Vodafone introduces "out of bundle" data fees

[Simon]

Vodafone is introducing charges for customers who exceed the data cap on their mobile phone tariff.

In a message posted on the Vodafone forums the company says it will initiate charges from 1 June to "make it fairer for everyone, and to protect our network from data abuse".  The new scheme will see pay monthly customers charged £5 for every additional 500MB of data after the first 500MB. Non-contract customers will be stung for 50p per 10MB after the first 25MB, which means pay-as-you-go data is somehow five times more expensive than contract.

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/357790/vodafone-introduces-out-of-bundle-data-fees

[Steve]

That's one way of not spending money on increasing network capacity.

[Simon]

It does sound rather expensive. 

[Niall]

It's annoying when you know they're blatantly ripping you off, but word it in such a way that they can have wiggle room if taken to court over it.

[zappaDPJ]

So they charge more for something that's already been paid for so everyone uses less of it and charge even more than that to people who probably can't afford to use it in the first place... 

[Gary]

So much for mobile Data being useful, would not want a Vodafone Dongle 

[Rik]

I don't understand how they can do this. If you PAYG and pay for a GB, how can they then limit when you use it?

[Simon]

It seems they were even pricing themselves out of the iPad market, but changed their minds:

Vodafone has issued its official iPad 3G data tariffs - making them more attractive than the figures published by Apple this morning.

Visitors to the Apple website were told Vodafone was offering customers only 250MB of data per month for £10, rising to £25 for 5GB. That left Vodafone looking remarkably more expensive than its rivals, with Orange offering 3GB of data for £15 per month, and O2 allowing customers to pay £10 or £15 for a monthly data cap of 1GB or 3GB respectively.

Vodafone this morning disowned the Apple figures. This afternoon, it set the prices at £10 for 1GB and £25 for 5GB, bringing its prices in tandem with O2 and Orange.

When challenged on whether Vodafone had changed its prices in reaction to its rivals, a company spokesman told PC Pro: "we didn't announce anything until this afternoon."

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/357823/update-vodafone-comes-clean-on-ipad-pricing

[Gary]

3GB monthly for £15, mobile data is always going to be so damn expensive, and with O2 you wont find that many 3G areas anyway  around here its Orange or Vodafone. Ill stick to my iPhone/smartphone/whatever phone methinks