Many people can’t live without their mobile phone. Mine… lives in my bag and is rarely used. But the iPhone interests me, more because of it’s internetability than as a telephony device.
Whilst I’m not going to buy an iPhone until data plans in Australia are reasonably priced and packaged (which to my mind means, comparable rates for data over a cable or through the air, and the ability to bundle all my data usage into a single price — sounds like I might be waiting a long time), I did have a look at the plans being offered.
What stood out was the iPhone 3G pricing – handset payments per month given by Optus:
| Phone | $19 Cap | Total1 | $49 Cap | Total1 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8Gb 24 month | $21 | $504 | $7 | $168 |
| 8Gb 12 month | $51 | $1224 | $37 | $888 |
| 16Gb 24 month | $12 | $624 | $12 | $288 |
| 16Gb 12 month | $47 | $1464 | $47 | $1128 |
1 I’ve added the totals
These prices are supposed to be about owning the hardware, they don’t include the plan fee which is supposed to be paying for usage. So, why does a handset repayment vary by call plan or length of contract.
How do they get away with this? Shouldn’t these prices be fixed and simply be spread over the life of the contract (given that the cost of owning an iPhone outright (Pre-paid with unlocking fee) is $729 for the 8Gb iPhone)? To me, these numbers suggest:
- recouping money lost from the “Cap” as a phone payment
- making it uneconomical/a rip-off to have a 12 month contract
This is probably the norm in the industry, I don’t know, I’ve never really bothered looking. Buyer beware, I guess.