Here are highlights of new monthly plans:

• Customers can get fixed minutes and text deals on the following monthly costs – £10, £15, £20, £25, £30, £35 and £40 (24 month contracts)
• The deals will also be available on 18 month contracts for an additional £5 per month.

Tariffs range from 100 minutes and 100 texts for £15 per month to 1,200 minutes and 500 texts for £35 a month. Customers will pay £5 more for 18-month tariffs than 24-month deals allowing equivalent monthly airtime. Customers will now get a Flexible booster in addition to their text and minutes as part of their contract, which they can change each month. The flexible boosters include:

• Unlimited texts
• Unlimited internet
• Unlimited landline talk
• Unlimited T-Mobile talk
• Euro talk & text
• USA & Canada talk
• Europe &Amsterdam talk

Customers can ALSO buy another booster in addition to the one with their contract for only £5 extra a month.

T-Mobile is also dropping its ‘Solo’ SIM-only brand from March 1 for a range of ‘SIM-only’-branded propositions at new pricepoints. Rolling one-month deals start at £10 per month for 100 minutes and 100 texts,  and rise to £25 per month for 900 minutes and 500 texts.

Twelve-month SIM-only deals allow 600 minutes and 500 texts for £15 a month, and rise to 1,200 minutes and 500 texts for £25 per month. All unlimited text bundles have been removed.

SIM-only customers also get to select a free booster, and opt in for further bundles at £5 a go.

Existing Solo plans (affording 300 minutes and unlimited texts for £15 a month, 600 minutes and unlimited texts for £20 a month and 800 minutes and unlimited texts for £25 a month) are available until March 1.

From April 2009, T-Mobile’s popular Flext tariff will be refreshed to give more value to customers. New benefits will include: International calling and texting, 08 numbers and unlimited web’n'walk access.

Flext customers can now take advantage of the following features as part of their monthly allowance, without incurring extra charges:

* The inclusion of over 50 of the most popular international calling destinations, so customers can use their allowance to call or text friends and family abroad
* Calls to our most popular 08 numbers, including telephone banking, key utility and customer service lines and premium rate numbers
* Special offer of unlimited web’n'walk access to enable customers to enjoy the whole internet on their phone
* The inclusion of access to voice mail messages as part of the new Flext package
* A free weekly text alert to be able to keep track of spending and detailing their remaining credit during the month

You should be signing up for 18 months contract with T-Mobile, credit includes 92% of the most popular international calling destinations, to over 50 countries:
Australia, Austria, Bangladesh, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Channel Islands, China, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Isle of Man, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxemburg, Malaysia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Pakistan, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Trinidad & Tobago, Turkey, USA

Also 89% of most popular 08 numbers are included (Flext inclusive 08 number calls are to numbers starting with 0800, 0808, 0845, 0844, 0843, 0842 and 0870. Calls to numbers starting with 0500 are included too.)

This is a good news if you have relatives or friends abroad, you can call or text them and it will be included in your monthly allowance. T-Mobile website doesn’t mention at what rate international calls will be charged (deducted from allowance). Probably details will be announced later, closer to launch.

Source: T-Mobile

iPhone proved to be very popular among UK punters, O2 sold over million iPhones.

Below is the table with new iPhone tariffs:

Apple prepares OS update for iPhone and iPod Touch in June, version 3.0. Update will bring long-awaited features like MMS support, copy-paste support and many others.

Source: O2 Press Release

T-Mobile follows announcement by BT that calls to 0800 numbers will be free for its BT Mobile customers on 4th February 2009. Offer will be available to customers who are upgrading and will be available to new customers later on. Minimum Flext tariff is £35 a month.

The new tariffs also allow customers to make international UK to Europe calls that are deducted from their bundle.

This is really good move from T-Mobile, we hope that other mobile operators will follow. It would be nice if T-Mobile also included 0844 numbers, these were included in bundled minutes before but withdrawn later in 2006.

Source: Mobile Magazine

Other mobile companies also charge high rates for calling ‘free’ 0800 numbers, with 3 charging 15p a minute and T-Mobile 10p.

However, BT Mobile is scrapping all charges for its Consumer customers who dial 0800 numbers and similar 0500 numbers from May 1, despite the loss of tens of thousands of pounds in revenue.

BT announced in February last year that it was switching all its helpline numbers to 0800, making it free for all of its 14m customers to call them from any landline.

Consumer Focus, which incorporates the former National Consumer Council, is calling for mobile companies to give customers a fair deal by ensuring that calling an 0800 number from a mobile is free – the same as if you call the number from a landline.

Audrey Gallagher, of Consumer Focus said: “Scrapping unfair charges on 0800 calls from mobile phones is good news for BT customers. With so many consumers using mobile phones rather than landlines to contact essential services, find information and seek help, it is more important than ever that they do so for free across all 0800 numbers. Consumer Focus calls on mobile phone operators to follow BT and stop making money out of 0800 calls.”

John Petter, managing director of BT’s Consumer business, said: “We think mobile customers are irritated by having to pay high rates to call ‘free’ 0800 numbers, so we have put our own house in order by making it free for any BT Mobile customer to call these numbers.

“We have all called an 0800 number from our mobiles and experienced the frustration of the message telling us that the call will be charged at standard rates.

“A customer with Orange would pay £7.50 just to make a 30-minute call their insurance company or bank and sort out a few issues. But if they made that call from a landline it would be free, so we can’t see the need to have this huge difference in price.

“We had already made calls into BT free for our 14m landline customers and we are happy to back Consumer Focus and other consumer organisations in their efforts to address this anomaly. We also recently announced that calls to 0870 and 0845 numbers would be included in call packages for BT landline customers, so it is a good time to be calling these organisations from a BT landline or mobile.”

Source: BT Press Release

This is good news, whether other mobile operators will follow or not, that is the question! We hope they do!

In launching the offer, Carphone will match 3 by offering the cheapest pay monthly tariff on the market. 3 launched a £9 monthly tariff in the New Year called Mix and Match 100, which offers users 100 minutes or texts, or any mix of the two.

Source: Mobile Today

Similarly T-Mobile now does not offer it’s popular Flext tariff on 12 month contracts anymore.

I personally do not like 12 month contracts, they tie you longer and you have to wait longer for phone upgrade. Let’s hope that other operators will not follow O2 and we will be still able to get 12 months contracts from other operators.

Via Mobile

I have compiled few tips for you to try to minimize your outgoings on mobile spend.

1. Downgrade your priceplan

Many of do not use all of our monthly allowances. Look at your invoices for past 2-3 months, are you using all your voice and text allowances? If you don’t, maybe it is a good idea to phone up your operator and ask if you can downgrade to a cheaper priceplan. My wife used to be with T-Mobile Flext 30, but she never used up all of her allowances in a month. We have downgraded her priceplan to Flext 25, giving us saving of £5 a month, £60 a year!

You have to be eligible to downgrade, some operators impose minimum term before you can downgrade your priceplan, so if you had your mobile contract signed just 2 or 3 months ago, you may not be eligible. Check with your operator. You can always upgrade if you notice that current allowance is not enough.

2. Get SIM only contract

If you are deciding to get a mobile contract, and you are happy with your current mobile phone, go for SIM only deals. You can get decent amount of minutes and texts for as low as £10 a month. Remember that operators incorporate price of new handset into your monthly payments over your term of contract. Cheapest SIM only deal you can get is £10 Vodafone, for which you will get 75 minutes and 500 texts, cheap but may not be enough if you make a lot of voice calls. Best deal in my opinion is Virgin Mobile’s Liberty SIM, which gives you anytime any network 300 minutes and 300 texts, calls to voicemail are free and you can cancel your contract anytime you wish.

T-Mobile gives you slightly more for the same money, 350 minutes and 500 texts for £15 a month, but calls to voicemail are charged at 12p a minute and calls to customer services are chargeable as well. Please be aware that you might need to unlock your phone if you buy SIM from different operator.

3.  Make the most of your renewal deal

When it is time to renew your contract, consider all possible options. You can compare offers from competition and tell your current provider to match it or ask for price reduction on your current priceplan. Many people get new handset during their renewal and sell it off on auctions like Ebay or Amazon. You can get a decent lump sum by keep using your old phone and selling new one.

4. Sell your old mobile phones

If you have old mobile phones that are just lying there in the cupboard and collecting dust, sell them! You won’t make a fortune but you can use money that you get for something more useful. There are a lot of websites that pay top money for your old mobile phone like http://www.mazumamobile.com or http://www.mopay.co.uk. They will usually send you envelope, which you use to send your phone to them freepost. After they have checked your phone is working, they will usually send you a cheque. Of course there is always Ebay or Amazon where you can turn your trash to cash.

5. Don’t call 08* numbers

Recently most of mobile operators increased prices for calls to 08* numbers, some priceplans as much as 400%! Unless it is absolutely necessary, don’t call 08* numbers from your mobile phones, try to use fixed line instead.

Writing 70-290 and 70-270 is easier for a 220-601 candidate who has certifications like 70-291 and 646-204 as well as 640-816 to his credit.

* Top up £5 during the month and receive unlimited texts weekday evenings in the following month
* Top up £10 and receive unlimited evening and weekend texts the following month
* Top up £30 or more and receive unlimited texts to use at any time the following month

Unlimited Weekday Evening text period is from 7:30pm until midnight each weekday evening

Unlimited Evening and Weekend text period is from 7:30pm until midnight each evening and from 7.30pm on Friday to midnight on Sunday.

Word ‘Unlimited’ doesn’t really mean unlimited, there is a fair usage policy of 3000 texts per month. Texts can be sent to any mobile number in UK.

New and existing PAYT customers can opt in free by dialling 2345 from their handsets. Vodafone will kindly send you a text message on the first day of your offer period informing you about offer that you qualified for.

T-Mobile hadsuccessful campaign when they launched ‘Top Up and Stretch’ campaign. Now Vodafone promising to give more value when they top up.

“Vodafone is the first and only UK mobile network to let pay as you talk customers send free unlimited texts when they TopUp from just £5 per month. And with a new simple flat rate of 20p for calls, we continue to offer outstanding value,” says Ian Shepherd, consumer director for Vodafone UK.

To mark the launch of ‘Text Unlimited’, Vodafone UK will also be launching Sony Ericsson K770i in exclusive colors: ‘Star Heaven Silver’ and ‘Touch of Pink’.

Vodafone will have huge marketing campaign to promote this offer, including outdoor, radio and press ads.

Check Vodafone Press Release for more details.

First of all you need to sign up for 24 months mobile broadbnd contract for £30 per month. In return you will get free laptop, USB modem, mobile broadband, and free unlimited access to T-Mobile’s WiFi spots. Sounds good, but over 24 months you will pay T-Mobile £720. If you buy laptop from major retailer on it’s own, it will cost you around £299 for similar spec machine. If you take a mobile broadband from 3 or T-Mobile on it’s own, it will cost you £15 per month, in 2 years that makes £360. If we add those 2 figures up: £299+£360=£659 which is far less than what you will pay to T-Mobile. With T-Mobile’s contract you are getting free WiFi hotspots access, but if you have mobile broadband, you don’t really need WiFi, do you? Also, T-Mobile claims that you can “Surf as much as you like with no run-on rates”. You still have 3GB fair usage policy, but if you go beyond that, T-Mobile will not charge you anything extra. What they going to do is as follows (according to customer services):

1. First month you will be warned by letter about your excess usage

2. If you exceed your 3GB limit following month, your internet access speed may be reduced for couple of weeks

3. If you exceed again in 3rd month, you internet speed may be reduced up to 2 months.

So if you frequently visit data intensive websites, download music/video, listen to online radio or watch movies online, this offer may not be for you. Otherwise for lighter users offer is ok. Good thing with T-Mobile is that you will never get nasty surpise in terms of huge bill. I would advise to check other offers by PC World or Carphone Warehouse or buying laptop and mobile broadband separately.