scandalous mobile phones rip off

paul larry

can someone explain why my brother, a uk mobile subscriber o2 to be precise, gets a brilliant phone (so good its not yet available in RoI) fro free, and 700 mins/unlimited text for £35 approx €50 a month, whereas poor me has to pay €50 for a second rate nokia thats like a slow pc. it keeps randomly turning of, yet cost me €50 on conract-meteor-where i get only 300 mins/month and no free txts. oh and brutal coverage in donegal. is anyone who works in the mobile phone induystry at liberty to explain the unbelievebale difference between north and republic?!
take for example the new craze the LG touch screens, starting at €100 in rep. irl on contract, yet in n.irl one can be bought for free on contract!!!!!!!!

Paulw

It's called market forces and economy of scale. In the UK they can sell more phones and have more subscribers, therefore increasing profits, and so they are able to reduce the cost to the end subscriber.

Here, we've a much smaller market.

Also, if people pay the prices, they're not going to drop the price.

Mimikyu

This post has been deleted.

eth0_

Brutal coverage in Donegal...i'd be willing to put a fiver on most mobile operators having less than fantastic coverage in Donegal! Look at the geography of the place, not exactly conducive to mobile phone signals, neither is the scattered population.

Also - there are way, way more mobile operators here in the UK.
Vodafone, o2, three, t-mobile and Orange are the main ones, then you have the 'piggyback' ones like Ikea, Tesco, Asda, Virgin etc etc etc, all competing for tens of millions of customers.

In Ireland we have what, four main operators competing for about 3 million customers. Of course the deals aren't so great in Ireland.

The downside here is that most operators tie you into an 18 month contract if you get a free phone.

dahamsta

I don't think economies of scale can fully explain the differences between here and the UK. Has the Irish mobile industry ever been investigated for cartel-like behaviour?

eth0_

Has the ESB been investigated for being more expensive than Mpower, scottish power, hydro power in the UK?

It's the same thing, economies of scale. If you have 13 million subscribers as o2 UK do, OBVIOUSLY you can afford to give them a better deal than o2 Ireland which has about a tenth of the customers.

dahamsta

Read the first line of my post. Note the word "fully". Try comparing like with like. :rolleyes:

eth0_

I did notice the word 'fully' and my reply still stands.

It's purely economies of scale as far as I can see. Irish networks are far from extortionate anyway...

Honey-ec

DaMelodrama wrote: »

I don't think economies of scale can fully explain the differences between here and the UK. Has the Irish mobile industry ever been investigated for cartel-like behaviour?

Yes they have, and O2 and Vodafone were found to be operating a duopoly, which both providers strenuously denied and both lodged a High Court appeal against the findings. I'm not sure what the outcome of the appeal was, but I worked for O2 for 6 years, and I can tell you that the hatred that those two companies have for eachother would amaze anyone that hasn't worked there. The idea that they were operating a cartel is laughable.

As others have mentioned, the reason for the difference in prices between here and the UK is simply the fact that the market there is so much bigger. The car insurance market is directly comparable - look at the value on offer in the UK compared to here.

And the reason that Irish networks do not offer free handsets is that they are prevented from doing so by the Regulator.

tony1kenobi

paul larry wrote: »

can someone explain why my brother, a uk mobile subscriber o2 to be precise, gets a brilliant phone (so good its not yet available in RoI) fro free, and 700 mins/unlimited text for £35 approx €50 a month, whereas poor me has to pay €50 for a second rate nokia thats like a slow pc. it keeps randomly turning of, yet cost me €50 on conract-meteor-where i get only 300 mins/month and no free txts. oh and brutal coverage in donegal. is anyone who works in the mobile phone induystry at liberty to explain the unbelievebale difference between north and republic?!
take for example the new craze the LG touch screens, starting at €100 in rep. irl on contract, yet in n.irl one can be bought for free on contract!!!!!!!!

Meteor weredoing the nokia n95 for 49 and the samsung tocco for same.

The package plan you are on gives you all of your off peak calls to any network or landline inclusive in the price. Or you can have all of your calls and texts to your home network for free. It's your fault if you haven't opted into either of these offers.

The coverage issue is something you should have checked before taking a contract.

You can't buy something that is free.

All together it looks like you have it far better than your brother. You just need to open your eyes.

jor el

There was a piece on mobile phones on The Last Word tonight. The bottom line of the article was that the reason the prices are so much higher here than in the rest of the western world, is because we'll pay it. Simple as that. Profits are running at around 20% of revenue, which amounts to over 200M a year for each of the two big operators here, Vodafone and O2. They have plenty of money to subsidise the price of the handsets, and to offer cheaper calls and texts, but they don't need to, so they won't.

Another thing mentioned was that Irish people won't change provider, even to save money, so where's the incentive for any of the operators to change their stance if their not loosing any money or customers. The other main thing mentioned was that the price difference between all 4 operators here is very small. There isn't much to be saved by changing between any of them. Voda, Three and O2, which all have operations here and the UK, are doing the exact same thing with their prices for here Vs UK.

At the end of the day, it's our own fault for paying what they charge.

misnomer

its worth shopping around for your package, I got 350 mins of calls and 150 text for €50 on an 18 month contract on O2 and the tocco for free in the o2 store in waterford also had a choice of sony c902 for free I could have gotton all my o2 calls and text to o2 for €25. How long have you left on contract if its not long it might be worth while buying out your contract

Gillo

jor el wrote: »

Profits are running at around 20% of revenue, which amounts to over 200M a year for each of the two big operators here, Vodafone and O2.
Another thing mentioned was that Irish people won't change provider, even to save money, so where's the incentive for any of the operators to change their stance if their not loosing any money or customers.

I seriously doubt profits are anywhere near that high, can you back that up?

A lot of people do change networks, working in the retail arm of one the the network's, I can tell you that the vast majority of "new" customers are ports.

Mr. Presentable

jor el wrote: »

At the end of the day, it's our own fault for paying what they charge.

And that's the truth. So long as we are happy to be shafted, we will be. And it's not just phones - it's all across retail.

jor el

Gillo wrote: »

I seriously doubt profits are anywhere near that high, can you back that up?

Nope, but it was what was reported on The Last Word last night. The show is available on Podcast and that particular piece was on between 6-6.30PM. 20% was the figure quoted, and €200M+ profits.

They also said that the bulk of money is made in the contracts, not on PAYG or the handset sales, so perhaps since you work in the retail side, you don't see that. The majority of contracts are with businesses too, so it's not even under the control of most of us to do anything about the prices, as the businesses will always pay the bill.

Mr. Incognito

It's called "Paddy tax",

Look at the difference in prices in anything. Take an I-phone for instance.