Would a blast from the past be a fairer upgrade strategy?
Posted by Dave in Handsets, Mobiles, Networks, Technology, tags: iPhone 3GS, O2, Orange, upgradesO2 still showing no sign of budging on the iPhone 3GS upgrade saga. In fact when I rang up before to merely enquire about my priority list status (which is the lowest level despite having two contracts and o2 broadband so no early upgrade for me) the CS then proceeded to spend 5 minutes dissuading me from the 3GS and singing the virtues of software 3.0 on the normal iPhone 3G (I didn’t mention that I’ve been running that software since Tuesday).
So with no sign of victory on either side I’ve been thinking about the whole having to buy your contract out to upgrade early thing and wondering, did it always used to be this way. And the answer is no.
Many moons ago some of the networks, most notably orange, used to charge a fee to upgrade rather than simply charging for the remainder of the contract. The fee would vary depending on monthly spend and how long of the contract was left but was generally less than the remainder of the contract and meant that if you had the money you could upgrade as often as you liked.
Now surely a system like this would be better for not just iPhone users but any contract customers as it would mean they could upgrade as often as they choose with the networks not losing out as they recovered the subsidy and other losses from the upgrade fee. Win win situation as far as I can see.
One has to wonder why the networks abandoned this system of upgrading!
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All to do with money. They thought why charge £95.00 upgrade fee when we can charge the remainder of the contract and charge them for the new handset.
Well yeah. Though they did use to charge the upgrade fee and charge for handset. I remember once upgrading onto the orange SPV many years ago during contract and got charged £100 for the handset and a lovely £250 upgrade fee