https://www.*.com.au/telstra-vodafone-unlimited-mobile-data-plans-2018-5
Testra and Vodafone will offer customers unlimited mobile data deals from this week in a fierce new competition for the mobile market.
Both telcos announced plans for unlimited data plans yesterday, with the Vodafone offers starting today, May 2, and Telstra’s from Thursday.
The moves come after rival Optus dabbled briefly in uncapped data deals over the last two months.
Of course there are limits to the “unlimited” in the fine print. Vodafone’s plans come at $60, $80 and $100 per month price points, offering between 40GB and 120GB of data at normal network speeds before additional data is at a capped speed of 1.5Mbps.
Vodafone Consumer Business Unit Director Ben McIntosh said more than half of the average time spent online is now via a mobile device.
“Our $80 Unlimited Plan comes with 70GB data at our normal network speeds which is enough to stream every episode of Stranger things ever made, every single month on Netflix,” he said.
The Vodafone plans are offered in one, two and three year contracts in a bundle with a smartphone.
Telstra’s mobile plan is $69 per month for a year, but it’s BYO phone, with the download speed uncapped to 40GB then, like Vodafone, it drops to 1.5Mbps for the remainder of the monthly billing cycle.
The telco’s Group Executive of Consumer and Small Business, Vicki Brady, says the throttled speed is still fast enough to stream video in standard definition, listen to music, browse the web and access social media.
The Telstra plan also includes unlimited talk, text and MMS to standard Australian numbers, access to Telstra Air hotspots. The telco says customers also get access to live streaming of AFL, NRL and netball games in 2018.
Optus, which yesterday announced it had secured the Australian rights to another three years of the English Premier League as it moves towards becoming an entertainment business, said it had “no comment at this stage” on whether it would introduce unlimited data plans too.
