Mobile Phones and Internet

Moving to Australia hasn't been as dramatic a transition as I had thought it would be. I don't find myself missing certain foods, shops, or much of anything really. With this one exception. They have a different way of billing for internet and mobile (cell) phones.

Let's start with the internet since it's the easier of the two to explain. In the States when you sign up for internet service you pay based on how fast a connection you want. I upgraded from something like 2Mbps to 6Mbps before I left Baltimore. The upgrade actually cost me $3 less than I was already paying. Go Verizon!

The same holds true for Australia. You pay more for faster connections, but they take it one step further. Here you also pay for the amount you download. That's right, you have limits to how much you can use the internet. Most plans start around 1GB / month, and for heavy users can go up to 10GB / month. For anyone who likes to watch videos, you're stuffed. For a point of reference, a movie on DVD typically runs between 4-8GB. I have a plan with my mobile phone that gives me 2GB of wireless internet, and a plan with the apartment network that gives me 4Gb. That's 6GB / month. I ran out this weekend. I'm probably going to pay through the nose in overage charges.

I suppose that having limits to how much you use the internet can be a good thing. We're quite spoiled in the States with unlimited amounts of almost everything. So, I can live with internet limits. Mobile phone billing? Here's how it works:

You pay a monthly price for a service package, just like in the States. For that monthly price you get calls, texting (SMS), bonus features, etc. If you sign up for a plan you get the phone at no extra charge (depending on how much you are paying). All of this sounds pretty much like the States, eh?

Here's where it gets weird. You don't get minutes, you get money. For example, when I signed up for the $69 / month "cap" I got $650 / month of calls and texting. They then calculate how much you used by charging you per minute or per text message. So instead of doing the math for you, that is saying how many minutes $650 will buy, you have to do the math yourself. That is, if you can find how much they are charging you per minute. Obscuring the billing by adding that extra step seems so unnecessary.

This billing method is not unique to one service either. One interesting thing to note, phone services were a government service until July 1997. Just like the States has a government agency to deliver mail to all residential / business addresses, Australia had an agency that ran communications including phones. The agency became more or less a private business, and now competes with other private companies. However, since they originally owned the phone lines and networks, they have an obvious advantage in the current market (although the customer service is reportedly pretty bad.) Maybe the billing system is a result of former government control.

They told us during our international student orientation to recognize that things can be "different" without being "wrong." For the most part I think I would agree. Mobile billing, at least for the moment, is wrong.