Top prepaid mobile phone plans

Top prepaid mobile phone plans in SA

Parastatal Telkom surprises the mobile phone market by outscoring the opposition in the prepaid market.

Top prepaid mobile phone plans

Not everything started by the South African government is bad. Take Telkom for instance. A new study by Tarifica, a leading authority on telecom pricing, says the parastatal offers more high value plans for prepaid mobile consumers than any other operator in South Africa.

Using the Tarifica Score, an algorithm that weighs every feature of a mobile plan (usage allotments, geographic coverage, data speeds, value added features and promotional elements) against its total cost, determined consumer value of prepaid plans in the country.

Unlike contract plans, prepaid plans do not have set usage allotments. Therefore Tarifica used three user profiles (light, medium and heavy) which define the minimum included usage for voice, SMS and data. Plans with scores above 75 (top quartile) are designated “Top Value Plans” in each user profile. Across all profiles, 28 plans achieved this distinction, 15 of which were from Telkom, followed by MTN with eight, Cell C with four and Virgin Mobile with one. In addition, Telkom had the Top Overall Value Plans (highest scoring) for both the moderate and heavy user profiles. Cell C took that honor for the light user profile.

At a glance

1. Telkom captured three Top Value Plan positions in the light user profile, seven in the moderate user profile and five in the heavy user profile. Its success was based on having the second least expensive per-minute calling rate and aggressively priced SMS and data bundles that allow users to easily scale to match their mobile usage.

2. Cell C’s plans performed well in the light user profile capturing the Top Overall Value Plan and two other Top Value Plans, based on having the least expensive per-minute calling rate in South Africa and effective bundling.

3. MTN performed best in the moderate and heavy user profiles capturing four Top Value Plans in each based on its diverse bundle options, relatively competitive per-minute calling rate and generous data promotion.

4. Virgin Mobile performed best in the light user profile capturing one Top Value Plan based on an effectively priced bundle.

5. Vodacom did not capture any Top Value Plans due to its relatively high per-minute and per-SMS rates, although it did score significantly better in the moderate and heavy user profiles than in the light user profile.

Sources: Tarifica & IT News Africa