Pay as you go - iPhone - help!

[Small Car]

Excuse me for being ignorant - I have relied on my work mobile for many years and have lost touch with how things have changed in the mobile market. Could someone enlighten me -

I want to buy Mrs an iPhone. She is on Orange pay as you go at the moment and has been for 5 years or so - on a Nokia 6210 which gives you an idea where we 'are'! I was just thinking of buying the Orange iPhone and carrying on as I have been. But I do not understand how pay as you go works when data and the internet is involved. A few idiot questions -

1. Is data and the internet different. I thought that you downloading when using the internet ? Someone has said to be careful of the cost on this as you can get caught out. Do you know how this works on pay as you go ? We will be using a home wi fi to download apps but that will be about it I think.

2. We don't use the phone much - say 60 mins a month. I do not understand how £30 top up can be unlimited minutes as quoted on O2 - is that only for a month ?

I have got so confused I am thinking of saying 'sod it' and just taking out a £25 contract and letting that cover it. Any ideas ?

I have been told to change to O2 as this has a £10 top up which equates to free internet for a year. God I am confused - please help !

[kevin63]

You could really do with looking on the Orange and O2 web sites. As I see it you can have Internet on Orange for £5 a month for a limit of 500mb and if you went over that it would take the money off your payg credit. On O2 you can get an add on for £7.50 for unlimited web so say if you put £10 credit on and activated the Internet for a month then this would come off your credit leaving you £2.50 for calls or text (though which you would have got 300 text free for a month). If you do not have enough credit on your phone you can not activate web on this offer. If you are on your WIFI then it's free as you are not using the phones network which ever you are on, Orange or O2.

Also if you buy an iphone on payg then on O2 you get 1 years free internet, not sure about Orange.

Edited by kevin63 on Monday 5th April 00:01

[Small Car]

Thanks for that. I think I am getting confused about the download sizes - if I surf the web does that count as download, or is that only for apps.

All of a sudden I feel very old...

[DanL]

Small Car said:

Thanks for that. I think I am getting confused about the download sizes - if I surf the web does that count as download, or is that only for apps.

All of a sudden I feel very old...

Yep, any Internet traffic (web surfing, downloading an app, streaming video from YouTube, Google maps, etc.) counts as a "download", as you're downloading data from the net.

The next thing to consider is how you do this - over wireless at home it won't count against you, as you're not using the phone company's network. However, if you do it out and about, it will count against your allowance.

Don't think you won't use the net when you're away from home - Google maps is really handy and needs to download data. Many of the useful apps also download, and it's handy to look up train times, etc, when you're out too. Before getting a "smart phone" I wasn't sure how much I'd use the net - turns out I use it loads once it's there and easy to do.

All of the above was written on my iPhone

[Small Car]

Thanks Dan. I just need to 'do it' but worried about getting stung by being an ingnoramus !

So when O2 is saying free internet for a year for the £10 they give you when you buy it, does that mean all the downloads as well then. I asked at the Carphone Warehouse when I popped by but was none the wiser... I think, from what you say above, it does mean that. Sorry. Not sure why I am being soooo slow on this one !

[CommanderJameson]

To give you a flavour of how much data you might use, I had an iPhone for 18 months and used it incessantly. Over the 18 months, I used a total of 1.8GB of data.

I have a BlackBerry Storm2, and my data plan with Vodafone gives me 500MB per month. Again, I use the data connection very frequently, and the most I've ever used in a month was 150MB - but crucially, I don't bother with streaming data like YouTube.

If you're just looking at web sites, rather than using any streaming services like YouTube, then even a basic data tariff is going to be adequate. If you're a video-watcher, though, you might want to consider a tariff with a more robust data element, because streaming video can chomp through your allowance quicker than you think.

[jimothy]

This is why I could never do PAYG as it seems so complicated. I'm on the £35 a month iPhone contract and I probably could spend less by doing PAYG as I don't use it that much I know that all I do is pay my £35 then can use the net, make all the calls I'd want/send all the texts I'd want without worrying...

[audi321]

Buy an iphone (on any network) unlock it and stick a Three sim in it.

They are the best PAYG tariff by far IMO. The credit never expires (i.e. no minimum top up each month), you get free texts/data (ok there's a limit, but it's plenty and lasts for 90 days). Good website to view your account balances and if you top up online, you get doubled free texts/internet. Finally, there's completely free calls to other people on the Three network, so if you ever lose the work phone, get a Three phone then you get unlimited calls between you.

Three have moved on miles since a few years ago when they were the butt of the mobile phone market (poor network coverage, etc) but as they were originally set up for the 3G market, as time has progressed and 3G has become the norm, they've come into their own!

Edited by audi321 on Monday 5th April 11:34

[stemll]

Small Car said:

Thanks Dan. I just need to 'do it' but worried about getting stung by being an ingnoramus !

So when O2 is saying free internet for a year for the £10 they give you when you buy it, does that mean all the downloads as well then. I asked at the Carphone Warehouse when I popped by but was none the wiser... I think, from what you say above, it does mean that. Sorry. Not sure why I am being soooo slow on this one !

If you buy a PAYG iPhone from O2 then you do not pay for web access over 3G for the first 12 months and there is no requirement to top up every month either. It is free and "unlimited" for 12 months. You also get free access to The Cloud wifi hotspots and (I think) BT Openzone. At the end of 12 months, unlimited web and wifi is an optional bolt-on and O2 will deduct £10 from your PAYG balance to pay for this (it's optional but they'll assume you want it unless you say no) You get a text from them each month to tell you that month x of your free access has started and then more at the end to tell you it's going to start costing £10/month.