Good value as it includes 100 mins of international calls to 70 countries which is difficult to find for $10.
Tip: There's no port out fee when you port in your number or if you create a new number and stay for more than 6 months. There is a port out fee IF you create a new number with ETel and leave within 6 months.
Thanks for the warning.
Warning?
Been with Optus for years, and I thought it was better than Telstra, is this not the case?
Not where I am, historically oversaturated, much slower data
Depends where you live.
Some places Optus is OK, others it is shocking.
98.5% vs 99.5% network coverage.
Data breaches.
Nation-wide outage back in Nov last year that lasted for almost 14 hours, after which "welfare check was not undertaken" for 2,468 customers who tried to call 000 during the outage.
@pj1351: You forgot to mention Telstra's failure of the Triple Zero emergency service just a few weeks ago (1st March 2024), including the death of a person that couldn't get through emergency services because of the incompetece of Telstra, including a back up system, which was non existent.
Just appalling.
Source: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-03-01/telstra-apologies-dea…
https://www.itnews.com.au/news/telstra-explains-why-triple-z…
That extra 1% coverage is in areas that barely any person will ever travel to (or lives in), so for almost everyone it's of zero use, just good for marketing.
This is partly why Telstra is so expensive, the majority of the population that use Telstra are paying a premium to maintain mobile cells that barely get any use, for a handful of people.
@Nem0: Yes, all telcos, Telstra operates the triple zero network and it failed from their operational end, their network crashed and they had no backup.
that couldn't get through emergency services because of the incompetece of Telstra, including a back up system, which was non existent.
The "non-existent" backup which still managed to get 346 out of 494 calls (70%) manually connected to emergency services during their outage? And where they did try to reach out to all 148 remaining calls through alternative means and welfare checks (even if one was unfortunately too late)?
From a numeric perspective, how is that supposed to be worse than completely dropping the ball on 2,468 Optus customers that didn't get welfare check follow-ups?
This is partly why Telstra is so expensive, the majority of the population that use Telstra are paying a premium to maintain mobile cells that barely get any use, for a handful of people.
How do you go from 1 person's death because of Telstra being more meaningful than thousands that were at risk (but fortunately didn't have any casualties) because of Optus, to "f_ck all them thousands of people living in remote areas"?
@pj1351: You mentioned the nationwide (single network) Optus outage, failing to mention the nationwide 000 outage which impacted all 000 callers within Australia no matter which network they were on, which was a disgraceful and embarrassing failure of the Telstra network.
Someone here is either A) working for Telstra, B) brainwashed by Telstra BS, C) A Telstra shareholder brainwashed by Telstra BS, D) All of the above.
Do you really expect more than 1 network in very remote areas? It will never happen, it doesn't provide an ROI, 1 network will suffice. The government can handle the rest with the blackspots program along with Starlink (all new phones will have connectivity to Starlink for calling very soon).
The point is that 99.99% of the population travel and use their devices within the Optus coverage areas.
Why would the rest of us care about the 1% of additional Tel$tra coverage for the few thousand people who use it? It is of no use to us to almost all of the population, yet the rest of the pop that use Telstra pay a premium to cover the <0.001% pop that uses it.
Someone here is either A) working for Telstra, B) brainwashed by Telstra BS, C) A Telstra shareholder brainwashed by Telstra BS, D) All of the above.
Try E) Someone who had the unfortunate experience of having an Optus mobile while trying to contact emergency services regarding a bushfire while travelling, in what should be a full coverage area according to Optus' own coverage maps.
@pj1351: Huh?? Total rubbish.
All phones allow for 000/112 calling - You can even take your SIM card out and call 000 or 112 (other than when Telstra 000 had the outage), as long as it can connect to 1 of the three networks or Starlink.
If for some reason that does not work, just disable the SIM in settings (you don't need an active number to call 000)
Effectively you are saying Telstra didn't have coverage where you needed it also if you couldn't call 000/112.
In reality, all phones on all networks have the same 000/112 emergency coverage.
As for regular calling, no coverage in any area with any network is guaranteed, depending on the terrain and tower locations, outages etc.
It can and will happen with all radio frequencies.
I can show you plenty of locations, in Melbourne and Sydney where Telstra shows coverage but it does not exist, it is estimated coverage based on terrain data to tower ratio & frequency travel, with all 3 of them and all 3 networks use the same data formula to estimate this.
Huh?? Total rubbish
…
Effectively you are saying Telstra didn't have coverage where you needed it also if you couldn't call 000/112.
Sure, that totally explains why my Optus phone (that was explicitly on their list of "Top Pick for Regional Coverage") was an absolute nightmare of poor signal and repeated drop outs.
Meanwhile, my mother's iPhone with Telstra that barely charged enough to turn on, fortunately connected straight through without issues.
What's next? Going to try to shift the blame to some fault on the part of Telstra dealing with Android vs Apple?
I mean, it's not like there's evidence of Optus network failures can lead to potentially screwing over Optus customers trying to call 000… Oh.
@pj1351: You clearly have no idea what you are talking about or how 000 works, which it was my comment was above. Of course Telstra has greater coverage than any other network, they always will thanks to what was government funding, as no network would fund this on their own as the return on investment is not there, that's factual, you view the stats of this on the RFNS site. If you live in remote community areas, why would you connect with anyone else other than Telstra? People that live in these communities are usually smart enough to know this.
Back to your false claim about your emergency calling issue, the fact is 000 coverage is the same for everyone, no matter what network you are on, as 000/112 roams, 112 roams to whatever network it can find, worldwide, EVEN without an active SIM. That is a fact, unlike you claiming you couldn't call 000 because of the lack of Optus coverage. That is laughable and proves you are fibbing.
If you couldn't get Optus signal, your phone WILL connect to Telstra if their signal is available for 000/112, if for any reason this does not work, disable the active SIM and it WILL work if any network is available, this is what people had to do with the Optus 000 routing issue.
With the Telstra 000 outage, there was no alternative and no way to get through, no matter what network you could connect to, because the 000 emergency service itself was effectively switched off.
This would be a statistical outlier. The general consensus is that Optus is a lot worse than Telstra in terms of signal strength as well as speed.
@Munki: This is a good read, Optus won quite a lot of the awards and you can filter per state/territory as that’s the most important factor.
https://www.opensignal.com/reports/2023/10/australia/mobile-…
This info really should be on the post. Thank you.
Does it have visual voicemail for iPhones?
This is cheaper then the catch 30 day plan (4gb) for $10/m and an additional $5/m for $100 with of calls, also on Optus network
Just keep in mind, Catch is prepaid (PAYG) with zero possible excess charges, this is postpaid with potential additional additional charges for exceeding your allowance inclusions, including possible port out fees, depending on how long you've been with them for.
Just so you know, Etel recently featured in ABC news which I recommend to check it out. Can't provide link just google it under "ABC Townsville Etel".
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-04-10/optus-customer-victim…
I don't know much about eTel but it specifically says in the article that eTel sent a confirmation code to the number before porting. To do this swap the attacker would have to have already had access to the victim's number either by stolen Optus SIM or having access to a cloned Optus SIM.
Another reminder to never use SMS 2FA if authenticator is an option.
Apple Watch compatible?
$130 a year with 130gb, meah?
Postpaid, NO F Way!
International inclusion but no data banking
Optus network = Pass want nothing to do with optus
These guys look like they charge for excess data usage. Are there any plans which stops data usage or slow the speed down, but don't charge for excess data.
Dodo $10/month
Android has a monthly data cap feature that would stop any extra data past whatever you set it. Otherwise most providers have an option to not add extra data after running out.
esim?
https://www.belong.com.au/go/data-plans
Belong on Telstra Wholesale, $15 for 20GB ongoing, unlimited after quota at 1MBPS.
Edit: This is a Data Sim.
Yep, as you've noticed this is a data only SIM which is of no comparison to this deal, unfortunately :)
On optus network if anyone need to know.