Broadband at dial-up price

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › Broadband at dial-up price

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#122790 11-Apr-2008 10:38

15 mins per month for $5.
43200 mins per month for $16.95.

or, on data use, 15 mins at dialup speed, lets say you get 5KBps assuming you max out your connection the whole time you are connected to dialup

Dialup usage - 4.5MB (approx).

Thats approx $1 per meg that you are paying now.

$16.95 for 200megs = approx $0.09c per meg.

I am struggling to think of a way in which this offer is bad value.

Total cost is higher than your $5, thats not a disputed fact, but if you only want to spend $5, you simply are not worth having as a broadband customer.

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#122791 11-Apr-2008 10:42

If I have a $1000 car thats a few years old, and my car dealer wants me to upgrade to a new car, that was $40,000 but is now only $20,000 - but all I want to spend is $1000, that doesn't make the $20,000 car bad value, it makes me an unwilling consumer.

Its not reasonable to expect that the $20,000 car comes down to $1200 to make it more attractive to me. They cant sell cars at that price and stay in business.

All of a sudden, I find my budget and my custom worthless to the dealership, and they have nothing to offer me.

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#122792 11-Apr-2008 10:43

tonyhughes:
I am struggling to think of a way in which this offer is bad value..

I am NOT saying that the offer is bad value

Just that I find the way that it is advertised (edit: on TV and in newspapers - haven't seen the website) is misleading

But since no else agrees with me I'll shut up now :)

=mjc=
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#122793 11-Apr-2008 10:46

jim.cox:
tonyhughes:
I am struggling to think of a way in which this offer is bad value..

I am NOT saying that the offer is bad value

Just that I find the way that it is advertised is misleading

But since no else agrees with me I'll shut up now :)

The voice over and website state:

If you are a Telecom home calling customer you can sign up to our Basic Broadband plan now and it will only cost you $16.95 per month for the first six months. That's the same price as our most popular Dial-Up plan!

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#122795 11-Apr-2008 10:56

jim.cox:
tonyhughes:
I am struggling to think of a way in which this offer is bad value..

I am NOT saying that the offer is bad value
Just that I find the way that it is advertised is misleading
But since no else agrees with me I'll shut up now :)

:-)

I had not actually read the advertising myself till just now, and for everyones benefit (in either camp), I will post a pic. I have highlighted the things that jumped out at me. They were all "above the fold" in the same size and colour font as other elements on the page. Not hidden. And a very clear explanation that the dialup price referred to is the most popular dialup plan.

I guess its really down to whats fair and reasonable - I see nothing misleading here, and no attempt to cover up any less favourable details.

screen clip from xtra website showing offer terms and conditions

screen clip from xtra website showing offer terms and conditions

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#122822 11-Apr-2008 12:42

jim.cox:

"Broadband for the price of dialup"

It isn't - at least not in my case

"$16.95 per month"

But only for the first few months

Maybe "fraudulent" is too strong - lets just say "misleading"

I still think Telecom are not being as up-front and honest as they should be

They are, the ad says its the same price as their most popular dialup plan.

You are clearly not on a popular one so whats the issue?

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#123302 13-Apr-2008 22:24

i can be reasonably critical of telecom and their ads but this one's okay.

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#123317 13-Apr-2008 23:52

That 200MB is worth 10 hours of dial up. If you are on a $2.50 /hr connection and use 7 hours or more, the broadband becomes cheaper.

I would be interested to know what people think.
If you were to advise someone who was sick of having to dial up, and wanted a more stable connection, which should they get
1) $16.95 200mb and then 2c per mb there after. 256/128
or
2) $20 to $25 500mb and then 64k flatrate there after. 128/128

I reckon many would go for the 2nd plan and after a couple of months end up upgrading to one with a better data cap. It would be a better way to get people off of dial up with something like plan 2. Only a couple of years ago wasnt xtra dial up still $25 a month for the flatrate plan - untill seeing this promo I thought it still was.

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#123324 14-Apr-2008 07:04

raytaylor: wasnt xtra dial up still $25 a month for the flatrate plan - untill seeing this promo I thought it still was.

Xtra Value Flatrate has always been $27.95, they're talking about their most "popular" plan - which matches the price of Xtra Prepaid 150

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#125981 23-Apr-2008 21:30

manhinli: The offer is also valid for 6 months, on a 11 month contract.

Actually it's a 12 month contract, but you can cancel it within the first month and get a refund for all costs.

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#125983 23-Apr-2008 21:36

BiggusDoggus:
Another thing jim - are you actually with Xtra at all? As freitasm says, the $2.50 an hour plan is not one they currently offer.

Actually they do still offer the "Xtra Prepay 2" $2.50 Hour plan, it's a minimum of 2 hours a month, Dialup pricing here.

http://www.telecom.co.nz/content/0,8748,205570-1373,00.html

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#125987 23-Apr-2008 21:44

tonyhughes: I had not actually read the advertising myself till just now, and for everyones benefit (in either camp), I will post a pic. I have highlighted the things that jumped out at me. They were all "above the fold" in the same size and colour font as other elements on the page. Not hidden. And a very clear explanation that the dialup price referred to is the most popular dialup plan.

I guess its really down to whats fair and reasonable - I see nothing misleading here, and no attempt to cover up any less favourable details.

I've been reading it as I reccomended it to someone on dialup today which needed to download a 30MB Antivirus upgrade, and had seen the Ad on the telly and thought about getting it for my Mum.

Both the Television and web ad were very clear and I completely understood the deal I was getting. I think this was actually one of Telecom's most honest ad's in the last few years, after we as a nation debated the "," between "faster" and "cheaper" and Go Large :-)

The only think which took a while to figure out, which is listed no-where AT ALL is how much data you get, and cost of additional data (or if it goes back to dialup.) But I assume this would have been answered when I called, and I like how I can get a $13 dollar credit for 6 months for any Xtra plan.

As much as I beat down on the evil Xtra, they do very well for the mom and pops of this world with a 24/7 helpdesk and package deals.

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#125988 23-Apr-2008 21:50

exportgoldman: The only think which took a while to figure out, which is listed no-where AT ALL is how much data you get, and cost of additional data (or if it goes back to dialup.)

They do tell you this though:

If you are a Telecom home calling customer you can sign up to our Basic Broadband plan now and it will only cost you $16.95 per month for the first six months.

Then you would have to search for the Basic broadband plan on the site... but on the telly, it does say in fine print during the ad something along the lines of "200MB data allowance, 2c / per MB..."

exportgoldman:
manhinli: The offer is also valid for 6 months, on a 11 month contract.

Actually it's a 12 month contract, but you can cancel it within the first month and get a refund for all costs.

It says right at the top of the offer page:

11 Month minimum term and $90 early termination fee apply after the first month.

So they only apply the contract after your "30 day money-back guarantee"

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#125993 23-Apr-2008 22:20

manhinli:
Then you would have to search for the Basic broadband plan on the site... but on the telly, it does say in fine print during the ad something along the lines of "200MB data allowance, 2c / per MB..."

I've only seen the ad once, because I don't have a Telly, so my only window in NZ Television is a 1.5 hour window when TV3 broadcasts the news and John Campbell live between 6:00pm and 7:30pm :-)

What I really cannot make heads of tails of is this statement from the Terms and Conditions

Telecom Broadband from the same price as dial-up is based on signing up to our Basic Broadband plan for $16.95 month and is only available to Telecom direct dial calling residential and home biz customers.

If you want to sign up to another Telecom Broadband Plan or you don't have your direct dial calling with us you will receive a $13.01 monthly credit on the Telecom Broadband plan you sign up on for 6 months whilst you remain eligible for this offer.

From reading the first paragraph it seems to say you have to be a Telecom tolls customer, sweet ok makes sense, but the second paragraph seems to then say I'll get I'll get the credit even if I'm NOT a Telecom tolls customer??? (Actually, I seem to get a extra 1c for not being a tolls customer.)

I assume I'm either reading this wrong, or a lawyer somewhere was distracted by a pretty girl while drafting this clause.

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#125995 23-Apr-2008 22:23

exportgoldman: ... I'll get the credit even if I'm NOT a Telecom tolls customer???

Yep...

If you sign up to any other Telecom Broadband Plan or you don't have your home calling with us you will still receive $13 off your Broadband monthly plan charges for the first six months.

But I think the extra 1c was just an error.

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