Pre Paid Data Bundles [PPDBs]

[piranha786]

GooD BYE TELKOM, oh ... sorry VODACOM

 

[caspa]

V3G for president....where would 3G be with out him????

 

[MrG]

Contract billing systems are off-line systems, i.e. they can do the billing after the fact or at best near-real-time, every few hours for example.

Pre-paid is a fully real-time system, i.e. as each byte is sent or received, it must come off your pre-paid credit.

You can imagine it's a much more complex system. Before the question is asked, data is a completely different system to voice, so the pre-paid voice billing systems can't work for data.

So a brand new, real-time billing system. And it must be able to count (in real-time) down to byte level per user.

As far as I know, MTN only counts the data after the user disconnects, or otherwise on a 12hr basis. (Even Prepaid)

 

[ajax]

As far as I know, MTN only counts the data after the user disconnects, or otherwise on a 12hr basis. (Even Prepaid)

Highly unlikely. In 12 hours you can download more than a gig on 3G.
Maybe it is 10 minutes or something?

 

[Mams]

how then do vodacom cut you off precisely when u used your credit up ( on prepaid ) whilst on 3g/gprs? they obviously are using real time billing!! Go ahead and try it...take a prepaid card with R4 credit on it and try downloading a 2.5mb file and then see how u almost complete the download but get disconnected and recieve a sms saying u out off credit

 

[redarrow]

As far as I know, MTN only counts the data after the user disconnects, or otherwise on a 12hr basis. (Even Prepaid)

I don't know about 12 hourly.. but I'm pretty certain they don't bill per byte..

They have an odd sort of system, I've noticed when browsing via MTN,
my prepaid credit seems to drop suddenly by about R1.00 and then stay stagnant for a while whilst browsing, and sometimes when disconnecting it gets reimbursed by a couple of cents...

So it seems like they take a certain amount before you use the data, and aterwards put back what you didn't use or something like that

Just my observations..

 

[MrG]

Yeah, well that was not like that for me

 

[Mams]

pREPAID DATA BUNDLES>>>>>>>>>>>>>this year??

 

[caspa]

If i can predict V3G's next post......."Pre-paid bundle's are on track for the 1'st of March"

 

[redarrow]

What I'd like to know is whether Vodacom has a "release only on particular days" strategy of some sort?

In other words: If Vodacom gets all their testing and problems sorted out, lets say tomorrow (fat chance - yea I know ) would we have to wait till the end of the week / month or would they release it within say 24 hours or the same day?

 

[caspa]

most likely the start of the week so they can advertise in the sunday paper.

 

[murray654]

bye bye vodacom helo MTN

Was away from my desk taday so need to check where we are. Will revert.

Hi,

The non availability of data bundles is really sad. I have been testing MTN, and although the speed is slower, for reasons of economy I have to change service providers as soon as the balance is zero on my vodacom sim card.

Bye bye Vodacom Yello MTN,

Murray

 

[kilo39]

me believes telkom showing its hidden hand in voda not releasing these packages - telkom really running vodacom - and telkom can do no good - so - no pre-paid.

 

[RompelStompel]

Same here , goodbye Vodacom 3G - Hello MTN 3G .

Will continue to use Vodacom for voice comms - only wish prepaid data bundles will appear sometime this year

RompelStompel

 

[nicovdw]

Last I heard, it will *definately* be here before the Gautrain.

 

[eben80]

I switched over to MTN yesterday for my data.... Gave up on the first call to CC but then again you can do everything through IVR and their website.....

Its not a hard decision between 10 mins waiting on the phone in the off chance that something does go round or paying more than double for my data ALL the time......

 

[MrG]

so I guess everyone has just forgotten about Vodacom Prepaid Databundles

 

[caspa]

Yip, we all on mtn.....

 

[nicovdw]

Another month, another Sunday.

No word on databundles yet.

 

[nicovdw]

Another month, another Sunday.

No word on databundles yet.