Unlimited social, messaging data planned: Vodacom
Vodacom is looking at offering services such as unlimited messaging, and unlimited social network usage to complement its smaller data bundles.
This is according to Phil Patel, chief consumer officer at Vodacom, who was answering questions about how the network plans to respond to Cell C and 8ta offering unlimited BBM with their BlackBerry Z10 contracts.
Cell C in particular has packages specific to BlackBerry 10 that offers data allowances of 500MB per month for R39, 1GB for R57, and 2GB for R99 per month.
Patel said that Vodacom doesn’t have any plans to respond with its own BlackBerry-specific data deals, but added that they want to offer a worry-free experience to all their subscribers and not just BlackBerry users.
Part of their “limitless changes everything” approach, Patel said, is giving subscribers the certainty that basic smartphone functions won’t cause them to be charged out-of-bundle for messaging and social networking.

Phil Patel
For deals with smaller data bundles, this means offering unlimited messaging and social networking.
Larger bundles won’t get this, Patel explained, because online messaging and social services use very little data. The higher data cap therefore already gives subscribers the experience of “limitless” usage of such basic services, Patel said.
Other projects are also underway to help users avoid going out-of-bundle, according to Patel. These include real-time notifications when approaching your cap, with simplified data buying through the Vodacom app.
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