And you call them abusive?
Madduck complains about the lack of attractive data plans for mobile phone providers in Switzerland. Madduck: As always, you will have to remember there are many people confronted with a much worse situation than yours. Up to a month ago, I never envisioned using my phone for anything besides… Well, talking. But yes, since I got my new gadget, I keep playing with GPS or using it for simple things that require Web access and do not require much interactivity (the suckiness of a 12-key keyboard is überhuge!) - Provided, of course, that I am near a WiFi hotspot, of course. My mobile service provider, Telcel, just publicly launched its 3G network - this means, of course, prices are well over the roof: The cheapest plan starts at MX$59 (around US$5.5) a month, and gives you a whooping 1MB of allowed transfer - Anything you do over 1MB will cost you MX$0.06 per kilobyte. Yes, Telcel offers a 1.5Mbps connection, so it’d theoretically take only 6 seconds to exceed the monthly plan. After the joyful first seconds of network access, each second of full-fledged data transfer will cost you 9 pesos - Around US$0.85. How nice! Now, there are plans for 1, 3, 5, 10, 15, 20, 30, 50, 100 and 1000MB. Their price increases at a slow pace up to MX$459, which is still somewhat expensive if you even thought on using your cell phone as a gateway (say, over Bluetooth) for your regular computer’s connectivity. Of course, if I buy 1GB of data transfer, I’d expect a much lower price for each additional Kb. Well, no, it only goes down to MX$0.03. Per Kilobyte, yes, you read right. Those little things your Vic20 was full of. There is even an unlimited plan. Well, yes, unlimited but limited - For MX$579 (~US$55) you get a nice deal, right? After all, I pay MX$350 for my 1024/128 DSL connection - it is on the right range. Well, no - If you get over 3GB in one month, your data rate will drop to 128Kbps for the rest of the month. Nice. No good as a gateway either. So, I’m not hiring a 3G plan at all. But that’s also a danger - If I open a net-using program at the wrong moment, I’ll be billed at MX$0.14 per Kilobyte. Bah. [update] There is another similar service in Mexico, IUSAcell’s BAM. Pricing is equivalent, though.
Comments
Angel Olivera 2008-03-06 02:39:18
Typo
You mean US$ 0.85… :)
Anonymous 2008-05-18 13:09:35
Ditto on the desire for GPS
Ditto on the desire for GPS and WIFI!
Erik J 2008-03-05 17:59:39
Prices in Sweden
Since I have no blog to write on I’ll use your comment section. :-)
In Sweden the cheapest deal you can get is: 3G networks: <ul>
- 27 MEX$/MB , and something similar to your prices for unlimited.
</ul>
Broadband:
- 100 Mbps 556 MX$/month unlimited
- 8 Mbps 480 MX$/month unlimited
- 256kbps 172 MX$/month unlimited </ul> So it's cheaper to get slow mobile broadband than to get the cheapest broadband. ----- [gwolf]() 2008-03-06 13:20:35 **Oops - fixed** Sorry :) ----- [gwolf]() 2008-03-09 11:48:05 **Yup... That's the main reason...** ...I got a phone with WiFi support. Although 3G would be a very welcome plus! ----- [rik](http://www.dkube.com) 2008-04-09 00:24:08 **Yep very expensive** Haha yes Telcel is very expensive for almost everything and liers. Like Telmex. Telmex is ofering a "cheap" internet service. But they don't announce that you can only use 4gb per month.. I download more than that in a week. Well back again with mobiles, the new or old data plans in Mexico it's the same. I think is because the lack of competition in the country. But about iusacell bam i asked yesterday in a near mall of my house and the promoter said to me that you only paid MXN$300 per month (of course you have to get a 24 months mandatory contract) and you can download all Gb as you want. Cheers :) rik ----- [Roadmaster]() 2008-03-06 07:54:08 **berry?** Telcel offers a different pricing scheme for blackberries: MXN $343 a month, for (truly) unlimited access and push e-mail. Some clever apps take advantage of blackberry's internet service (such as gmail, google maps and twitterberry) and effectively give you unlimited access. Granted, it's slow (only EDGE is supported on the blackberry), but you can rely on having net access almost anywhere you get a phone signal, and not being charged per-kilobyte fees. And actually, the money I saved by NOT sending SMS, replacing them with blacberry messenger communication, made up for 90% of the extra cost! Plus the blackberry's full qwerty keyboard kicks ass. Now if only they offered the 8320, with wifi and gps receiver... ----- [toxickore](http://toxickore.blogspot.com) 2008-03-07 11:25:50 **Rates** Thanks for the information. I was looking for telcel data rates for GPRS some days ago and i didn't found it until you posted it here. Indeed, it's quite expensive yet in Mex, i'm also starting to use the data apps on my cell phone and would be great to pay lower rates. They will eventually decrease i think.