Consumer NZ launches Telecommunications Comparison Website Today

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30 posts

Geek

Trusted

#512308 26-Aug-2011 10:18

NonprayingMantis:

just wondering why it does that since it is possible that a plan that includes a landline might actually be cheaper than a naked option at a certain level of data.

for example, I selected Auckland, very fast speed, don't need upload, >50GB cap, and want to be slowed down when I hit my cap.

It reccomended Compass zone naked for $115 as the cheapest options, yet I know that several plans from other providers are cheaper than that, give >50GB of data, and still include a landline, but because they include a landline they are excluded from these results even though they are cheaper. bizarre.

We did it so you could find naked broadband easier. We perhaps should make this clearer, that if you don't mind having a landline with your internet then try adding it for more plan results.

Cheers

Technology Writer
Consumer NZ

@hadyngreen - twitter

DonGould

3892 posts

Uber Geek

#512309 26-Aug-2011 10:20

HadynGreen:

So am I to be honest. I think what it's doing is adding the cost of a landline to it. Which is a similar problem to what Skolink had. I'll flag all of the Telstra Lightspeed plans for us to have a look at.

Thanks for this

I'm wondering if you should add a little 'what I selected' debug option so that we can just post what we choose when we post details of a problem.

Also should there be a 'report this plan' option? So if a plan looks pear shape, you just click a link, the link then gives you the ability to add a comment about why you think the plan is wrong and it emails your selection, your comment and details of the plan back to the provider for checking and draws it to your attention for follow up.

/roll on crowd sourcing :)

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jbard

1377 posts

Uber Geek

#512334 26-Aug-2011 11:00

HadynGreen:
jbard: Put in my current details and got no plans found, i suspect this is because the price points i selected, for example i spend $115 on Total home broadband 60GB and selected $60 for landline and $60 for broadband as this is the average price, so being prepared to spend $120 on those it still doesn't find the plan i am on.

Not sure why they have price point selecters?

People are looking for the cheapest plan for their needs so why not show all plans in low-high order.

This is an interesting point. All of the results are obviously sorted low-high in price order, and had you selected "I don't know" for the price range you would've got what you wanted. Now, I'm not saying that you should've done that, I'm just thinking out loud. Though you are almost certainly paying more for your broadband than $60 and less than $60 for your landline, despite it being the average price on your plan.

Why are the price selectors there at all? Some people want to strictly budget for particular services and we wanted to let them do that. Unfortunately it does take away some packages from results for exactly the reason that you mention.

Cheers

I must say i failed to notice any "i don't know" option so this would have helped me, although maybe it should be changed to something more sutible like "I am flexible" or "show me all prices".

Also although some people will have a very strict budget of $x.xx for the broadband/phone i think 90+% of people would be flexible with their money if they could get better value, so for example in some cases spending $5 more a month can get you an extra 10Gb of data a month with a different ISP and most people would consider this better value for money, but if the $5 extra takes them over their set price they won't see it.

It would be good if you were more flexible in prices shown when selecting a budget or maybe have a section showing plans that are just above the selected budget for comparing with. After all the site is about comparing plans just as much as finding the right/cheapest plan for the person.

Also you are doing a great job on addressing some of the bugs geekzoners are finding :)

NonprayingMantis

6434 posts

Uber Geek

#512346 26-Aug-2011 11:16

aside from all the things that don't work, one thing that concerns me about this is that it is purely a price comparison tool. (I realise that is the intention, but hear me out)

Now that sort of thing might be fine for power where the product you are getting is identical i.e. your electrcitiy is just the same whether you buy it from Genesis, powershop, mercury etc. the only other difference between them is therefore customer service.

However for telco services there are pretty big differences in the products themselves that this model won't be useful for. e.g. some ISPs are demonstrably better for, say, international than others. Although this has a 'speed selector'. Most DSL plans are 'as fast as your line allows' which can generate very different results depending on the ISP.
VOIP is very different from PSTN, particularly best efforts VOIP.
Mobile providers have different coverage maps and different speeds for mobile data depending on many factors.

I guess my point is tha price is a much, much, smaller factor when comparing telcos than when comparing power companies, yet this site implies that price is the only thing.

Talkiet

4793 posts

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#512352 26-Aug-2011 11:24

NonprayingMantis: aside from all the things that don't work, one thing that concerns me about this is that it is purely a price comparison tool. (I realise that is the intention, but hear me out)

Now that sort of thing might be fine for power where the product you are getting is identical i.e. your electrcitiy is just the same whether you buy it from Genesis, powershop, mercury etc. the only other difference between them is therefore customer service.

However for telco services there are pretty big differences in the products themselves that this model won't be useful for. e.g. some ISPs are demonstrably better for, say, international than others. Although this has a 'speed selector'. Most DSL plans are 'as fast as your line allows' which can generate very different results depending on the ISP.
VOIP is very different from PSTN, particularly best efforts VOIP.
Mobile providers have different coverage maps and different speeds for mobile data depending on many factors.

I guess my point is tha price is a much, much, smaller factor when comparing telcos than when comparing power companies, yet this site implies that price is the only thing.

I came to this thread and was about to post _exactly_ this point, so I'll content myself with a "+1" and wait for a response :-)

Cheers - N

Please note all comments are from my own brain and don't necessarily represent the position or opinions of my employer, previous employers, colleagues, friends or pets.

Skolink

1081 posts

Uber Geek

#512386 26-Aug-2011 12:07

I think the TelMe website is very useful (once fixed). I compare by price first, then start eliminating from the cheapest from what I know of those ISPs' service, and what the plan detials are.
I buy alot of things this way - rank by price and work my way up the list until I find something suitable.

wired

187 posts

Master Geek

#512467 26-Aug-2011 13:32

After a few hiccups sorting out how to use it, it produced some good results for my mobile but not for the landline/broadband.

A couple of things that should be added:
- the Vodafone prepay accounts get charged $0.20c to access voice mail which doesn't appear in the summary. So I assume that it hasn't taken those costs into account and it would be good if it could so as to make the comparision more accurate.

- Landline/Broadband. It was recommending the Orcon genius however because I have a monitored alarm that is not a valid option. It would be good to be asked that questions first so that it rules those sorts of things out.

Looking forward to using the site more in future.

Quic Broadband

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HadynGreen

30 posts

Geek

Trusted

#512494 26-Aug-2011 14:07

Back after lunch...

DonGould:

Also should there be a 'report this plan' option? So if a plan looks pear shape, you just click a link, the link then gives you the ability to add a comment about why you think the plan is wrong and it emails your selection, your comment and details of the plan back to the provider for checking and draws it to your attention for follow up.

/roll on crowd sourcing :)

Not a bad idea, will pass that one on.

cheers

Technology Writer
Consumer NZ

@hadyngreen - twitter

HadynGreen

30 posts

Geek

Trusted

#512502 26-Aug-2011 14:18

NonprayingMantis: aside from all the things that don't work, one thing that concerns me about this is that it is purely a price comparison tool. (I realise that is the intention, but hear me out)

However for telco services there are pretty big differences in the products themselves that this model won't be useful for. e.g. some ISPs are demonstrably better for, say, international than others. Although this has a 'speed selector'. Most DSL plans are 'as fast as your line allows' which can generate very different results depending on the ISP.
VOIP is very different from PSTN, particularly best efforts VOIP.
Mobile providers have different coverage maps and different speeds for mobile data depending on many factors.

I guess my point is tha price is a much, much, smaller factor when comparing telcos than when comparing power companies, yet this site implies that price is the only thing.

Yeah I understand that. We've done as much as we can in this regard: we've tried to get service coverage down as close as we can (the issues noted above excluded); and broadband speeds are as reported to us (again excluding the issues noted above). We might look at adding more info in over the life of the project.

Cheers

Technology Writer
Consumer NZ

@hadyngreen - twitter

HadynGreen

30 posts

Geek

Trusted

#512506 26-Aug-2011 14:22

Skolink: I think the TelMe website is very useful ...

I stopped reading after that

Seriously, though thanks for the comment

Technology Writer
Consumer NZ

@hadyngreen - twitter

vexxxboy

4244 posts

Uber Geek

#512508 26-Aug-2011 14:24

i have tried it and entered every detail that i currently get from Snap, yet the only company i get recommended is Compass. what am i doing wrong?

Common sense is not as common as you think.

HadynGreen

30 posts

Geek

Trusted

#512516 26-Aug-2011 14:37

wired: After a few hiccups sorting out how to use it, it produced some good results for my mobile but not for the landline/broadband.

A couple of things that should be added:
- the Vodafone prepay accounts get charged $0.20c to access voice mail which doesn't appear in the summary. So I assume that it hasn't taken those costs into account and it would be good if it could so as to make the comparision more accurate.

That might be a hard thing to add in. For example if you're like me you never use voice mail even if it's a free service. But I'll pass it on.

- Landline/Broadband. It was recommending the Orcon genius however because I have a monitored alarm that is not a valid option. It would be good to be asked that questions first so that it rules those sorts of things out.

Looking forward to using the site more in future.

That could be an option as monitored alarms can't work with quite a few plans. It might need to be added under the caveats for each plan.

cheers

Technology Writer
Consumer NZ

@hadyngreen - twitter

HadynGreen

30 posts

Geek

Trusted

#512528 26-Aug-2011 14:50

vexxxboy: i have tried it and entered every detail that i currently get from Snap, yet the only company i get recommended is Compass. what am i doing wrong?

Can you give me some more information about what options you've selected?

Technology Writer
Consumer NZ

@hadyngreen - twitter

vexxxboy

4244 posts

Uber Geek

#512566 26-Aug-2011 15:44

HadynGreen:
vexxxboy: i have tried it and entered every detail that i currently get from Snap, yet the only company i get recommended is Compass. what am i doing wrong?

Can you give me some more information about what options you've selected?

i have a bundled plan with Snap so i chose landline and internet then where i live.

i ticked yes for national calls 3-4 month at 4-7 minutes each , don't know to neighbouring area. International calls 2-3 a month to usa 30 min +, no mobile calls no more than $ 60 a month
internet broadband very fast, fast uploads, over 50 G a month, slow down if over, and dont know for how much it seems i get every Compass deal and the cheapest option is Vodafone at $148 , which is $143 more than i pay with Snap

Common sense is not as common as you think.

NonprayingMantis

6434 posts

Uber Geek

#512576 26-Aug-2011 16:05

vexxxboy:
HadynGreen:
vexxxboy: i have tried it and entered every detail that i currently get from Snap, yet the only company i get recommended is Compass. what am i doing wrong?

Can you give me some more information about what options you've selected?

i have a bundled plan with Snap so i chose landline and internet then where i live.

i ticked yes for national calls 3-4 month at 4-7 minutes each , don't know to neighbouring area. International calls 2-3 a month to usa 30 min +, no mobile calls no more than $ 60 a month
internet broadband very fast, fast uploads, over 50 G a month, slow down if over, and dont know for how much it seems i get every Compass deal and the cheapest option is Vodafone at $148 , which is $143 more than i pay with Snap

you pay $5 for landline and broadband??

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