O2,meteor,vodafone Or 3

Blackdragon

My 12 Month Contract expires in Janurary which is just around the corner and im wondering should i stay with meteor or are there any better options out there.

Meteor - I like the whole free meteor to meteor txt thing but dont know that many people on meteor.

Vodafone - A very costly network i hear

O2 - I like that there minutes carry over every month

3 - I have heard that they are terrible and there customer service is very poor.


What network are you with - Is it Bill or Top-up - What are the pro's and con's.

Thanks for your Help:)

Lindaloo

I had issues with Meteor this month and after sending a complaint email and getting no response I phoned the company. My credit was lasting no time as I was on an old plan and I've now been changed over to a cheaper plan, I was given a lot of credit to make up for the hassle that I'd had with them so I'm going to stick with them.

For me, customer service is a huge thing and I had always found Meteor the best for it (well I'd only Vodafone to go on), I thought that they'd fallen down with their customer service but the last week has reassured me that it's still there so I'm sticking with them.

I've no problems with coverage when my friends on other networks have, I've had no problems when I go to the UK with coverage (and they are now apparently scrapping their roaming charges).

I would have changed to 3G, my friend is with them, he has had no problems with them, said their coverage is great and when you recommend a friend both of you get free credit. The deal he's on is very good and he never uses all his calls or texts.

I would never go back to Vodafone, found them expensive and not very nice to deal with.

No experience with O2.

Go to callcosts.ie and work out which is the best option for you pricewise.

Leanne_777

I'd say O2 or Meteor. I've had no experience with Vodafone but I've had endless hassle with 3, I wouldn't go near them again.

Sunny_Dublin

had nothing but hassle with vodafone. roaming was expensive and also i was able to send texts when overseas but could not make calls due to incorrect setup of profile. which they never successfully fixed despite my complaints...
also vodafone sold my friend a 3G phone pointing out the advantages of video calling and such... just to sell him a plan with the phone which doesn't support video calling anyways (guy in the shop said it'll all work fine, turned out later when on the phone to customer support that you need a very expensive plan to be enabled for video calls).
am with o2 now, top up at the moment which is no problem whatsoever and my boyfriend is on bill phone, no probs with customer service, i just would stay clear of their online shop, their ordering system is not very good and it's very hard to get hold of them when a problem occurs...

J.R.HARTLEY

don't touch vodafone unless you have to, have had no end of trouble on their "service"
i somehow lost the ability to receive MMS on my phone during the week, so i rang VF, "oh thats a setting on your phone i'll mail you the correct settings" he siad last friday i'm still waiting, i rang back on saturday and was told they couldn't mail out the settings because they didn't have them (for a phone they've been selling for 10 months) i was advised to check the settings on the motorola website, when i enquired how they'd have vodafone ireland settings i was told "eh..




...eh, maybe you should go to a VF shop"

so i went to the shop yesterday, and explained the rigmarole, all for the sake of mms, so he prints up the settings and we both input the settings and guess what? it doesn't work, in fairness he showed me their systems were down for maintenance and told me to ring VF again and not to take any guff off them, especially about not having settings.
so i rang them this morning and got a nice enough chap who i told about the last three days, taking my word for it he proceed to check the server profile and upgrade it, after an hour he asked if i had another phone i could try the sim in, but i didn't so he said go into a shop ask them to test the sim, if it works your phone is wonky it'll have to be repaired. ok , to the shop. yep the sim works in another phone mms come through fine.
so it goes back for repair, after four attempts (gary? no trevor, gerrard? no trevor, Jerry? NO TREVOR, oh TREVOR? yes) she still put my name down as jerry on the form, what the feck, don't VF have a system with all my phone and my info in it, shouldn't the staff simply type in the Phone and numbers IMEI and the rest of the form fills in automatically.
anyway she asks am i on billpay i say yes, here's your replacement a nokia so old it's a monochrome screen, ok, how long will my phone be gone, eh about 10 working days, but maybe 25.
hang on a feckin minute, i pay 99.99 ex vat ex any text messaging and ex any data services a month (bill total is always approx €140) so i said i 'm not paying that to be stuck with a phone so old you it practically has a rotary dialler for a month, no fair i'm paying for a 3g service that i can't access on their replacement phone, whats the frickin insurance for? i came home and dug out my old Sony Ericcson v800, and bought a new charger in the VF shop, thankfully it's taking a charge and should be working soon. thing is i need the phone cause no matter how many times i give my house number the hospital always rings my mobile, so i told them i'd leave the replacement "phone" with them. but feck all this rigmarole for what? it's ridiculous. and now my sister says her phone is doing the same thing, exact same phone bought within a day of each other, i'm wondering if it was a faulty batch, cause they're even from the same store (grafton street).

Sam Vimes

i had accepted 3's limitations because they were so cheap. then when i upgraded my phone and tried to get my old one unlocked they messed me about for a month. now i hate them but i'm stuck with them for another year

1huge1

ya 3 have a lot of problems
i've been with them a year almost now and only experienced one luckily
that being not being able to txt all UK netowrks
other than that ive had nothing but cheap calls and txts

constitutionus

im on 3 and ive no problems so far (but im only on it a month and ive heard the stories the other guys have had )

that said all i do is text and video message so if thats all your interested the 3pay option of 5c a message is a no brainer.

plus i love my 6280:D

Cutie18Ireland

I'm on meteor talk 400 €60 a month and all calls and texts to meteor numbers are free, its great

been with 3, stay away from them!! useless customer service...

Urban Weigl

I've only had good experiences with Vodafone customer service, whereas Meteor is the worst phone company I have ever dealt with (well them and Eircom), lots of hassle to get simple things done, and a very negative attitude towards the customer.

Stay away from Meteor if you think you'll ever need to deal with their customer "service" (in quotes). On the other hand, they do have quite good rates.

Can't comment on 3, as I've never used them, but I hear they're just as bad as Meteor. O2 overall seem the best, though be careful that you're not being ripped off if you're on a bill phone with them.

Sam Vimes

Cutie18Ireland wrote:

been with 3, stay away from them!! useless customer service...

to be fair, you were on 3pay so you had to get them to understand your language before you could get them to understand your problem. the bill pay people still get the scottish crowd who are marginally better.



i have a meteor phone too and i can assure you that unless you ask their customer care something along the lines of "what is the name of your company?" you will probably get the wrong answer. even then its a gamble

but i still have that number alongside my 3 number because its so much cheaper than the rest


if you want customer care, reliable service and middle of the road prices, go with o2

if you want really cheap and either no customer care, or worse, misleading customer care, go with meteor

if you want cheap, customer care who are nice but don't actually solve your problems, and a lot of technical problems that the other networks don't have, go with 3 bill

if you want sort of cheap (not cheaper than meteor), customer care who have the same training as the bill pay people but whose native language is hindi, and all the same problems as the bill payers and then some, go with 3pay


if you want a guy to come to your house every month, pick you up by the ankles, shake you and take whatever money falls out, go with vodafone. they're good for business, roaming (i have a voda sim for abroad) and have a good data package iirc

Blackdragon

Urban Weigl wrote:

I've only had good experiences with Vodafone customer service, whereas Meteor is the worst phone company I have ever dealt with (well them and Eircom), lots of hassle to get simple things done, and a very negative attitude towards the customer.

Stay away from Meteor if you think you'll ever need to deal with their customer "service" (in quotes). On the other hand, they do have quite good rates.

Can't comment on 3, as I've never used them, but I hear they're just as bad as Meteor. O2 overall seem the best, though be careful that you're not being ripped off if you're on a bill phone with them.

"be careful that you're not being ripped off if you're on a bill phone with them"

Why do you say that???

Blaster99

It should perhaps be pointed out that Meteor has some gap in coverage that you will not experience with the other operators.

I'm on 3 bill pay and the only problem I've had with them was roaming in Spain, otherwise purty good, very cheap, and no hassle with support. I've not tried to unlock my phone with them, though. I usually keep my phone until it's finished so that's not likely to bother me much. My main gripe would be the walled garden. They try to innovate with their Planet 3 etc and I sort of like them for trying something different.

I've used O2 on bill pay and they were very expensive but otherwise good, if 2G is your thing.

Blackdragon

Blaster99 wrote:

It should perhaps be pointed out that Meteor has some gap in coverage that you will not experience with the other operators.

I'm on 3 bill pay and the only problem I've had with them was roaming in Spain, otherwise purty good, very cheap, and no hassle with support. I've not tried to unlock my phone with them, though. I usually keep my phone until it's finished so that's not likely to bother me much. My main gripe would be the walled garden. They try to innovate with their Planet 3 etc and I sort of like them for trying something different.

I've used O2 on bill pay and they were very expensive but otherwise good, if 2G is your thing.

I have to agree with you there. I also find that meteor coverage can be terrible at times. Sometimes my phone informs me that i have full signal but yet the quality of the call is very poor. There is a lot of dropped calls with them as well not to mention calls failing.

But i have also heard from many many people that 3 have the poorest customer service and no matter what you ring them about they seem to think the problem is either your handset or you are out of coverage.

Lindaloo

Can I ask Meteor customers, do you find it's only recently that the customer service has gone into decline with wrong info and rude staff? I hadn't been onto them in about a year and was amazed at how bad they had become, although I may just have been lucky previous times?

rogue-entity

I was with O2 PrePay, back when it was O2 or Vodafone, when Meteor arrived, they were cheaper, but they had a rubbish service, so I stuck with O2 as the next cheapest (even if we still had to pay for Voicemail ¬_¬).
My opinion of O2:
> Fantastic network coverage, same as with Vodafone TBH.
> Text bundles (came in handy alright).
> Great Customer Care, there staff were always quite helpful.
> International WebTexts, still come in handy for sending free texts to friends in the US (although I cant receive their replies as I dont use O2 anymore).
> Relativly expensive compared to 3 and Meteor and they charge for accessing their O2 Active portal (not cool ¬_¬).
If you want international texting and roaming, they are your best bet, and certainly provide more roaming partners than Vodafone at present, their prepay works well in the US as well and its cheap enough, considering roaming charges these days.

I switched to 3 because I wanted a 3G phone without the rip-off prices of Vodafone. I was disappointed to learn I couldnt access normal internet pages, but I have broadband at home, so its not so much a problem. I am still with them for over a year and I have never had any major problems with them.
> Cheaper then the other networks depending on your plan.
> Best 3G coverage in the country.
> Good customer care, I have never had a problem with them so far.
> Slow to release new handsets, 3UK have had the N73 for a good while now, and so have Vodafone UK, but neither of the respective Irish networks have even so much as a hint of them, very annoying, but universal *sighs*
> Crappy Walled Garden, you get no proper internet access through your phone, so you cannot access Gmail for example.

I am sticking with 3, but I wont be upgrading until I can get the N73, and then I will badger them until they unlock my 6680

Some good advice OP, go to callcosts.ie and key in your usage details, you will get a fair idea of which networks offer you the cheapest plans.. if the cheapest network doesnt have a phone or service you want.. go to the next one up.

Blackdragon

Lindaloo wrote:

Can I ask Meteor customers, do you find it's only recently that the customer service has gone into decline with wrong info and rude staff? I hadn't been onto them in about a year and was amazed at how bad they had become, although I may just have been lucky previous times?

I have found that as well once or twice latley. . . . Perhaps they have hired a lot of new staff which is a common thing in a call center.

Your best bet is to contact them via email. If they are unsure they simply pass your request along to there tech dept who usually solve the problem very quickly.

I may be wrong on this one hoowever. Anyone else had problems with Meteor Customer service via Phone or Email?

Lindaloo

The email is where it fell down in the first place, I mailed, got a response a week later looking for more info and am still waiting 5 weeks later for them to respond to my 2nd mail! I rang after 2 weeks of the first mail, the girl promised to mail me and I'm still waiting for her to get back to me!

In the end I rang, got the wrong info and I emailed a complaint and got no response, a week later I rang, spoke to a really helpful fella who had the problem dealt with and sorted within about 7 hours!

Lindaloo

Meant to say in first post, Meteor are at present trying to do better deals for existing customers and it'll be happening in a few weeks, this is what I was told last Friday.

They have been concentrating on new customers and neglecting older ones but they are sortign that out and will be contacting older customers about their price plans etc.

Blackdragon

Lindaloo wrote:

Meant to say in first post, Meteor are at present trying to do better deals for existing customers and it'll be happening in a few weeks, this is what I was told last Friday.

They have been concentrating on new customers and neglecting older ones but they are sortign that out and will be contacting older customers about their price plans etc.

Imhappy to hear that seen as how if been with them since day 1.
I read on another thread that the reason eircom is trying to shut down smart is due to the fact that smart was applying for a 3g licence to create its own 3g network.
It would seem that Eircom would also like to aquire this 3g licence for meteor company.

Im a Smart customer but i cant help but wonder what meteor would be like with a 3g service. Would be amazing and a lot cheaper than 3 or vodafone i guess.

But if Smart do indeed win and eircom are unable to aquire the 3g licence then they may sell meteor to o2 as meteor is using its networks anyway.

All of this information is from another thread and is not confirmed information but something to think about.

Anyway i look forward to hearing meteor's new call plans for existing customers

Lindaloo

Don't shoot the messenger if this doesn't come about, cos chances are......:D

Blackdragon

Lindaloo wrote:

Don't shoot the messenger if this doesn't come about, cos chances are......:D

Agreed