- Monday, 9 November 2009
- INQ Mobile
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All the cudgels in Christendom, Kent or New England will never make me quiet - Randolph
Nothing is ever simple with PAYG mobile broadband
THE INQ has been struggling to help out a PAYG (pre-paid) user of 3 UK's mobile broadband service top up his internet access. The guy was insistent that it must be possible to top up using one of those green and black cards. It ain't.
His problem stems from the disadvantage of suffering from a serious speech impediment. So the ability to top up his mobile phone with an ordinary swipe card at any outlet was a definite bonus.
So he was hoping the same would be true with mobile broadband. Sadly, it isn't. 3 UK only offers an e-voucher solution or an online debit payment.
The reason for our reader for turning down the second option is easy. He's opted for PAYG because it uses cash - whereas he struggles with bank accounts.
The first option does work, but it means slipping a note to his local newsagent in order to obtain the necessary e-voucher with its 16 digit code.
The last obstacle facing our reader had the INQ scratching its head for a while. If you've run out of credit, how do you go online and type in the 16 digit number to top up your mobile broadband? Which is what you must do?
The answer is that 3 doesn't stop you from visiting its portal even when you're out of credit. So you can go onto 'My3' even if you're out of credit.
It's a bit of a bizarre situation really. But it enforces the INQ's view that signing up for and using mobile broadband should be made much simpler.
We heard from another reader who owns a laptop with an embedded 3G Sim capability. He simply bought a 3 mobile broadband dongle; fitted it inside his laptop PC; then sold the naked dongle on Ebay for £30.
Why don't the networks give up and just sell mobile broadband SIM cards separately? µ
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About half an hour ago I was all but abusing some Filipino girl.
I started the call "I HOPE THAT CALL IS BEING RECORDED SO THAT THE SERVICE CAN BE IMPROVED"
Vat es ya numBer pleeze? she says
Virgin Wireless Broadband
In the end she hung up on me and I had to start again - another 20mins on my mobile (revtel)
At the time the Virgin modem (Huwei?) was cheaper that telstra's and they seemed to offer better data deals.
The trouble is that even though they have given me an online account to log into, there is no usage, account history and worst of all i CAN'T RECHARGE online.
So I then phone their 1300 555 100 customer service number, full of advertising and another useless piece of software for automated recharge.
You got it that fails too.
So then I have to join the Cue and talk to an operator - a Filipino in the Philippines.
The other killer with the service is the constant drop outs, since writing this I have dropped off the network four times - inactivity for a few seconds and or more than a couple of megs download can cause it to stop and then drop off the network.
I'm told that this is because of contention (Optus is the Carrier/ Wireless system) and 6pm when everyone is on their mobile phone - each user is only allowed a tiny piece.
Every time I connect it says 7.2MB connection - even at 10% of that, I've never had - maybe 200KB a couple of times - like 3am.
Most of the time it equals dialup
$15 buys 500MB, $30 = 1GB, $50 = 3GB and 60 days to use it.
I'll be getting ADSL2+ soon, hopefully my new landlord will approve the Central Filter.
I'd like to comment on this story because I have had 1st hand experiences of this top-up problem.
Could I point out that although you can connect to the My3 portal to enter a top up, YOU CAN NOT PAY BY CARD unless you already have credit. Let me explain. When you go to enable a credit card on the My3 portal it uses on of those bank verification systems. Thats good for security fair enough, but if you have no credit, you can't leave the My3 portal, so after 5mins waiting for the verification page to load, it fails.
So a word of warning, if you ever want to use a credit card to pay for top-up's online, make sure you have done it BEFORE you run out of credit and not end up travelling from my hotel (in a remote part of Scotland) to a petrol station to buy a top-up.
On the plus side once it's up and running it's pretty fast and reliable.
Errhhh, you don't have to buy a 3 USB dongle to use 3 mobile broadband on PAYG.
Simply buy a standard PAYG SIM card (a fiver IIRC) and then add the mobile bundle to it on My3.
It's what I and other members of my family have done, and it works fine.
Regards,
Dave
Your friend knows 3 PAYG BB is £1 per MB?
Just pay the £10 a month and save your self a shedload of money. To get the same amount of bandwidth from PAYG (1 GB) would cost you a grand FFS.
This is wrong, you just add it as a data bundle, get exactly the same as a dedicated sim. By specifying data bundle, the credit can not be shared with call/txt credit. If you do not specify data bundle, you will pay £1 per Mb, but the credit can be used how you want.
QUOTE Woah. . .
Your friend knows 3 PAYG BB is £1 per MB? Just pay the £10 a month and save your self a shedload of money. To get the same amount of bandwidth from PAYG (1 GB) would cost you a grand FFS. END QUOTE.