[gorilla]

Let's take a moment to consider t-mobile's new price plans.
the big news this week has been the introduction of the full monty plan which includes unlimited internet access for price plans over £36 per month on a two year contract. The usual fair use policy (http://www.t-mobile.co.uk/services/uk/fairuse/) applies.

So, how can this still be advertised as unlimited?

We have also learned this week (http://www.coolsmartphone.com/2012/02/03/t-mobile-full-monty-shocking-speed-cap/) that the data speeds are capped, then they're not, who knows, clearly not t-mobile.

I'll let you draw you own conclusions, but it's clear that orange are starting to make an impact on t-mobile's pricing.

I have a sim only plan with t-mobile and they have refreshed (https://www.t-mobile.co.uk/shop/sim-only/sim-only-pay-monthly-10-12m/t-mobile-sim-card/extras/) this offering as well. Gone are the days of inclusive Internet, now customers have to fork out an extra £4 per month for 100Mb, £9 for 750. There are £14 & £19 options which include tethering.

I must admit that in NI orange have a pretty solid network and since everything everywhere switched on 3G sharing t-mobile have really benefited. But what use is a 3G network that only permits downloading 500Mb per month and has poor download speeds?

I can understand that for most, 500Mb is enough, but once people start to really understand what their phone is capable of, they will use it more and more. I recently had a conversation with someone (orange HTC wildfire customer) who did not know they could listen to Internet radio on their phone.

So, do these new price plans tempt you to join t-mobile?

[Hands0n]

Last question first :) No, they do not. £36 is considerably more than £25 for no particular value add (I'm on a Three SIM-only One Plan on my second handset). In my book that is not competing but jumping on the bandwagon, albeit somewhat speciously. As the acting profession might say ... "What is my motivation?" to join T-Mobile.

Much is made of 2G back-up to 3G networks. That is fine for voice and text, but if you're a heavy data user like myself then 2G (GPRS or EDGE) is completely useless for a smartphone. Some are happy for their smartphone to respond in minutes rather than seconds but I am not. So 2G as a backstop for 3G/HSPA/HSPA+ is a complete non-starter.

Watching the debacle of the alleged mobile data speed cap to 1Mbps would be comical if it were not so serious. People are being asked to sign up to a 24 month contract - this is well within the expected time scales for LTE to appear in reality (slated for 2013). So why would anyone, even if they do not use much data today, obligate themselves to such a commitment to a speed that is half what the government's intended minimum ADSL speed is to be? Are the buyers of this proposal absolutely convinced that within the next 24 months they will not use Sky.go, NetFlix, BBC iPlayer or any of the other streaming services? Really? That they will not want to do so when they see the big marketing push that is almost bound to happen, and see their friends and family take up use of these? At 1Mbps (best) these streaming services are going to operate highly variably.

Now it may turn out that the speed cap is nothing but a red herring, there has been word that there isn't a cap. T-Mobile's PR around this issue is lamentable, the best they've said in denial of a speed cap is that their customers will receive the highest speed available. That leaves the door completely open to a cap being placed. Basically it says "best endeavours" at best, capped if not. Not good. The week ahead may see their PR swing into operation, but clearly right now T-Mobile do not know what to say. But the whole blogging community is watching them very closely, every move.

So would I recommend T-Mobile's Full Monty proposition? No.

[Ben]

Is that FUP really applicable to the full monty plan? How the hell can anyone claim 'unlimited' when, a link-click away, it clearly states "Your price plan has a 500MB or 1GB allowance."

If that's really the case then it's entirely outrageous.

Regarding the changes in general, it's good to see that the mobile operators are still capable of getting it so wrong. What happened to T-Mobile becoming the value proposition?

[gorilla]

It's confusing. The link on the homepage to the full monty plans takes you here (https://www.t-mobile.co.uk/shop/pay-monthly/plans/) and that page has the link to the Data Fair Use policy. So either the full monty is not subject to this fair use policy or else it's not an unlimited (in the true sense) package.

[solo12002]

I was wondering who be the first to post about this new plan, funny that years ago it would of been in the press about mix and match now they have released this plan its taking days to get info out and about. Unlike the one plan this to date appears to be 24 months and no offer of a sim only deal, further more thay do say unlimted but in a sense thats not untill you go for the dearer price place. I have found this:

http://www.t-mobile.co.uk/shop/terms-and-conditions/pay-monthly-deals/

"The Full Monty Plan: Unlimited minutes, texts and internet on your phone

To join, you'll need to pass our standard credit checks and promise to stay with us for 24 months. All services are within the UK only. Your monthly payment is for your internet access on your phone, your WiFi allowance and your inclusive minutes and texts.

If you join Full Monty 36 you'll get 2000 minutes to check your voicemail, to call the customers of other UK mobile networks and to call landlines starting with 01, 02 and 03 (excluding the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man). You'll also get unlimited calls other T-Mobile customers and unlimited texts to UK mobile networks and landlines starting with 01, 02 and 03 (excluding the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man) .

On all our other Fully Monty plans you'll get unlimited minutes to call other customers of UK mobile networks, to check your voicemail and to call landlines starting with 01, 02 and 03 (excluding the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man). You'll also get unlimited texts to UK mobile networks and landlines starting 01, 02 and 03 (excluding the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man).

Our Fully Monty plans will give you unlimited use of our internet on your phone service when you're in the UK. You'll need internet coverage, check it at t-mobile.co.uk/streetcheck.If you choose a BlackBerry phone from us, you'll also get BlackBerry Mail and BBM free (usually £5.10 a month) too. To be clear, no fair use policy applies to our internet on your phone service or to the BlackBerry Mail and BBM booster.

In addition to our internet on your phone service, you'll also get access to our preferred WiFi partner's WiFi network; presently this is the BT Openzone network excluding any sites providing access to any organisation or location which is part of the Olympic Games in London in 2012 . The BT Openzone terms, including those about acceptable use, will also apply to you. You can see these at http://www.btopenzone.com/terms-and-conditions/index.jsp. As we aren't the provider of the WiFi service, we aren't responsible for whether there is WiFi available where you want it, or for the quality of that service. We might swap your WiFi service to another preferred partner in future, provided that you get the same experience.

These plans are for normal person to person use from your phone and are subject to your acceptance of our standard terms and conditions for pay monthly services. We monitor use in accordance with those terms. The terms state that you can't use these plans to sell access to our network to anyone else. They are also not to be used for anything unlawful or to send nuisance communications. At the moment, we'll decide that you're breaking these terms if you text more than 200 different numbers in a month. Remember, we're free to decide that other types of use may also be breaking this term. If you do break this term, we'll contact you and ask you to stop and if you don't then we may disconnect your SIM card from our network.
Calls to our technical customer operations team will cost £1 a call and calls to numbers starting with 070, 08 (including 0870), 09 and 118 are not included in your inclusive allowance. Calls to 070 numbers cost up to 77p/min. 08 numbers cost up to 40p/min and 09 numbers cost up to 255p/min. See www.t-mobile.co.uk/help&support/priceplans for further information.

[Ben]

Thanks for posting that, solo12002, sounds a bit more hopeful.

I hate the way T-Mobile insist on excluding Channel Islands/Isle of Man. The man on the street has no way of knowing if a mobile, especially, is from the mainland UK or not because the numbering plan is essentially the same. The first customers know is when they start getting charged for texts at the international rate. It just makes T-Mobile look bad, I really wish they'd get the stick out from up their behinds.

Anyone else hating the name? The Full Monty? Really?

[Hands0n]

Good info Solo12002. Still a great deal of uncertainty about that 1Mbps data speed cap (unless I've missed something in the media today).

[hecatae]

http://forums.digitalspy.co.uk/showpost.php?p=56388639&postcount=95

the above on digitalspy is all I need to know.

[Ben]

Are we talking 1mbps cap... always? That's as fast as she blows?

[Hands0n]

That is what all the fuss is about. T-Mobile are definitely not helping themselves with their misdirection and silence

[solo12002]

Ok Guys:

Ive now found this: http://www.engadget.com/2012/02/04/t-mobile-confirms-full-monty-speed-cap/ maybe the t-mobile twits at twitter can advise better. not that Im for moving from three

[Ben]

A launch well and truly fumbled.

[Hands0n]

And still they're not confirming or actually denying that the 1Mbps cap is in place exactly. I suppose they're waiting for the hiatus to die down and simply get on with selling.

Once again, Caveat Emptor prevails as the best advice. Do your homework before signing anything and for pity's sake ignore the headlines!

[hecatae]

1190

friend who swapped to full monty speed results, you can see before and after quite clearly

[Wilt]

1190

friend who swapped to full monty speed results, you can see before and after quite clearly

Unfortunately I can't see anything because the image has been shrunk down to 69x115. :(

[hecatae]

1191

try this

[Ben]

Ok yeah, that looks pretty convincing.

[hecatae]

I think only a cap could produce the same speed 3 hours apart.

[Hands0n]

Very disappointing ...

[Wilt]

According to some guys on digital spy the cap has been removed - not sure how accurate that is though.

[Hands0n]

I found this comment on the T-Mobile forum (3rd posting), it'll no doubt be removed by the Mods once they see it



I've spoken to someone in the Scottish technical support team who knew pretty much everything there was to know about the issue.

The bottom line is this.

ALL the new internet add ons - Basic, Standard and Extra are rate limited to 1mbit down and 385kbit up

The ONLY one that has no rate limit is the Super Internet tarrif - if you get this tariff added on and then speak to technical support - there is an option to set the profile to 7.2mbit down and 2mbit up (T-Mobile max network speed).

Took me three days to find all this out and if I hadn't got through to someone in the know I'd have never known, if you have the super internet add-on and your speeds are still throttled - if you go through to technical support on the add-on there is the option to change your profile to unthrottled - the computer SHOULD do this automatically but it might not sometimes.

FYI whilst playing around with the Extra and Standard plans there is something they can tweak to give you 3.76mbit down and 385kbit up - however they are not sure what it is and the profile will still state 1mbit down 385kbit up.

Hope this helps anyone who needs the info.

The above was on this thread --> http://forums.t-mobile.co.uk/discussions/index?page=forums&topic=801019cc098a30135383a7abb004973

[gorilla]

When I joined t-mobile I asked the twitter team about throttling and they were very clear: if you wanted faster download speeds you had to upgrade your internet add on. I really don't know why this is an issue. If you are upfront about your pricing policy then your customers will have more respect for you.
I have one of the old unlimited data plans (with a 500MB FUP) and my download speeds are capped at 1MB.

For me, the real issue is that 3G speeds are not improving with time. I can honestly say that I have not noticed a substantial improvement in 9 years. Compare that to ADSL or fibre and you can't say the same. I really expected that by 2012 I would be able to get of my landline in favour of a mobile broadband solution, but I feel like we are years away from that prospect.

[Ben]

Mhm... I don't know gorilla...

I just did a speed test on Vodafone 3G at my office, where I actually get working coverage, and got 6.6mbps down and 3.4mbps up. I'd be pretty pissed if I was on T-Mobile, capped at 1mbps down and 385kbps up! It would feel dramatically different!

I'm holding out hope for considerable speed increases after the new spectrum auctions are completed.