How good are the new T-Mobile tariffs?
Here at billmonitor, we constantly keep watch on tariffs. Our recommendations are based not only on contract allowances, but also on all kinds of out-of-allowance charges you might not see.
T-Mobile introduced new tariffs on 1 February, including their famous “Full Monty” plans. How good are these plans? Will you see a significant drop in your phone bill? Let's analyse this in three parts: what is the offer; what are the hidden costs; and a few examples with typical users.
The Full Monty, and some other novelties...
What has changed?
T-Mobile previously sold contracts with a given allowance for voice and texts, plus a booster. This booster was selected from one of unlimited texts, unlimited data, unlimited landline and a few international bundles.
This offer was flexible, with low prices, but was this a true unlimited allowance? As usual, you have to be careful when a network says “unlimited”. For T-Mobile, “unlimited data” meant 500MB allowance for video and music, unlimited for the rest.
With the new contracts data is truly unlimited, and this is good news. The new offers from T-Mobile are more transparent, clearer and the number of different options are reduced. Flexibility is still here, but not for customers with low usage: the free boosters are only available for plans with at least 300 minutes – other customers will pay £5 a month for adding a booster.
So what does T-Mobile really offer now? The classic pay-monthly contract remain quite similar, but the flexible booster choice is now one of unlimited texts, unlimited landline calls and unlimited calls to T-Mobile. If you want more data, you'll have to pay £5 a month for 1.5GB allowance.
The big novelty is the Full Monty plan, with data and texts truly unlimited. You can get unlimited minutes for £41 or 2000 minutes for £36 a month, which would be probably enough for most customers.
The hidden costs
Good news! Transparency, unlimited allowances, for reasonable prices...
But is it that easy? Not really. You'll get big allowances, but what about the other charges? T-Mobile won't tell you this in their next TV ad, but there has been a considerable increase:
- Voice: 30p/min becomes 40p/min
- Text: 12p becomes 15p
- Calling your voicemail: 12p becomes 40p/min !
- International calls: +13% on average (depending on destination)
How good plans fit with typical usages: the billmonitor test
The following prices include everything: the monthly cost, the upfront cost and predicted out-of-allowances costs. They are the best results calculated by billmonitor.
The prices are displayed in green if T-Mobile's offer is the best deal available, black if it is close to the best deal, and red if not (comparing with Vodafone, O2, Orange, Three, Tesco).
The classic smartphone user: 200min / 500 texts / 200 MB
| Handset | Price/month | Comparison |
|---|---|---|
| Apple iPhone 4S 16 GB | £38.04 |
£35.38 – Three |
| Apple iPhone 4 8 GB | £33.04 | £30.38 – Three |
| Samsung Galaxy S2 | £30.17 | £25.87 – O2 |
| Nokia Lumia 800 | £28.08 | £25.87 – O2 |
| Any phone | £26 | £8.80 – Tesco |
The texter: 20min / 1500 texts / 0 MB
| Handset | Price/month | Comparison |
|---|---|---|
| Apple iPhone 4S 16 GB | £38.04 |
£34.42 – O2 |
| Apple iPhone 4 8 GB | £32.31 | £28.17 – O2 |
| Samsung Galaxy S2 | £26.52 | £22.87 – O2 |
| Nokia Lumia 800 | £24.43 | £22.87 – O2 |
| Any phone | £12.10 | £7.50 – Tesco |
The all you can eat user: 500min/2000 texts/1024 MB
| Handset | Price/month | Comparison |
|---|---|---|
| Apple iPhone 4S 16 GB | £40.12 |
£39.12 – Three |
| Apple iPhone 4 8 GB | £36 | £34.12 – Three |
| Samsung Galaxy S2 | £36 | £32.40 – Three |
| Nokia Lumia 800 | £36 | £30.40 – Three |
| Any phone | £36 | £17.40 – Three |
The talkative user: 1200min / 200 texts / 50 MB
| Handset | Price/month | Comparison |
|---|---|---|
| Apple iPhone 4S 16 GB | £40.12 |
£39.12 – Three |
| Apple iPhone 4 8 GB | £36 | £34.12 – Three |
| Samsung Galaxy S2 | £33.08 | £35 – Three |
| Nokia Lumia 800 | £31 | £34 – Three |
| Any phone | £31 | £25 – Three |
Conclusion
Not brilliant. Three and O2 remain far ahead, and only a few users which are using a lot of voice allowance are likely to save money with T-Mobile.
Would like to know how good are these deals for your actual usage? Try out bill analysis, and we'll tell you!
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