UK: Wrong Tariffs are costing us £8.45bn per year!
Posted by Ben on Saturday, January 19th, 2008 at 7:42 pm under UK retail, Financial
A study by moneysupermarket.com has found that the Mobile Phone Industry is raking in more than £8.45bn per year from customers on the wrong tariff!
A study conducted last November revealed that the 'typical' user has 166 voice minutes and 133 SMSs per month free, as part of their package. But, the 'typical' user also uses an extra 23 voice minutes, and 23 SMSs over and above their allowance, thus incurring up to £130 extra per year.
What we are basically saying here is that lots of people (over 2000 in the study, at least) don’t check their tariffs regularly, and hence don’t have the most appropriate tariffs.
I use O2 in the UK, and my experience in this area is great when I do call them – O2 are only too happy to do a usage review with me, and advise where I could tweak the tariff!
Nonetheless, if this report is any kind of indication, it does suggest that many people are getting hit for charges that they might not necessarily have to pay, were they more interactive with their provider.
Update: apparently there was some over-calculation on the figures (due to the fact that the UK market is heavily Prepay), so in fact the figure is closer to £2.5bn. But heck, that’s still pretty big…
[Via: Mobile Marketing Magazine]
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