Mobile data in the UK
Three’s rates are ridiculously cheap. We have friends of Danielle’s from America staying next week so I had a quick look to see how much it would cost to get them some basic cell service for their visit. They have HTC smartphones of some type, although I don’t yet know if they are carrier-locked. Hopefully not, so I can just swap their SIM card over to a UK one when they arrive.
I can get a pre-pay SIM card for free — well, actually for £10 with £10 of credit preloaded. That £10 of credit can buy a bundle of 500 MB of data, 100 minutes of voice, and 3000 SMS messages — all valid for 30 days. So that’s easily enough to cover their entire visit. For a tenner! And Three are by no means unique — I can similar deals from at least six different companies (our main networks Vodafone, O2, Orange and T-mobile, and some MVNO services like giffgaff and Tesco).
Feel free to try and work out how much this would cost on AT&T in the US and how much hassle it would be to buy. I’ve been around this loop when trying to make my unlocked iPhone work in the USA; it’s a pain in the arse and costs far, far more. This is because your mobile telecommunications market is fucked, America. The hippy-dippy European GSM patent-pooling business model won out over the ruthless American CDMA-style ruthless business model, and this is the proof.
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