irnbru14

OK, I have a work phone but its an antiquated and un-user friendly pile of rubbish, I have my Sony Ericsson I brought from home which I use as Vodafone Pre-Pay, mostly for texting, and am wondering if I should think of getting a contract?

Any thoughts?

Vodafone is easier as I can use my existing very good handset, whereas I would need a phone with Telecom as they don't use Sim Cards (!?!?!?)...but all the decent deals are on 24 month contract which I don't really want, mainly as at the moment I am legally not allowed to be here in 2 years time!!!

Is a 12 month contract worth it, if I take a 24 month how hard is it to get out of???

howden40

Almost impossible to get out of contracts, you need to leave the country.

Both my husband and son took out a contract before they new we were emigrating, when the time came the matter was discussed with the 'telephone service', they were adamant the contract had to be honored, so when the final bill came in they duly paid up for the last month rental and using and gave written notification that they had no forwarding address as leaving the country permanently on 30.12.07.

I personally don't like contract, it's too easy to go over board, fortunately when my young son went over budget on his first contract phone (to the tune of £1,200), we were a LOT more comfortable than we are now and I was able to pay it off for him, we discussed this with the company to try and terminate the contract, but couldn't so we dropped to the minimum tariff and he bought a pay as you go.

Research to see which suits you best, you can do some pre-pay with quite good deals on txts.

irnbru14

Yeah I had similar problems with Orange when trying to get out of my contract, ended up dropping the tarrif to the minimum one for the last 4 months, bah!

Just trying to guarantee my outgoings on a monthly basis, find myself spending more on PAYG than I would like, mostly texting, vodafone PAYG is on and you can add 2000 texts a month but thats only to Vodafone mobiles, isn't great when half your friends are on telecom, other option is that Telecom do a great deal with PAYG texts to all/both networks, but would involve me buying a new phone and they are sooooo expensive here, and I love my Sony Ericsson!!!

Worst thing is this 24 month contract thing, its crazy!!

Kiwiprincess

I did a wee search and it came up with this:

http://www.vodafone.co.nz/plans/endi...oose-plans.jsp

Which I think is clear as mud. It purports to be clear then adds little disclaimers in after each table of charges. Grrrr.

howden40

[QUOTE=irnbru14;6435817]Yeah I had similar problems with Orange when trying to get out of my contract, ended up dropping the tarrif to the minimum one for the last 4 months, bah!

Ours were both Orange and Vodaphone. Orange being the one my son ran up the £1,200 bill, we dropped to lowest tarrif for contract to be terminated at end of years contract. then at the end of the year Orange rang to see if he wanted to renew contract - he said no, but 6 months later got a bill for 6 months at the higher original tarrif. Discussed with Orange who agreed the phone had not been used for 11 months, but when they rang re; renewal of contract they were actually asking if wanted to upgrade, so had said no to upgrade rather than continuing present contract - asked how on earth are we supposed to realise that 'do you want to renew contract' means do you want to upgrade,

Didn't pay anything in the end. Would never use orange again.

Having said that vodaphone UK probably wouldn't give us a contract now having run out - but we did pay up until leaving, we didn't run up a bill and run

hazeandsteve

I had a good look at them, mainly due to my being worried I was spending too much on PAYG. None of the staff seemed to want to listen to my questions, they'd already decided what contract I needed, all of which seemed to cost more than I'm currently paying
I decided to keep topping up my Vodafone at $20 at a time. At least I just get cut off when drunkenly phoning mates in UK....

Kiwiprincess

Grrr I hate people not listening! though I had the opposite problem regarding 'upgrading'.

I went into a Vodafone store in Wellington to discuss getting a blackberry. Not particularly because I wanted a blackberry but I was on a bit of a fact finding mission for work (people asking for them or similar without really wanting one...ie they just wanted a cool phone so i decided to find out more about them myself so i could answer questions). I literally asked them to tell me about a blackberry, what features it had, how it differed from a regular phone (ok i knew about emails, but i wanted it just that little bit clearer). I *did* ask questions. Contract costs, if it was possible to get one as a private account rather than a business account etc.

And the stupid guy turned around and showed me a $300 phone and started discussing that one and how it would be a good phone. Now i am not expert but even i know there is a big difference somewhere along the line between a phone costing $300 and a phone costing $1000. He could have asked questions before deciding that a blackberry, or similar, would be wasted on me.

Just made me annoyed.