Pre-paid competition heating up for Virgin

[revorushin]

Just to clear the air, Virgins rates are best.
They are:
74c per minute V2V (bettering Cell C's 99c C2C)
99c per minute to other networks (equallig Cell C)
SMS 45c
Data 45c/meg (NOT 60c) (bettering all networks but equal to 8ta)

[falcon786]

Just to clear the air, Virgins rates are best.
They are:
74c per minute V2V (bettering Cell C's 99c C2C)
99c per minute to other networks (equallig Cell C)
SMS 45c
Data 45c/meg (NOT 60c) (bettering all networks but equal to 8ta)

What on earth are you talking about?
Their website clearly states that their post paid rates are R2.35 per minute charged PER MINUTE,thats even worse than MTN and you comparing to cell c.MTN atleast bills per second at that price on an anytime 100 contract,on the higher contracts the rates come down even.

Cell C is currently the best contract supplier for telecoms as far as rates go.

And dont even mention v2v because who the hell is on virgin mobile,i have yet to come across anyone using their network.NOT EVEN ONE PERSON THAT I KNOW.

[rorz0r]

Virgin mobile are still around?

[eshwar]

Its only value if you can use the ##!#@$%#$ network! Most of the times even if it is Cell C piggybacking, that piggybacking doesn't happen. Its not seamless and they suggest manual network selection. Defeats the point of automatic selection right?

People sign up for itemised billing and they don't receive it. Its appalling. I would support them, but I have an expectation of service.

Here's waht I will go ahead and say. If they offer me a contract that I can get out of early (i'll return the phone no problem) because of bad service, I would sign up. otherwise no. not 2 years of torture.

plus anyway, cell c has lovely contracts now !

[chrisc4290]

Pity Richard Branson does not have anything to do with it any more. He would not take this kind of *** from anyone remotely associated with his brand. When I worked in London in the '80s, there were a few Virgin Megastores around. There was an article in the newspaper about a Megastore employee who got fired because she would not refund a customer for something he had purchased in error. After the fuss had died down, RB posted his conditions of employment. In the 8 paragraphs of the contract, each one emphasised service to the customer above all and made it crystal clear that no waivers would be allowed. You did your job like your employer wanted, or you left.

And that included being commercially competitive.

[SaiyanZ]

They have become more expensive over the last year or two. I'm almost at the end of my 2 year contract with them. Galaxy S @ R300pm which gives R300 airtime and 1000 free SMSs.

The Galaxy S II currently goes for R322pm with only R200 airtime. So they're giving R100 less airtime than they used to. The Galaxy S1 was a similar price to the S2 at release so the decrease in value can't be due to difference in hardware costs.

I just checked their website. The S2 retails for around R5600 whereas my S1 retailed for around R7600 when I signed up for the R300pm for R300 airtime contract. So the hardware costs are actually R2000 lower at the moment and they are offering R100 less airtime per month with the S2. Way less value than before.

[Tpex]

That pathetic excuse for a virgin company is still around?

[SUPERMAN89]

I LOL @ this article

[mercurial]

You'll be my myBB junior proofreader.

Foshizzle Jeremy still hasn't rectified it. I noticed he made some other errors in his other articles as well.

[Korn1]

Virgin mobile is pretty good for me,they had a good deal when I got my phone .

Only have Edge so can't comment on the 3G .

[K3NS31]

Actually, they're right. I'm only changing to Cell C now for a reason - it's only with the advent of their new pricing that everything's cheap enough to warrant moving (voice, data and SMS (yes, I still use those. Why wouldn't I when I had 500 free/month)). I will finally save money with Cell C now, with my usage patterns.
They had to bring out a fully customisable, cheap data bundle, voice, sms bundled package to actually be cheaper. And Voda and MTN? Don't make me laugh. So as it stands, in terms of price, I reckon for most people Virgin are still the 2nd cheapest for actually communicating via mobile. Wouldn't know how it works out if you want phone contracts and stuff, since I try to avoid those.

And for those who are complaining about data coverage, I dunno where you are, but in Cape Town I get far better coverage via Virgin piggy backing on Cell C (phone SIM) than I do via Vodacom (laptop SIM) - this despite the laptop having significantly better reception (built-in laptop antenna vs small-even-by-cellphone-standards Xperia Mini antenna)

[ave]

I have gone to them expectantly every time I was due for an upgrade, and have always found their contracts wanting- dont know about prepaid, but they are far behind the competition when it comes to contracts. They can learn a few lessons from red bull mobile.

[entrepr]

The subscriber numbers always speak volumes about where the value lies.

Agreed - customers are often dumb and easily swayed by simple advertising, especially with mobile. But even after allowing for that, Virgin simply hasn't garnered customer interest.

[lcbxx]

Triumphantly walked away from MTN to Virgin Mobile a couple of years back when Branson launched the service.
Crawled back to MTN, hat in hand, 7 months later, after Branson left.

[K3NS31]

Well, we all have different needs. Personally, I've saved a substantial amount using Virgin instead of Vodacom over the last 2 and a bit years. Only moving cos I'll be saving even more on the new Cell C deals.
I gotta say, it feels good to know I'm no longer financing a significant portion of Super Rugby. Damn, I gave Voda a lotta money over the years.