Coles Mobile is currently available at the following stores:

Coles Mobile stores

• Bendigo Central (Vic)
• Berwick (Vic)
• Berwick North (Vic)
• Burwood East (Vic)
• Brandon Park (Vic)
• Brunswick (Vic)
• Caroline Springs (Vic)
• Chadstone (Vic)
• Coburg (Vic)
• Knox (Vic)
• Lynbrook (Vic)
• Melton West (Vic)
• Oakleigh (Vic)
• South Melbourne (Vic)
• Taylors Hill (Vic)
• Shellharbour (NSW)

Coles Mobile offers you access to contract mobile plans, prepaid mobile sim and prepaid mobile broadband starter kits. You can also learn more about Coles Mobile online.

Here are some quick tips in determining how much data you will be using when browsing the net using your iPad, laptop or mobile phone.

• Email (text only) = 50 KB
• Email (w/attach.) = 4 MB
• Web page browsing = 400 KB
• Music streaming = 1 MB per minute
• Video streaming (Standard def) = 7 MB per minute
• Photo download/upload (Hi-Res) = 4 MB
• Music download and upload = 6 MB per music file
• 3G VoIP = 1 MB per minute
• 3G VoIP with Video = 8 MB per minute
• Online gaming = 150 MB per hour

Below are a couple of online calculators that can assist you to work out just how much data you use each week.

• Vodafone Data Calculator
• Optus Usage Calculator
• Telstra Usage Calculator

Received an interesting chat request this week from a customer that is using the Optus Crew Cap prepaid mobile offer. Whilst they were happy with Optus overall,

Amaysim as you go plans

they didn’t want half of their credit offer being for Optus calls only. They obviously didn’t have enough friends using Optus. So they asked for some help on finding an alternative plan.

I started explaining the range of other plans that Optus offered and also asked a few questions regarding how they currently used their mobile phone, how much they were spending and what they wanted to be able to do with their phone.

It turns out that they didn’t actually make many calls but some calls could be quite long (usually on hold with the Taxi Directorate). They also used Txt quite a lot as well as Facebook on their phone. The last point they made was that they thought they needed to spend more on their prepaid mobile plan. This is the one that startled me a little. Most people want to spend less not more.

I looked for a few alternative plans which also offered unlimited Facebook, and a low cost call and SMS rate. The first that came to mind was the Amaysim As You Go plan. Unlimited social media, 15c calls per min, no flagfall and 12c SMS.

I thought that this plan would actually enable the caller to save money by having cheaper calls and SMS. Even if they spent 5 minutes on hold trying to book a taxi a few times a day, the cost of the call would be less than a $1 each call. $30 per month should see them through. The other option I put in front of them was the Amaysim Unlimited plan. $39.90 with unlimited calls and Txt plus social media should more than cover them each month. In fact I thought that it was excessive but  all I can do is recommend options.

The customer actually thought they needed to be spending $60 per month on their mobile phone usage. Their mobile behaviour had very little correlation with what they thought they should be spending.

I hope I have saved them some money. They could easily have walked into a telecommunications store and had someone sign them up to some expensive plan at $50 – $60 per month.

The customer didn’t seem all too happy to buy online so I recommended that they visit a Dicksmith store or Coles store local to them to buy the sim card and access some assistance with getting the porting sorted.

Prepaid Plans Newsletter Issue 58

I have often wondered why Dodo have never made a real go of the prepaid mobile market. They had an offer which was somewhat competitive, but it was hardly promoted.

A week ago, they launched a new prepaid mobile range using the Optus network which I believe will do really well.
Not only is it competitively priced but it also comes with a healthy credit expiry, good data rates and an international call offer.

DODO PREPAID MOBILE OFFER
Dodo’s latest prepaid mobile offer consists of two products, Pay As You Go and Unlimited.

Dodo Pay As You Go – comes with 11c/min call rates, no flagfall, 11c SMS, 5c MB data and a minimum 60 day credit expiry.

Begin with a $2 sim card and then recharge with:

• $10: $10 credit + 60 days to use it
• $20: $20 credit + 90 days to use it
• $30: $30 credit + 90 days to use it
• $40: $40 credit + 90 days to use it
• $50: $50 credit + 180 days to use it
• $100: $100 credit + 365 days to use it

Plus get $5 bonus credit with your first recharge.

Dodo Unlimited – For $39.90 you receive unlimited locals calls including 13, 1300 & 1800 numbers, unlimited voice-mail, unlimited SMS, 5GB of data and 100 free call minutes to 50 international destinations. Credit lasts 30 days.

What I like about the Unlimited offer was the combination of unlimited calls and SMS, loads of data (5GB) and free international calls.

Learn more about the Dodo prepaid mobile range here.

USING SKYPE TO MAKE INTERNATIONAL CALLS
Most people have heard of Skype as a way of communicating with friends locally and overseas. It’s actually a free application that you install on your PC or smart phone which then uses the internet to transmit calls and video.

Skype is “free” between Skype users but you can also make calls directly to a fixed line or mobile number. To do this you simply buy credit and it gets charged just like a phone card does.

Now there is never really such a thing as free. With Skype the cost of a Skype to Skype call is the data that you use on either your home computer or your mobile device. Remember that Skype is also available as an App for your smart phone.

Just how much data does it use?

Skype-to-Skype calls will use about 3MB for a one minute call. A 10 minute call will use 30MB. A video call between two mobiles will use about 10x this, eg 30MB per minute or 300MB for a 10 minute call. If the video call is between a mobile and a computer it would use even more data per minute.

Therefore, Skype could actually be a very effective option if you had a reasonable data allowance that you found you were never using. Why waste it each month? Make some international calls using your data.

PREPAID MOBILE RECHARGE OFFERS
Quick reminder of some of the prepaid mobile recharge offers that you can take advantage of at the moment.

Amaysim Unlimited – $10 Off Your First Order
Sign up to Amaysim Unlimited before 07/05/12 and enjoy $10 Off your first order. In other words pay $29.90 in the first month to get started rather than $39.90. Use Promotion Code UNL104.

Amaysim As You Go – Bonus $10 Credit
Amaysim have extended their Money Magazine Offer. Using Promotional Code AYG10 with your first Amaysim purchase, you can reward yourself with $10 bonus credit. Offer expires 07/05/12.

Virgin Bonus $1200 Credit
If you purchase $2, $5 or $29 sim pack and recharge with a $29 Your Cap (or higher) before 31/05/12 you will receive $200 bonus credit each month for 6 months.

Virgin Bonus $50 on First Recharge
Join Virgin Mobile online and receive a bonus of $50 credit on your first recharge. Conditions are that you purchase a prepaid mobile phone online.

Optus New Turbo Cap Plus – Unlimited Weekend Calls
Connect with the Optus New Turbo Cap Plus before 23/06/12 and stay connected for the entire year with minimum credit and you will receive unlimited weekend calls to Australian standard numbers. This includes national voice calls to mobiles, landlines and 1300/1800.

Telstra Prepaid Cap Encore Free Calls
If you sign up with Telstra’s Prepaid Cap Encore you will receive unlimited calls from 6pm to 6am every night of the week to any network. This offer now runs until the 30/07/2012. You can sign up with a $30 recharge, which offers $250 in calls and 500MB of data. Lets hope Telstra keep extending it!

Lebara Mobile Mega Plan $9.90 Bonus Offer
Buy a $39.90 Mega Plan Starter pack online between 25/01/12 and 30/06/12 and receive a BONUS $9.90 Mega Recharge voucher. The Mega Recharge voucher can be used to top-up your call credit for international calls and data, at Lebara’s standard low-cost rates.

OneMobile Bonus Sim Card
OneMobile is offering a bonus sim card when you purchase a $29 Caps Sim Card. Use this sim pack to access unlimited OneMobile calls, Unlimited Facebook and $200 of calls credit. Offer ends 31/05/12.

Lyca Mobile Offers
Lyca Mobile is offering free calls within Australia to both fixed and mobile lines. A 25c flagfall applies to these calls. No fair use policy applies. The offer is open until 30/4/2012.

Also, Lyca Mobile is offering free calls Lyca to Lyca, until to end of April. No flagfall applies. Offer ends 30/4/2012. Fair usage policy of 5000 minutes applies per customer during the promotional period.

If you like what Red Bull Mobile has to offer, but would like to also use your phone for services outside of what is covered by the prepaid offer, then Red Bull Mobile also has a range of post paid plans.

Red Bull Mobile

Whilst these plans look exactly the same as the Red Bull Mobile prepaid plans, there is a difference. The post paid plans come is three flavours, Access 30 – runs for 30 days, Access 180 which runs for 180 days and Access 365 which runs for 365 days. In each case you are given access to unlimited locals calls and Txt, MMS, 1300/1800 numbers plus data of 4GB, 4.5GB p/mth and 5GB p/mth respectively.  Sounds just like the prepaid plans, well yes but if you run out of data, then Red Bull Mobile will charge you 5c/MB for any excess data you spend. You can also make international calls with this plan, plus international text, make call diversions and call special numbers.

All of these extras will be billed to you separately each month.

Compare Red Bull Mobile post paid plans here.  

Newsletter Issue – 57

JB Hifi have launched their own prepaid mobile offer, which should prove to be successful given their brand popularity, not to mention the fact that it is actually a pretty competitive offer.

PrepaidPlans Newsletter

In other news this issue, Telstra have made some important changes to their prepaid mobile rates, they impact on both current plans, and expired plans that many of their customers are likely to be using.

Optus have also announced a move to charging prepaid mobile broadband users by the MB rather than per 10MB. We take a look at what everybody else is also doing when it comes to data increments.

Finally, we congratulate the lucky winner of our latest giveaway.

JB HIFI GOES PREPAID

JB Hifi have teamed up with Telstra to launch their own prepaid mobile offer. Earlier this month, JB Hifi launched the JB Hifi Prepaid Mobile Offer for retail and online customers.

The recharge offer is available via the Telstra network and seems to be built upon the Telstra low cost Simplicity plan.

All of the support and purchasing online works directly via the Telstra website. There are four recharge offers starting at $20, which gives you 50MB, $20 credit and call rates of 12c/min, no flagfall and 12c Txt. Expiry is 30 days.

The next recharge option is $30, with 100MB data, $30 credit and 60 days expiry. Next is $50 with 200MB data, $50 call credit and 90 days. Finally we have $100 with 500MB data, $100 credit and 180 days to use it.

The offer is pretty competitive and given the low cost branding that JB Hifi already has, I would expect that it will do well. They certainly have the client base and foot traffic for it.

JB Hifi is not a MVNO (Mobile Virtual Network Operator), they have simply created an offer with Telstra that they can promote. Expect to see more of this from JB Hifi if it does well. You can check out all of the details here.

TELSTRA PREPAID GIVEAWAY – $30 CREDIT + BONUSES

Congratulations to Rod for winning the $30 Telstra Prepaid sim starter kit. Check out his great entry:

“I have never won a contest or race in my life. My day is always composed of troubles and strife. A prepaid micro sim would put a smile on my face. It would fill up all my day, as I surf the net and at last win a race.”

Your sim kit will be in the mail shortly.

Well done Rod!

IMPORTANT CHANGES TO TELSTRA PREPAID PRICING

Telstra is making changes to many of their prepaid mobile plans. Well the changes apply to two of their existing plans as well as many of their old plans that many customers are still using.

Here is a summary of the changes. They take effect from 17 April 2012.

Telstra Long Life – this plan is actually getting an upgrade which is good. Now when you recharge $40 or more, in addition to getting 6 months credit expiry, you can also get Bonus Talk to standard Telstra numbers. So at $40 you receive 50 mins talk (charged per min), at $50 you receive 100 mins talk (6 months expiry), at $70 it is also 100 mins (12 months expiry) and at $100 you receive 200 mins (12 months expiry).

That is the good news. Now for the price hikes.

Simplicity – From 17 April message bank retrieval rates are changing to 78c/60 seconds (or part) with a 39c connection fee.

For customers on all other offers (except for the above and Telstra Pre-Paid Cap Encore™, Telstra Pre-Paid Simplicity™, Talk & Text+, Text & Data, Pre-Paid Cap+, Weekend+ and JB Hifi Pre-Paid Mobile offer) Telstra is making the following changes to some of your standard rates.

• Connection fee – going up from 35c to 39c
• Call rates – going up from 40c per 30 secs to 78c per min
• SMS rates – going up from 25c to 29c

OPTUS CHANGES MOBILE BROADBAND DATA CHARGES

Whilst Optus offers competitive data allowances with its prepaid mobile broadband plans, one thing that has always let them down is that data is charged in increments of 10MB, whilst the rest of the market charges in per 1MB or even per 1 KB. What this means is that your data allowance is spent a lot quicker when you are with Optus.

From 1 April, Optus will now be charging in per 1 MB increments bringing them inline with most other providers. The table below displays the key prepaid starter kits on offer at the moment, their cost and how data increments are charged:

• Optus: $69 for USB, 3GB lasts 25 days (1MB increments)
• Telstra: $79 for USB, 3GB lasts 30 days (1MB increments)
• Virgin: $49 for USB, 4GB lasts 30 days (1KB increments)
• Vodafone: $49 for USB, 3GB for 30 days (1MB increments)
• Crazy Johns: $49 for USB, 4GB for 30 days (1MB increments)
• Boost Mobile: $29 for USB, 2GB for 30 days (10MB increments)
• Dodo: $49 for USB, 5GB for 30 days (1MB increments)

Compare the best of prepaid mobile broadband offers here.

PHONE CARDS FOR INTERNATIONAL CALLS

If don’t have a prepaid mobile plan which offers you great international call rates and are looking for a phone card which you can use from your mobile, home phone or even a public phone, then check out the range we offer at prepaid plans. We have searched for some of the best phone cards on the market so that you get the best rates and the longest period to use it all up. Find great rates for calling any of the following countries:

• Calling India
• Calling China
• Calling New Zealand
• Calling UK
• Calling Hong Kong

Check them all out here.

POLL: HAVE YOU EVER EXPERIENCED BILL SHOCK?

Was it due to roaming charges when traveling overseas, data usage on your smart phone, making overseas calls from Australia, generally making too many calls or some other reason. Would love to hear your feedback. Vote online or leave a message on our Facebook page.

Reward Mobile is part of the Pivotel Group who also bring you the popular Think Mobile plans. Whilst they have been around for some time, I can’t say I have heard much about their offers outside of their website. Their plans over the two years that I have covered them on prepaidplans have been sim only no contract plans. In fact they also sell mobile phones and plans via their site.

Reward Mobile uses the Vodafone network. A couple of weeks ago, Reward Mobile undertook a revamp of their sim only no contract mobile plans. they went from about 10 plans down to one plan, called the Ultimate plan.

The Ultimate Plan is actually an unlimited mobile plan. For $39.95 per month, you receive unlimited mobile and local calls, unlimited calls to 13, 1300 and 1800 numbers. Unlimited SMS and mms plus a big 4GB of data.

Is there anything special about this plan? Well, it actually covers pretty much everything you want to do with your phone, plus the data is one of the better offers available add to that increments are 200kb rather than 1MB.

Note that this data offer does not cover Blackberry data. Additional charges apply for Blackberry data.

Compare Reward Mobile’s Ultimate Plan plus all other unlimited mobile plans now.

Coverage limitations may apply. Flagfall and per minute usage fees apply to call types not included in the plan. [1] Standard call types exclude calls to premium numbers, video calls, international calls, satellite calls and other special service numbers. [2] Standard text excludes premium text and video MMS. All non standard call types are charged in one minute increments unless otherwise stated. All prices are quoted including GST. Actual charges may vary on your statement as charges are rounded to the nearest cent before GST is included. All prices are subject to change. Reward Mobile may apply call barring where fraudulent use is suspected or for credit control purposes. You will receive an itemised bill by email from Reward Mobile once a month which enables you to keep track of your calls and any payments made during the month. Reward Ultimate is available to credit approved customers only. Reward Ultimate uses the Vodafone 3G network. Data capability is supported at speeds up to HSDPA (high speed downlink packet access) where available. Standard Domestic Data Services are included within the monthly included data allowance. Included data is decremented in 200KB blocks. Excess data is charged at 10c per MB, billed in 200kB blocks, once you have used the included value. Blackberry data is not included and is charged separately at $1.00 per MB. A 3G capable handset or modem is required to access the 3G data network. [3] Minimum cost is $39.95 on the Ultimate $39.95 Plan month to month.

Dodo this week relaunched their prepaid mobileoffering. They have always had an offer via the Vodafone network which hardly changed over the 3 years that I have

Dodo Prepaid Offer

been running the prepaidplans.com.au website. Then last year they announced their offer was actually going to close to new customers and run for recharging only. I thought that is disappointing.

This week however I learn’t that a new offer was finally arriving and now it is here. More competition means more choice and options for you the user.

Dodo prepaid consists of two plans, Pay As You Go with cheap call and SMS rates and the Unlimited offer. Plans use the Optus network.

With the Dodo Pay As You Go offer you can purchase a $2 sim to get your started, then recharge with these offers:

$10 – $10 credit and 60 days to use it
$20 – $20 credit and 90 days to use it
$30 – $30 credit and 90 days to use it
$40 – $40 credit and 90 days to use it
$50 – $50 credit and 180 days to use it
$100 – $100 credit and 365 days to use it

Call rates – 11c/min
Flagfall – Nil
SMS – 11c
Data – 5c/MB

The $100 recharge gives you 100 minutes free calls to select international numbers.

The Dodo prepaid Unlimited offer will cost you $39.90 per recharge, last for 30 days and give you unlimited calls to fixed line and mobile phones, 1300, 1800 numbers unlimited Txt/MMS + 5GB of data.

That is a pretty competitive offer. Low cost calls if you want to save some money and don’t use your phone much. The credit expiry starts at 60 days which makes it much easier for irregular mobile users. The more you recharge, the longer it lasts. $100 for 365 days.

If you make lots of calls, then the Unlimited offer could work out to be more effective for you. For $39.90 you can make as many calls as you like. Add to that a data allowance of 5GB and you have everything you need.

Think Mobile launched their Ultimate Plans last year offering unlimited calls and Txt. Yep the usual unlimited benefits.

Think Mobile Ultimate Plans

To be more specific, what is included is Local and National calls, Calls to other Australian mobile networks, 13 and 1300 calls, 1800 calls, Domestic and International SMS & MMS (excl. video), Voicemail retrieval. So what isn’t included is international calls and SMS, video calls and messages and satellite calls.

In terms of data, the plan originally came with 750MB, quite a let down. Looks like Think Mobile have realised that they need much more than this and now the plan comes with a whopping 4GB of data. Now this isn’t all, data increments are 200KB, this is 5 times better than 1MB, which is what most providers offer. Excess data is charged at 10c/MB.

If you are planning to use Blackberry with this plan, please note that Blackberry data is not included and is charged separately at $1.00 per MB.

The Think Mobile Ultimate $39.95 plan lives on the Vodafone Network (which we know has a received a huge upgrade over the past 12 months).

And finally, yep no contract as well. This is a month to month agreement, so pay what you owe Think Mobile and you can leave when you want.

Check out the full Think Mobile plan range here. 

Optus have finally realized that charging data by 10mb increments (this means each time a session is started) really isn’t customer friendly particularly when they are the only ones in the market with this policy. Most others charge by the 1mb and some by the kilobyte. So from April 2012, Optus prepaid mobile broadband users will be charge per MB. This means that your data should last you quite a bit longer.

Hopefully Optus won’t reduce their data allowance to negate the change. Time will tell.