What's the report card like for One NZ?

Forums › One NZ (including Farmside) › What's the report card like for One NZ?

MikeB4

MikeB4
18775 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 12765

ID Verified

Trusted

Subscriber

#322826 26-Sep-2025 10:35

My wife has expressed interest in swapping from Spark NZ to One NZ for our mobile services. She is frustrated with Sparks glacial rollout of 5G. Her role as a national sales director takes her around Aotearoa and overseas. With Sparks coverage she has been frustrated with the poor performance when making video calls and meetings on the go. The last time I was with One NZ was in the Vodafone days and their customer service and accounting was umm interesting.

So folks what is your feedback as to OneNZ's customer service, accounting, coverage and continuity of connection?

Here is a crazy notion, lets give peace a chance.

1 | 2

6888 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 3362

Trusted

Subscriber

#3418953 26-Sep-2025 10:43

I have been with them since 2017 for broadband and mobile and my anecdotal experience:

Very reliable - no outages that I can recall.
Switched from wireless broadband to fibre when I moved house in 2019, then shifted fibre when I moved house again in 2021. All went without a hitch.
Purchased new iPhone a year ago using One Wallet with balance paid over 12 months. Billing has been perfect and service in store was excellent.
Had some problems connecting my Apple Watch to eSIM when it was first launched. Call centre was clueless, and resolution required intervention from a Geekzoner. I suspect their processes have improved as that product offering has bedded in.

Overall I'm very happy.

I know you're based in the Wellington region Mike, so one word of caution is that the coverage is very poor around the South Coast. Houghton Bay, Princess Bay and Owhiro Bay are the notable problem areas.

Batman

Mad Scientist
30012 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 6217

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#3418955 26-Sep-2025 10:47

significantly worse reception than Spark where I live and places I travel, for some reason. So I've been stuck at Spark/Skinny forever

richms

29098 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 10207

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#3418962 26-Sep-2025 11:11

For me, the network is massivly better than spark/skinny. I only use it thru MVNOs or prepay, no direct billing so no idea how bad they still are for that. I do keep getting emailed bills years later for -$4.something for an old account with them. No obvious way to get it moved to a prepay sim or anything that I can see so I just ignore it and will leave it there incase I decide to get a plan with them again.

Richard rich.ms

jfw01

19 posts

Geek
+1 received by user: 8

#3418964 26-Sep-2025 11:13

MikeB4:

So folks what is your feedback as to OneNZ's customer service, accounting, coverage and continuity of connection?

I have idiosyncratic requirements about the process, for which they should probably not be blamed. I have twice failed to buy from them, despite trying to. Once was for rights to a landline telephone number in a range that the NAD (https://www.nad.org.nz/) said that they owned, in order to port it to another operator. The other was for fixed internet access with direct debit and paper billing.

What I do blame them for is that their call-centre staff don't have a plan for being out of their depth (so they spend a lot of time passing me from person to person, who fails to pattern-match me to the conversations that they usually have, and sometimes make misleading statements), and that they have a corporate policy of continually, gradually changing their prices, so automatic payment is not a feasible form of payment.

YMMV.

SpartanVXL

1498 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 666

#3418970 26-Sep-2025 11:31

Yep agree with the customer support and billing stuff. Notorious for upping prices or offering discounts and then messing them up.

The actual service when running is good, no issues with connectivity.

KiwiSurfer

1722 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 993

ID Verified

Lifetime subscriber

#3418977 26-Sep-2025 12:05

I've changed networks once every 1-2 years since number portabilty came into effect nearly 20 years ago. I'd rate One as the better coverage/capacity, closely followed by 2degrees (2deg has near coverage parity with one NZ but limited capacity in some areas can let them down) with Spark coming dead last.

Andedotically but my husband is stubbonly with Spark and I've lost count of the amount of times he's had to borrow my 2deg/One phone to make a call or even an SMS. I recall one hilarious incuident out in very rural Far North location where I could make a video call no problem but he couldn't even get a signal. Whereas it almost never happens the other way around.

Front line customer service I find is poor across all three so wouldn't choose a network based on customer service. Generally I find it more efficient to raise issues here on GZ where it's more likly to be picked up by someone at the relevant telco who knows what they're doing! When I've been with One NZ for mobile I've found the system/network/etc just works -- very rare I've had to call/visit/email them regarding a fault.

Could dual SIM be an option? 2deg/One very similar coverage footprint while Spark is quite different so having one each of Spark and One/2deg can offer the best of both worlds. Personally I would look at keeping Spark as they do have some pockets where they are the better carrier and have One as a backup as they generally are quite good in most places.

Mighty Ape

Shop now at Mighty Ape (affiliate link).

yitz

2238 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 594

#3418984 26-Sep-2025 12:32

The umlaut certification report for 2024 shows that: - One New Zealand has the best mobile network performance in New Zealand

Anyone here able to vouch for zombie resiliency ? 😄

My own experience is that it works great as car wifi on a 3G device rocking a solid 350 KB/sec on the occasions I purchase a $2-5 Fantastic Fridays data pack. Also their real-time rating and billing is great for casual data use. Their new prepay plans launched this week also finally got rid of excess data charged at casual data rates.

DjShadow

4222 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1322

ID Verified

Trusted

Subscriber

#3418986 26-Sep-2025 12:46

I've found with One NZ they have the best sound qual of the 3 main carriers, also a big one they have over Spark is allowing Wifi-Calling to work from overseas.

I did notice on gis.geek.nz they have 632 more cellsites than Spark but comes down to the areas you are in.

Aucklandjafa

521 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 249

#3418990 26-Sep-2025 13:26

Few people frothing One, it definitely comes down to location, whist One’s coverage is much better in the far north and East Cape, I’ve personally found Spark to be for consistently solid everywhere else - especially in the Wairarapa and Otago.

My two cents is Spark’s already started to reframe their U850 3g frequency to 5g, so once their 3G network’s turned off in March they’ll have a pretty robust 5g footprint - technically will be greater than the other 2 until they both start reframing their respective U700 4g frequencies.

quickymart

14940 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 13953

ID Verified

#3419003 26-Sep-2025 14:43

No issues for me, best coverage in all the places I visit.

I've been with them since late 2000, and still with them as I think their overseas roaming is (was?) the best, although that's starting to tick up in price now.

MikeB4

MikeB4
18775 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 12765

ID Verified

Trusted

Subscriber

#3419103 27-Sep-2025 08:55

Thanks for the feedback, much appreciated. I will now do plan comparisons

Here is a crazy notion, lets give peace a chance.

Quic Broadband

Move to New Zealand's best fibre broadband service (affiliate link). Free setup code: R587125ERQ6VE. Note that to use Quic Broadband you must be comfortable with configuring your own router.

ajw

1968 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 369

#3419109 27-Sep-2025 09:58

On Kogan mobile using one.nz network excellent coverage where I live in Lower Hutt.

Bluntj

584 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 284

#3419234 27-Sep-2025 14:18

Seems like they have new prepay plans?

farcus

1626 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 437

#3419250 27-Sep-2025 15:37

DjShadow:

I've found with One NZ they have the best sound qual of the 3 main carriers, also a big one they have over Spark is allowing Wifi-Calling to work from overseas.

I did notice on gis.geek.nz they have 632 more cellsites than Spark but comes down to the areas you are in.

where I live there are A LOT more One cell sites than Spark. Despite this, One's coverage seems much worse (at least on my Pixel phone on 5G)

ajw

1968 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 369

#3419262 27-Sep-2025 17:19

Aucklandjafa:

Few people frothing One, it definitely comes down to location, whist One’s coverage is much better in the far north and East Cape, I’ve personally found Spark to be for consistently solid everywhere else - especially in the Wairarapa and Otago.

My two cents is Spark’s already started to reframe their U850 3g frequency to 5g, so once their 3G network’s turned off in March they’ll have a pretty robust 5g footprint - technically will be greater than the other 2 until they both start reframing their respective U700 4g frequencies.

Do current phones have the chipset to receive this band in 5G.

1 | 2