# Mobile phone tariffs



## 1790260

Have we any geeky types amongst us? I've no questions, it's just a discussion piece.

I've been looking at mobile phone tariffs of late (I look periodically for deals and happily hop from one deal to another) and it seems to me that prices are steadily increasing.

I'm not a big phone user; a couple of hours of calls a month is more than enough and less than 5gb data. Tariffs now are, in general, offering way more data than that (it's how people use there phones these days) for corresponding higher tariffs.

Around a year back, I snapped up a 200gb £12 a month deal for our home network (home phone, internet, streaming, etc) from Red (SFR) More than enough, I rarely use more than half of that. Out of interest, I looked at what they could offer me today - 100gb at 17€pm!

I thought the advent of 5G might drive down 4G only tarifs, but maybe the opposite is true and the infrastructure investment has to be recouped quickly.

Best deals are these days via the virtuals (resellers if you like) and they can be a mixed bag service wise.

I think I might have to radically revise my budget (or my needs!) if I want to change again. My current €2pm for 1gb data and 4h calls looks to be a keeper for a while yet.


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## Befuddled

If you can wade through the minefield of offers and make any sense of them I commend you. It seems the providers try to make it as difficult as possible to compare like for like. Having no mobile network coverage here at home I have never been particularly worried about owning one. For a landline at home I ended up with Orange/SOSH, the bare bones deal that gives me landline and internet. When I took up the offer it also gave me a mobile Sim in with the deal all for 30€ a month. I haven't a clue how many calls or data that includes because I don't use the mobile.


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## Crabtree

You can have what deal you like but if the only way of getting a signal is standing on your garden bench that is placed in the only part of the garden where there is a signal or driving 3 km up the road ..... check with your neighbours which company has the best signal in your area


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## 1790260

Crabtree said:


> You can have what deal you like but if the only way of getting a signal is standing on your garden bench


I feel your pain!

Fortunately, we have good coverage with the antenne only around 2 or 3 km up the road. SFR gives the best reception here, by a whisker, and is my preferred network.

We used to have a SOSH internet/phone but that wasn't full speed ADSL, we only got RADSL. Nothing would stream on that and with no chance of getting fibre optic (foreseeably) around here I opted for a 4G modem. It works well for the most part.


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## Nomoss

Appunti. I have a Huawei 4G router with a Free Mobile SIM card, and with the house phone system (3 Gigasets) plugged into it. Do you have problems with your 4G modem similar to mine? -

To log into my UK bank using 2-stage verification I have to key or speak a code on the screen into my phone.
If I do so using the house phone the code is not recognised, whether keyed or spoken.
The call now goes to my mobile phone, which works correctly.

When making a call, if I speak before my correspondent has stopped, their voice is cut off until I stop speaking, so it doesn't seem to use a duplex system, but a switched simplex one. I now try to remember to wait before replying.

The third problem is that the answer phone of the Gigaset doesn't work properly.
If I set any delay before responding it doesn't answer, so messages are recorded by the Free "Voicemail".
The Gigaset answer phone works only on the "Immediate" setting, but the phones don't ring, so have decided to switch to that when we go out, as it is the only setting where my personal message is sent out.

I want to record a personal message for the Free sevice, but have to record it as an MP3 or WAV file, to do which it seems I have to download an app., which I have not yet found the time to do. The W10 Sound Recorder produces M4A files.


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## Jfhjfh

appunti said:


> Have we any geeky types amongst us? I've no questions, it's just a discussion piece.
> 
> I've been looking at mobile phone tariffs of late (I look periodically for deals and happily hop from one deal to another) and it seems to me that prices are steadily increasing.
> 
> I'm not a big phone user; a couple of hours of calls a month is more than enough and less than 5gb data. Tariffs now are, in general, offering way more data than that (it's how people use there phones these days) for corresponding higher tariffs.
> 
> Around a year back, I snapped up a 200gb £12 a month deal for our home network (home phone, internet, streaming, etc) from Red (SFR) More than enough, I rarely use more than half of that. Out of interest, I looked at what they could offer me today - 100gb at 17€pm!
> 
> I thought the advent of 5G might drive down 4G only tarifs, but maybe the opposite is true and the infrastructure investment has to be recouped quickly.
> 
> Best deals are these days via the virtuals (resellers if you like) and they can be a mixed bag service wise.
> 
> I think I might have to radically revise my budget (or my needs!) if I want to change again. My current €2pm for 1gb data and 4h calls looks to be a keeper for a while yet.


I doubt if you will get much better than that, but I have a Lebara account (mine is UK based, but they are in France also) and they have a variety of good deals. The reason I got it was that it includes free roaming, unlike most of the other UK providers, which will save me a lot until I get a French number (we are in the process of moving to France), so if this is important to you I would have a look at their offers. They are a virtual network (in the UK they piggy-back on Vodafone and in France on SFR), but the service so far has been good. There is no contract, just an automatically renewing monthly fee that can be cancelled at any time.


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## 1790260

Nomoss said:


> Do you have problems with your 4G modem similar to mine? -


The short answer is no, and I have a similar set up. A TP-Link 4G modem, RedSFR SIM, VOIP via OVH with Gigaset handsets. I won't say they are faultless (one handset in particular can play up) but generally speaking fine. I use the OVH voice mail and it works well enough (email notification) but truth told most of our calls are via our mobiles.

I have an old 80s US wall mounted Bell trimline phone (one of my quirks!) with a huge long curly phone cable so we can walk around the kitchen talking on it (you've doubtless seen something like on US TV or movies) That's connected to our old UK VoIP number (via Sipgate) It's analogue but I've butchered it and use a Cisco digital to analogue box to connect it. If it rings, it's either my wife's family or an insulation sales call! I love it to bits, adore hearing it ring and the sound quality is good.

Edit : all my 2FA stuff is via app or SMS on my phone, I don't have the spoken verification so I can't comment.

@Jfhjfh I'll have a look at Lebara, being on SFR they might work well for me. I have seen them mentioned but not looked closely at their deals (arrogance on my part sadly as I associate them with sales people in railway stations and airports etc!)


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## Nomoss

Thanks, Appunti. The only annoyance now is the voicemail. Previously there was light on the phones if a message had been recorded, but now we have to look at emails, call 666, or go online when we get home to discover if there is one. Not a big deal I guess.

I just realised we can also easily go on line when away to check for messages.
Not that anyone calls us old f*arts much these days.


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## 1790260

Nomoss said:


> Not that anyone calls us old f*arts much these days.


Ditto, I know the feeling! Thank you, that gave me a chuckle!


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## Nunthewiser

appunti said:


> I'll have a look at Lebara, being on SFR they might work well for me


Actually , in France they use Orange network infrastructure per their website. I stumbled upon them a week ago, still here in the US and responded to an offer for a free SIM card, never thinking that they would actually send me one here at a US address. Six days later, here it is. I am impressed.


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## Poloss

With laposte mobile you get 50gig data and calls for 9,99 a month.
My wife's and son's bills never exceed 9,99€ whatever they do

Laposte use the SFR network.
My mobile is on SFR RED and I pay around 16,99/month for the same offer.
Next time I go to town I'll change to laposte


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## Clic Clac

Poloss said:


> Laposte use the SFR network.
> My mobile is on SFR RED and I pay around 16,99/month for the same offer.
> Next time I go to town I'll change to laposte


Do it online. You can keep your number, if you want to, and I think they tie everything off with your old supplier.



https://www.lapostemobile.fr/offres-mobiles/forfaits-sans-engagement?idpdv=10&part=google&gclsrc=aw.ds&&gclid=Cj0KCQjwnbmaBhD-ARIsAGTPcfWrUG5xQx4J-MqyXpJx7n3vEHUuwjHoEopteoPxBEGmIGbanfXWSgYaAq70EALw_wcB



Not sure what the 'Price Client Box SFR' discount is.


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## 1790260

So maybe Lebara are on SFR and Orange? That's possible, some virtuals do offer a choice.

Edit: just looked at their French website and it is Orange only. 

@Nomoss does your Gigaset have a base unit? One that is network accessible to amend parameters etc? I ask because there are a staggering number of tweaks you can do to VOIP connections to make them better/clearer etc - not just dial strings either. My Gigaset 'just works' out of the box but I did have to tinker with the Cisco for my POTS (analogue) phone.


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## 1790260

Clic Clac said:


> Not sure what the 'Price Client Box SFR' discount is


My guess is that you get the discount if you have an SFR internet connection with the router/modem (i.e.'box') that SFR supply. Free do a similar sort of thing. It's usually on their own deals though, I've not seen such deals offered via a virtual before.


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## Nomoss

appunti said:


> @Nomoss does your Gigaset have a base unit? One that is network accessible to amend parameters etc? I ask because there are a staggering number of tweaks you can do to VOIP connections to make them better/clearer etc - not just dial strings either. My Gigaset 'just works' out of the box but I did have to tinker with the Cisco for my POTS (analogue) phone.


My Gigaset is AS285. It has a base unit, but I have no idea if it is network accessible. The computer is connected to the router by ethernet cable, the printer and laptop by WiFi.
Accessing the router by its IP address shows no details of the Gigaset.

I have another, 2-handset, Gigaset AS 405, which I bought 2nd hand on Amazon, to use while using both my old Livebox and the new router during the changeover so that I could make sure it worked before cancelling my Orange contract.
The handbook for this mentions reducing echos when used with a router by activating XES mode, but the menu on the Gigaset I'm using has only "Eco +" and "Eco" in that location. These settings reduce the WiFi transmission power of the handsets.


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## 1790260

Nomoss said:


> My Gigaset is AS285. It has a base unit, but I have no idea if it is network accessible.


Ah, gotcha. It's not network accessible in the sense I was hoping; all the clever VOIP stuff is handled by the router and without hacking it, you'll not be able to do much (as you've encountered). Does the Huawei have any VOIP options?

Back in the day when when we had SOSH internet and phone, the Gigaset handsets could connect wirelessly (by whatever protocol) directly to the Livebox, but that did give us some problems and I ditched that set-up, reverting back to the base unit.


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## Poloss

Clic Clac said:


> Do it online. You can keep your number, if you want to, and I think they tie everything off with your old supplier.


I like the human contact at my local post office - I catch up on all the local gossip.


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## Poloss

Poloss said:


> I like the human contact at my local post office - I catch up on all the local gossip.


I made it today - two people at the post office spent 30 minutes patiently guiding me through the whole endeavour!


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