Suggestions for NZ Communications

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#124942 19-Apr-2008 16:27

My 2c

- better roaming agreements
- value for money data
- more minutes packed for your dollar
- better subsidy on hardware
- more affordable innovative services

tonyhughes

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#124945 19-Apr-2008 16:50

farcus: Basically what I'd like to see is the three networks really having to fight it out over customers. At the moment the two current networks just don't seem to have to do that.

You haven't been working in, or close to Vodafone NZ or Telecom NZ then...

Sure, it hasn't been a peppy super-middleweight bout, but there has been a continous grudge match on for a long time!

exportgoldman

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#124968 19-Apr-2008 18:59

Here's my suggestions as a small business owner.

1. Correct & Accurate status of mobile broadband usage.
2. Ability to limit individual phone numbers to certain credit amounts (both data & phone)
3. A simple range of plans which you don't need to spend a few hours analysing with your bills to work out which deal is best.

Same as someone else with a cheap data plan for mobile phones. I currently pay for the 1GB plan for my iPhone because I'm scared of going over the limit and costing $10,240+gst for the second GB with Vodafone.

Other than that we have 5 connections to bring across when your up and running :)

Tyler - Parnell Geek - iPhone 3G - Lenovo X301 - Kaseya - Great Western Steak House, these are some of my favourite things.

James_

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#125510 22-Apr-2008 10:46

M2M / Telemetry GPRS Plans.

*Sim ordering / management done only from website - no need for call center staff who don't understand telemetry anyway.
*Decent online billing reports
*Lower monthly SIM charge in volume, justified by no call center staff requirements for this plan.
*Don't keep network issues private. Post them on website in all their glory so customers ( who have enough experience that all networks have problems ) don't waste time debugging their systems, appreciate the communication, and don't need to ring the call center to ask the same questions.

eXDee

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#126488 26-Apr-2008 14:32

And if you want the younger audience, you'll obviously want decent prepaid deals like texting plans similar to telecom

tonyhughes

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#126494 26-Apr-2008 14:53

Wob:
SaltyNZ: What would YOU like to see us doing?

Giving me a job??!? - Need any field engineers or installation project managers in Dunedin?

^^^^^^^^^^^ How not to apply for a job! ^^^^^^^^^^^^^

lol

I especially liked "??!?"

paulspain

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#126570 27-Apr-2008 14:03

I believe delivering a plan which allows calls to move on/off GSM/3G and Wifi during a call (aka WLAN/GSM roaming) would attract a significant number of customers.

It would probably still be attractive if this option only worked in conjunction with your own cellsites as you may not be able to offer this so simply when your customers are roaming on Vodafone's NZ network.

Paul Spain
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richms

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#126954 29-Apr-2008 01:28

How about multiple sims sharing one data connection, so I can chuck a sim in the mobile connect card, have the cellphone, have a sim in a vodem equivilent, another in my crap cellphone that still manages to get some internet happenings, and they all share the same 3 gigs or whatever I buy. At the moment I have to either bluetooth, or if I want faster, pull the sim and put it into my mobile connect card for some hsdpa action. - quite annoying when pared with the long startup times of most cellphones these days.

Something like family for calling between them, and a nominated landline or more then one landline. And the ability to connect via SIP vs over the air so that I dont have to dick around with flakey gsm gateways and analog ATAs that dont work properly sometimes.

ability to port a landline number to you and just have it foward to the cell at the normal airtime rates, which you would make good I hope too.

Richard rich.ms

mushion22

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#126960 29-Apr-2008 06:52

I guess it depends whether you're a 'lets play fair and generate demand by being innovative' company or a 'lets screw the customer as much as we can' company. I think the fact that you're participating proactively on GZ is a good first step!

Proactive plan changes would be good. Ie - you could have a system that monitors usage against the whole range of plans and sends texts/emails or adds messages to bills suggesting a plan change.

I also like the idea of modular plans, kind of similar to YouChoose but much more modular with many more options with a scaled price plan (eg discounts for choosing more options). I am in canada at the moment and no matter whether you're on prepay or no-contract account or a contract-account you can pick and choose to add options such as data, smart services, roaming packages, etc etc.
Also a decent interactive web-based account management portal would be good. Something where you can log on, break down calls into regions, times of days, costs, etc etc; look at whether your current account package is cost effective or if another would be better (without having to go thru bills and compare to marketing literature); instantly change plans and add extra options (eg add data blocks).

That would also be particularly good for businesses if they could manage their phone fleet from a single integrated portal (particularly if it can be further integrated into their own systems without specialised - expensive - setups). For them it would be good to have integration into their CRM systems and such, kind of an extension to their Unified communications systems (eg, marketeer makes a call to customer x, CRM system gets notified of it and logs the call). Some kind of XML stream of billing data could be one way to attack that. Also central bulk management of phone settings (eg email server settings, installed apps, call restrictions etc) would be good for business users, although a lot of that would depend largely on phone makes and models and software.

Roaming is a biggy - if you can get decent roaming deals you'll be on to a winner with business and globe trotting consumers. Its rediculous that in this day and age I can turn on my laptop here in Canada and make a call with skype back to NZ for 3 cents a minute, but Telecom charges me $3.50 a minute if I dare use my NZ cell (comparatively, if i use my Canadian cell it costs me about NZ$1 a min to call NZ on a prepay plan). I would use my cell all the time if it were the same price as using it NZ, but instead i don't use it at all so they're actually making less money out of me. And we all know about rediculous roaming data charges. One thing would be to allow people to set limits as a safeguard and/or use prepaid datablocks (preferably via easy online portal), but still it would be nice to actually be able to use data without stupid costs.

Also you should be looking beyond just GPRS/UMTS data roaming, but looking to make sure your customers have access to global Wifi networks from capable handsets/laptops and use that as an option to reduce roaming call/data costs. Complimenting your cell services with unified VoIP access would be a winner.

mushion22

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#126961 29-Apr-2008 06:58

PS: You should take a look at what WxC are doing in the VoIP field to get a good idea of how to provide a good service to your customers. I'm not sure what maverick's plans are for integrated cell/VoIP systems but there could be a wide potential for your company to work with his if you are wanting to be innovative.

Wob

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#126985 29-Apr-2008 09:55

tonyhughes:
Wob:
SaltyNZ: What would YOU like to see us doing?

Giving me a job??!? - Need any field engineers or installation project managers in Dunedin?

^^^^^^^^^^^ How not to apply for a job! ^^^^^^^^^^^^^

lol

I especially liked "??!?"

I posted this in jest, but things have happened since then...

Downers have bought Astute, so now all the techs working on Vodafone (and TCL, and everyone in fact) now have to go through the process of applying for jobs with the new owners - Downers.

If you are looking to employ skilled and motivated BTS and network technicians, now's the time!! They may be pretty p*ssed off (myself included) but they are well worth snapping up.

I appreciate this is well off topic, but my original post still stands - I am looking for a new job!!?!

(the "!!?!" was just for Tony)

Now based in Perth WA.

paradoxsm

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#127007 29-Apr-2008 11:05

dual sims/numbers under one master plan. (carkits, partners)
a "one price" system where the price per minute is always the same, maybe commit $30 a month and it's 15c off pezk/60c peak
commit $40 and it's 10c off peak and 40c peak for example, avoid the "free minute" regimes at all costs. "overage snags" should not exist.
advertise that your plans are "no surprises"
make all services on same network half the "any network" pricing.

realistic prices for smaller amounts of data based on the "oneprice" model.
push Pc-esque services like IM, twitter, facebook, bebo, youtube and a mp3 download setup. wap portals with overpriced content are very 1999, get the income off the data usage, promote "1 hour of msn chat only costs approx $1.50 on the standard (casual) plan"
a high level of realtime account main online and through a phone browser xhtml portal and normal web, mayber offer a "charge for customer service" cut rate service.
offer all the standard consumer pricings on prepay and let them buy "data bundles"

have a reliable network, something that is not currently a reality on nz gsm.

jobel

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#127929 2-May-2008 15:11

hi sally, i am trying to get familiar and understand the stiff competition among the telecom operators in NZ, you seem to be the know-how person, can you help me??

SaltyNZ

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#127936 2-May-2008 15:26

jobel: hi sally, i am trying to get familiar and understand the stiff competition among the telecom operators in NZ, you seem to be the know-how person, can you help me??

I assume you mean me, not actually a Sally. :-)

I'm unclear on what you mean.

There are currently 2 mobile network operators: Vodafone and Telecom. Vodafone operate GSM/UMTS, and Telecom operate CDMA, and are building out a GSM/UMTS network right now. They recently retired their TDMA network, and the CDMA one will join it once the GSM/UMTS network is sufficiently well covered. Probably another couple of years down the track I would expect.

I work for NZ Communications Ltd. We are also building a GSM/UMTS network. I can't elaborate much further than that, as the interesting stuff is obviously not ready for public announcements.

BTW everyone else, thanks for the ideas; I'm playing with some of them now to see what we can and can't do!

iPad Pro 11" + iPhone 15 Pro Max + 2degrees 4tw!

These comments are my own and do not represent the opinions of 2degrees.

tonyhughes

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#127939 2-May-2008 15:33

jobel: hi sally, i am trying to get familiar and understand the stiff competition among the telecom operators in NZ, you seem to be the know-how person, can you help me??

This thread is for discussion on "Suggestions for NZ Communications" (Ltd).

You have a different topic. Please start a new thread, or PM "Sally".

Aside from the reply already made by SaltyNZ, please - no further discussion here that is off topic.

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