc. you pay $49
$200 worth of calls, messages etc. you pay $49
$210 worth of calls, messages etc. you pay $59
$250 worth of calls, messages etc. you pay $99

/tips hat at NeoRicen

Thank you for that really good explanation!

Sweet.. well, I was impressed. Well done.