International travel is still out of sight but for Boost Mobile it isn’t out of mind according to General Manager of Boost Mobile Australia, Jason Haynes.
Earlier this year the Telstra Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) released an international roaming offer only to see our borders close within the following fortnight. Subsequently this offer was withdrawn due to some “changes behind the scenes” according to an announcement by the provider.
The roaming offer had been under development for over a year when it was released in February, but according to Haynes became a low priority when Telstra began its move to a new digital stack.
Telstra confirmed that this temporary change is part of Telstra's broader program to digitise and simplify it's plans. As a result of these changes both Telstra Prepaid and Boost Mobile SIMs will lose international roaming capabilities from October 27, 2020.
According to a Telstra representative the move will only impact providers using the entire Telstra network (Boost and Telstra), therefore other MVNOs like ALDI Mobile will not need to withdraw international roaming from available prepaid plans.
Despite the convenient timing of this behind-the-scenes-revamp Haynes told WhistleOut that, “[Boost Mobile] want to provide [international roaming] to people as soon as we can”.
Haynes said, “from a Boost point of view we want everything,” and continued to say “[international roaming] will be the first product to be added back on.”
The provider is keen to stick with the original offer of 5GB of data, 100 SMS messages and 30 minutes of calls to standard numbers for $60 on a 14-day expiry, although isn’t entirely ruling out making changes.
When previously benchmarked we found that similar roaming options with Telstra and Vodafone prepaid set you back $85 and $70 respectively, making Boost’s deal a solid option for travellers.
The General Manager suggested that Boost would want the offer back on the cards even if it’s just within the proposed trans-tasman travel bubble. Whether this would be possible is unclear as Telstra's official recommendation for customers who want access to international roaming during this time is to switch to a month-to-month mobile postpaid plan where roaming is still available.
Although there are no dates for when these offerings may return, Telstra has earmarked the first half of 2021 for an official relaunch.
Anula Wiwatowska
Offsite Editorial Lead | Instagram
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