Mobile Phone News
HTC One Sydney Event
It’s a constant of the tech industry that no matter how many spec sheets, reviews and opinion pieces you read you’ll never really get a proper feel for a device until you hold it in your hands and use its key features. Fortunately for us, HTC held a belated HTC One launch in Sydney last night and we got to do just that.
Vodafone Continues Network Upgrades
After a less than ideal past couple of years, Vodafone Australia is pledging to turn things around in the next twelve months by investing a potential $1 billion in its mobile network. While the company has yet to reveal the exact cost of the proposed network improvements, it has spent $1.7 billion on network repairs and upgrades over the past two years. Vodafone Chief executive Bill Morrow has announced that 2013 will see the company spending more on its network than ever before in a single year, with a view to create stronger, better coverage and hopefully win back customers.
2012's Most Satisfied Customers
Roy Morgan Research, Australia’s best known market research company, has held its second annual Customer Satisfaction Awards in Melbourne this week, honouring the companies and organisations with the most consistently happy customers in 2012. The awards are the result of a survey of around 50,000 Australian consumers and 22,000 business decision makers over 2012. The survey ranked customer service and satisfaction by conducting personal interviews and distributing self-administered questionnaires.
Virgin Mobile Raises International Call Rates
Virgin Mobile announced yesterday it will be raising the cost of international calls for mobile customers – and judging by the reactions so far, customers aren't happy with the changes. The telco’s Big Cap, Big Plans and Fair Go plans will be affected by the changes, which will apply from February 28. Virgin Mobile contacted customers by email Monday and yesterday posted the announcement on the Virgin Mobile website’s community forum, causing some forum members to express their disappointment at the proposed changes.
Exetel Now Has 4G Mobile Plans
We’ve been keeping an eye on the state of 4G in Australia over the last few months, and eagerly awaiting news of when smaller resellers will be passing 4G mobile coverage on to their customers. While Optus MVNOs such as Vaya, Amaysim and Spintel have stated they hope to provide 4G sometime in the first half of 2013, it looks like they've been pipped to the post.
HTC One SV Hands-On Impressions
We haven’t been giving much love to mid-range Android handsets of late and we apologise for that. To try and make up for it we thought we’d get our hands on HTC’s latest 4G LTE mid-ranger, the HTC One SV (not to be confused with the HTC One S or HTC One V) and put it through its paces.
New and Rumoured MVNOs for 2013
2013 looks set to welcome a few new players to Australia's prepaid mobile market, as the competing big telcos continue opening up their wholesale networks to smaller operators. Telstra continues to take steps to challenge Optus' dominance as a mobile wholesaler, by allowing the newly launched Kogan Mobile, and new partner Boost Mobile, access to its Next G 3G networks. For now, the carrier is keeping 4G LTE access reserved exclusively for Telstra customers.
Goodbye Crazy John's
One of Australia’s most recognised independent mobile phone retailers is effectively no more, with Vodafone confirming plans to shut down the Crazy John’s brand next month. All Crazy John’s stores will be closed entirely, or rebranded as Vodafone stores, by February 20th – meaning that from this date, no new customers will be able to sign up under the Crazy John’s brand. Around 40 of the 60 Crazy Johns stores in operation will be closed, with the rest being transformed into Vodafone outlets.
Vodafone Cuts Free Social Networking
UPDATE: Since this post, Vodafone has revised the decision to begin charging for data in 1MB blocks. The telco have issued a press release stating that, after many customers "expressed concern" about the proposed changes to how data would be billed, it would be dropping the minimum data session for prepaid customers from one megabyte to one kilobyte. The original change would have seen many prepaid customers' data usage and monthly plan costs go up significantly.
Adelaide Gets 4G LTE for Christmas
Optus announced today that it will be flicking the switch on a new 4G LTE network for its Adelaide users just in time for Christmas. 4G is quickly spreading across Australia, opening up a new world of super-fast wireless broadband for Aussies with speeds that are often in excess of landline broadband connections.
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