Amaysim launches pretty damn amazing 'unlimited' plan for $39.90/pm

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Wednesday, 01 June 2011 13:40

Your IT - Mobility

Living up to its name, Australia's funkiest MVNO (mobile virtual network operator) has come out with a new 'unlimited plan' that cuts the cap crap spewed forth by Australia's $1-a-minute rip-off telcos.

When caps were first introduced, they were a revolution - you got a certain amount of calls for a specific dollar amount  - initially at low per 30 second charges of about 15c per minute.

Over the years, this has jumped to 99c per minute or more on some so-called 'capped plans', with what was initially a no-mininum monthly spend morphing into a cap amount that was a minimum spend whether the cap value was used, or not.

Those early days were pioneered by Three Mobile in 2003 when it first launched its 3G service, but now in 2011, capped plans are more famous for bill shocks and cap slaps that cost consumers far more than the headline cap amount is supposed to be.

So in has charged Amaysim, which not only shook up the Australian telco market with charges of 15c per MINUTE - equalling 7.5c per 30 seconds - but also doing away with the kinda almost evil 'flagfall' charge that every other telco revels in, much to the chagrin of consumers' wallets.

Now, when someone comes to the market offering an 'unlimited' plan, one has to immediately ask - what the hell are the limits?

After all, unlimited is just a marketing term, right? Surely there's no 'real' unlimited phone and text plan out there for home users and consumers?

Well, it looks like Amaysim has done it, and the news will undoubtedly send quite a different 'bill shock' - except this time right to Amaysim's competitors, who'll surely be reeling from an exodus of users desperate for actual call and SMS value.

This then leads to the obvious question: what is Amaysim's new deal for heavy talkers, and what are its inclusions and exclusions?

Well, it's all pretty simple. For AUD $39.90, you get unlimited Australian local and mobile calls, in Australia, with no 'thresholds' beyond an expectation that you'll not be glued to your phone 24x7 or are making extraordinarily high, non-stop use of your Amaysim service.

There's unlimited national access to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Foursquare, MySpace and eBay within Australia and unlimited voicemail access.

You get unlimited SMS and MMS included, as well as a very nice 4GB of data, which smartphone users will naturally find very useful, and it's all delivered on the Optus 3G network, so while it's naturally not as good as Telstra's Next G network, it's a gazillion times better than Vodafone or Three's networks.

You get SMS alerts once you've reached 75%, 90% and 100% of the included 4GB allowance, and if you go over the limit, you pay just 5c per megabyte - or you can purchase additional 1GB blocks at $9.90 each.

What's not included is video calls (which are charged at 49c per minute in Australia), there's no 1800 or 1300 calls included (as you'd expect), and calls and texts to international numbers are naturally extra, as are premium SMS messages, call diversions and satellite calls.

However, if you want unlimited calls to normal Australian landlines and mobiles - $39.90 per 30 days on what is effectively the Optus network is a better deal than even Optus or Virgin Mobile are offering, and will definitely be raising competitive eyebrows and tempting a deal-loving public.

 

Continued on page two, please read on!!