International Call rates

[colinw2410]

PAYG customers under Vodafone Freebie rates pay significantly less for calls to UAE than a longstanding (10 years +)  Pay Monthly customer.

On my pay monthly package I can obtain chealer rates of 20p p/m for a fee of £5 p/mth

as a PAYG customer I can register for Vodafone Freebies using 4351 from the phone and then when I top up for say £10 I get 60 international minutes which works out at a rate of 16.66p p/m.

that compares to my total rate of 28.33p p/m;

This gets worse if I increase the PAYG top up to £30, where you get 240 minutes which works out at rate of 12.5p

whereas on my monthly plan this equates to £53 or 22.08p p/m.

Where is lyalty rewarded here!!!!!

[ToniCa]

Do any of the Freebies still exist for new opt-ins? As far as I know, they were all discontinued quite a while ago, although customers who were already opted in remain opted in until they opt out or do something, like opting in to the Big Value Bundle, which would remove them from the Freebie.

Freebies were always incompatible with any of the other PAYG products, so remaining opted in to Freebie International Minutes would mean paying for all your other services at OOB rates - UK calls at 30p a minute, texts at 14p, data at a mininmum £2 a day on any day you use it - so it's highly unlikely to be an economic prospect.

If it is still possible to opt in, and you regularly make a lot of calls there, it might conceivably be worth having a separate PAYG account just for calls to UAE, but it's one heck of an inconvenience. If you decide to give this a whirl, make sure that you get your confirmatory text that you have opted in before topping up, or else your top-up won't trigger the Freebie. Good luck!

[colinw2410]

Totally, I would get confirmation first.  My main point is partly inconvenience but more around how PAYG seem to be valued more than Pay Monthly customers and those of us that have been long serving customers get little if any loyalty rewards/benefits

[ToniCa]

Well, the grass is always greener....

My general impression is that, for the heavier users, the deals available for Pay Monthly are significantly better than those for PAYG, while at the lighter end of the range the differences are less marked, and the rewards scheme (although halved in value about a year ago) does make a bit of difference, especially since we can leave any time we like without penalty. As to feeling more valued, well, the rewards scheme is a small plus, but Vodafone does have a deflating tendency to make statements about "customer benefits" which don't apply to PAYG, and the Support section is littered with minor inaccuracies about PAYG, which certainly leave me feeling that Vodafone sets up some good schemes for PAYG, then isn't interested enough to follow through properly. But, twenty-something years later, I'm still here, though still inclined to grumble.

[ToniCa]

After my last post, I found https://support.vodafone.co.uk/Vodafone-products-and-services/Pay-as-you-go/Vodafone-Freebies/482861...

I rang 4351, listened to the description, then chose to hear the Ts&Cs. Listened to those, then, when I thought I'd be asked to opt in, promptly got cut off. Rang again, chose to opt in (on my spare account), confirmed I understood that I'd be opted out of PAYG1, and was told that it would be activated within 30 mins, so shouldn't top up until I'd had my text.

Two hour later, no text re that, but two texts asking me how satisfied I was with the outcome of my call. I'm moderately sure that the support page is just Vodafone not bothering to tidy up properly after a change in its PAYG offering, but I'll make a few more attempts to opt in, and let you know how I get along.

[ToniCa]

After 24 hrs, no sign of my confirmatory text, and 2345 still informed me I was on PAYG1. So I tried again, exactly the same except that, before being cut off from the Ts&Cs, I was informed that the service was currently unavailable, so please try later. But it still let me opt in via the other option. I persuaded 2 friends to give it a try, with exactly the same outcome.

So I'm even more sure that the Freebie isn't available for new opt-ins. Well, it's one thing not bothering to tidy away old info if the only customers offended are PAYG, but the evidence is that at least one Pay Monthly customer is also being offended, in which case Vodafone should perhaps take it more seriously?