cwathen wrote:StuartPlymouth wrote:12 months into an 18 month contract with Orange you can renew (ie upgrade - read the small print)
Yes, but I can upgrade to handsets and packages of Orange's choosing not my own. I would still be under contract for another 6 months so they weren't going to bend over backwards and upgrade me to a premium handset if I didn't have the option of leaving without paying them off.
Yes, they were going to bend over backwards (and did), because you were upgrading your talk plan at the same time. You went from a Dolphin35 to a Panther45, which you could've done on day 2 of your previous contract, but without a handset upgrade. You haven't "bought-out of your old contract for nothing", you have simply replaced and upgraded it - a common practice, certainly with Orange.
The handset upgrade is determined by the rating Orange hold for your account: dependent on size of bill, payments being on time and length of continuous connection to their network. You can have any handset you want, but sometimes they charge if it's above your threshold. They are always willing to write off the upgrade fee to keep a customer, I used to do that quite often.
cwathen wrote:And actually slightly less than £5 extra per month - my old Dolphin 35 was an ex. vat deal so I was actually paying £41.13 per month. I'm now on Lobster 45 (or something) but paying £45 inc. vat per month, so over the life of the contract. Over the entire 18 months of the contract (assuming I don't downgrade), I'm going to be paying £69.66 more than my old one - hardly a major increase (and because I have so much more included, it wouldn't surprise me if actual bills went down).
All Orange talkplans are inclusive of VAT. Your Dolphin35 was therefore set up incorrectly if you were paying more for the actual tarrif (You should question your previous bills). If you now have the correct talkplan for your usage (Panther45 - not
lobster)then your bills should indeed go down as you shouldn't be exceeding the call/data/text limits.
cwathen wrote:StuartPlymouth wrote:your mobile number is portable to any network anytime (by Ofcom rules)
I am aware of that, but the concencus seems to be that whilst you can port from one network to another, you cannot port between different agreements on the same network, hence the O2 stopgap.
Not true. There was no need for any porting to take place here at all! I'm not familiar with the handset you had before, or changed to. Had they been compatible with the same SIM card then you simply put the old one in the new phone, the number is with it. If they weren't compatible, the dealer registers the new SIM with your account and the number swaps automatically when the card becomes active (normally 2 to 24 hours), and at the same time your old SIM is deactivated.
You may have been in a Phones4U store, but the Orange call centre administered the deal over the telephone. Phones4U just got a healthy commission for having tempted you off the street. Had you gone into an Orange store, or done the deal on-line or over the phone you probably would have got a better offer, as they wouldn't be paying any commission.
If you're happy with the deal you got, then that's fine. But be aware that you were told quite alot of unnecessary spin by P4U to make you believe you were getting something nobody else could offer. The fact is, you could've got something better by going directly to the network concerned (as is normally the case with mobiles).
