Telkom: The Real Cost

[Bandwagon]

This is an extract from Wikipedia, the online global encyclopaedia.

There are two points of particular interest to the citizens of our
fledgling democracy:

1. Telkom is 39% owned by the Government

2. According to Wikipedia, an average ADSL subscriber in South Africa pays roughly R1,010 ($160 currency conversion) per month for access; the annual sum of this fee is slightly higher than the national per-capita income.

OK, so where is the democracy?

 

[kilo39]

OK, so where is the democracy?

The democracy is us paying for them

(the rich people supporting telkom supporting the government supporting the poor people)

 

[Dovi]

Old news haha. Btw someone should fix that post, R1010 is not what the average South African currently pays for ADSL..

 

[Clipse]

Id say the average atm is 384K line + 3gig adsl account = R350 + R230(avg for 3gig accounts) = R580

Still wondering where they got R1010 from

 

[Bandwagon]

Democracy

KILO
No problem with democracy (i.e. helping the government help the poor people). But we're talking about the exorbitant costs of bandwidth
in South Africa, and if Telkom are democratic about their fee structure for bandwidth they should apply the basic tenet of democracy: Government by the people. And the ADSL people want an equitable fee. If the Government is a shareholder of a system that charges 10 times more
for a basic service than any other service provider in the world, then that government is not only being undemocratic; it is being exploitative.

 

[kilo39]

then that government is not only being undemocratic; it is being exploitative

They don't have my vote

 

[VQuest]

Id say the average atm is 384K line + 3gig adsl account = R350 + R230(avg for 3gig accounts) = R580

Still wondering where they got R1010 from

Actually they were spot on. It used to cost us about R1010 in the beginning when we didn't have any other options. 512 = R680; 3GB = R249; Phone = +- R80

Quite sickening if you ask me.

 

[TMoose]

According to me the average price of ADSL access would be around:

R270 (192) + R359 (384) + R477 (512) + R680 (1024) / 4 = R446.50

R446.50 + R223.33 (average 3GB account, taking the cheapest, middle and most expensive prices from Hellkom - R100, R250 and R320 / 3)

= R669.83

So basically R670 more or less. And according to the CIA World Factbook South Africa's GDP per capita for 2004 was $11100 or R68265 at the current exchange rate (R6.15).

R670 * 12 = R8040 / R68265 = 11.7%

So the average South African ADSL user does NOT spend slightly more than the national per capita income on ADSL, even if it was R11100 instead of $11100.

 

[bekdik]

1. Telkom is 39% owned by the Government

Isn't it now higher than this with the DOC having control of part of the tinta buy back?

 

[Juice]

According to me the average price of ADSL access would be around:

R270 (192) + R359 (384) + R477 (512) + R680 (1024) / 4 = R446.50

R446.50 + R223.33 (average 3GB account, taking the cheapest, middle and most expensive prices from Hellkom - R100, R250 and R320 / 3)

= R669.83

So basically R670 more or less. And according to the CIA World Factbook South Africa's GDP per capita for 2004 was $11100 or R68265 at the current exchange rate (R6.15).

R670 * 12 = R8040 / R68265 = 11.7%

So the average South African ADSL user does NOT spend slightly more than the national per capita income on ADSL, even if it was R11100 instead of $11100.

You may be confusng average with median...

What you'd really have to do is take an acceptable sample of users representative of all ADSL users and find out what they're all paying individually, sum the individual totals and divide it by the number of people. That would give you an average.

If you want to calculate the average cost of the ADSL service across all the various options, then you'd simply add the individual options together and divide by the number of options.

Unfortunately the two scenarios above really have nothing to do with each other.

You can probably, for the sake of the argument, find out exactly what the users pay for ADSL on average by getting stats from Telkom directly. They'd at least be able to tell you to the last user how many people have which types of ADSL lines, so you can get a clear idea of the base cost. It won't be as easy to calculate the average subscription though, because you'll have to contact each of the ISP's directly and get the information from them, and even then you won't have an accurate picture because some people have multiple ADSL ISP accounts, but only a single Telkom ADSL line.

So we're probably back at using a representative sample and extrapolating an average for the entire population from that.

So, the average cost of an ADSL line may be R446.50, but what does the average user pay for ADSL? Who knows?



Juice

PS, Yes, it's a slow day at work...

 

[TMoose]

No. Median is the middle of a series of numbers, for example, the median of 1, 3, 5, 8 and 10 is 5. While the average of those numbers is 5.4.

I know perfectly well that what I gave isn't an accurate average (and said so in the original post), but it's the best I could do without having a database of all the ADSL users in South Africa in front of me. I believe that it'll be a pretty fair representitive anyway, and that it's pretty close to the truth. But that's just my opinion. In any case, the point of my post was to show that there's no way the average user pays R1010 per month for ADSL.

Call it a calculated guess if you will. But it wasn't a median.

 

[YAPOC]

192 and 384 shouldn't even be called ADSL. What you guys are paying for is not ADSL or broadband.

 

[mancombseepgood]

It's like...

It's like what my dad used to say when I spent too much time in the bath...

"Son, please get out of the bath, everyone else wants to bath.."

but that may be OT

 

[Carlhead]

According to me the average price of ADSL access would be around:

R270 (192) + R359 (384) + R477 (512) + R680 (1024) / 4 = R446.50

R446.50 + R223.33 (average 3GB account, taking the cheapest, middle and most expensive prices from Hellkom - R100, R250 and R320 / 3)

= R669.83

So basically R670 more or less. And according to the CIA World Factbook South Africa's GDP per capita for 2004 was $11100 or R68265 at the current exchange rate (R6.15).

R670 * 12 = R8040 / R68265 = 11.7%

So the average South African ADSL user does NOT spend slightly more than the national per capita income on ADSL, even if it was R11100 instead of $11100.

I seriously doubt that it's $11100 more like R11100... you forgot your standard Telkom line rental R87 making the average R757 which is about 80% of GDP per capita... still disgusting!

 

[Nick333]

192 and 384 shouldn't even be called ADSL. What you guys are paying for is not ADSL or broadband.

Wether its broadband or not is debatable, but its definitly ADSL. Just slow ADSL.

 

[jabulani]

192 and 384 shouldn't even be called ADSL. What you guys are paying for is not ADSL or broadband.

Well whatever it is it would be fairly useless to be on a 2Mb link and have an enforced 3Gb cap! What would you do on the 2nd of the month?

 

[Carlhead]

Well whatever it is it would be fairly useless to be on a 2Mb link and have an enforced 3Gb cap! What would you do on the 2nd of the month?

Get another account... one for each day... and 2 for busy days

 

[PostmanPot]

192 and 384 shouldn't even be called ADSL. What you guys are paying for is not ADSL or broadband.

broadband



<communications> A class of communication channel capable of
supporting a wide range of frequencies, typically from audio
up to video frequencies. A broadband channel can carry
multiple signals by dividing the total capacity into multiple,
independent bandwidth channels, where each channel operates
only on a specific range of frequencies.

The term has come to be used for any kind of Internet
connection with a download speed of more than 56 kbps,
usually some kind of Digital Subscriber Line, e.g. ADSL.

 

[TMoose]

I seriously doubt that it's $11100 more like R11100... you forgot your standard Telkom line rental R87 making the average R757 which is about 80% of GDP per capita... still disgusting!

You can seriously doubt it all you want, but it stays a fact. No matter how much you hate Telkom or the country, the facts don't change.

South Africa's GDP in 2004 was US$491.1bn. GDP per capita was $11100. Last years figure should be about 4.9% higher @ roughly US$515.1bn and $11600 respectively.

http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/sf.html

No offense, but it's clear to me that you're ignorant to the fact that South Africa has the largest economy in Africa and the 23rd largest economy on the planet. Haha, R11100, that's so naieve it's almost funny.

Why add line rental? You're paying it already aren't you? You have to have a telephone line to get ADSL in any country on Earth. So why do you add it like some special fee? That charge has nothing to do with ADSL, it's for analogue access. It's true that we're being ripped off and that we shouldn't be paying ADSL line rental, but that doesn't enable us to magically add the regular line rental to the ADSL charges.

ADSL consists of ISP + Line rental. That's the money you pay for ADSL. You don't pay your telephone line rental for ADSL, because you'd still have to pay it whether you have ADSL or not.

192 and 384 shouldn't even be called ADSL. What you guys are paying for is not ADSL or broadband.

ADSL is just a technology. The technology being used is ADSL. You still call your 650 watt microwave a microwave, even though the neighbours might have an 800 watt one.

 

[Nick333]

No offense, but it's clear to me that you're ignorant to the fact that South Africa has the largest economy in Africa and the 23rd largest economy on the planet. Haha, R11100, that's so naieve it's almost funny.

Considering the poverty that the majority of people living in this country are subjected to one would have to assume that there is a gross imballence in per capita income if GDP per capita is indeed $11100.
How much would one ceo who earns R12 million distort the picture considering that we all now that millions of people here are unemployeed ?
No offense but your confusion between statistics and actual quality of life is so naive its downright sad.

Why add line rental? You're paying it already aren't you? You have to have a telephone line to get ADSL in any country on Earth. So why do you add it like some special fee? That charge has nothing to do with ADSL, it's for analogue access. It's true that we're being ripped off and that we shouldn't be paying ADSL line rental, but that doesn't enable us to magically add the regular line rental to the ADSL charges.

I pay for a analogue phone line I dont even have a phone connected to, because I cant have an ADSL without one, thats why I add it to my calculations as to what I pay for internet connection every month.