What are Goody Bags
Contract or PAYG
Traditionally the decision was always should I have a contract or should I go on PAYG (pay as you go). If you wanted a new phone then the contracts were quite tempting, giving you the latest phone (ie the latest iPhone is that the iPhone4 or iPhone5 or the latest Android offering from various manufacturers) at a reasonable (or sometimes free) price. Bundled with the contract was 12 months of calls and texts sometimes this included internet or may be an add on. These contracts have got longer and longer with more nowadays being 24 months and some even 36 months.These contracts are designed to tie you to their network, the mobile as the carrot and the monthly charge is the stick. think about how many calls and texts you need to make each month. People tend to think about the penalties for going over these bundled packages and then pay for more than they actually need. generally the bigger companies charge 20p/min to call outside of your bundle. those that didn't want or need the latest phone would go on PAYG, with teasers like extra texts or internet given as treats.
The market has also changed with the supermarkets muscling in to provide cheaper phones and cheaper tariffs. Then arrives giffgaff with their different way of doing things. The market place has changed again, no hugh budget to advertise, but instead tries to tap into the social networks that already exists. Hence texting on facebook and twitter is free.
Recently being advertised is the fact that most networks lock their phones, making it as difficult as possible for their customers to leave. giffgaff runs on the O2 network so anyone with a phone locked to O2 can use it on giffgaff once an activated sim is inserted. If your phone is locked to any other network then there would be an additional charge to unlock your phone before being able to use it on giffgaff. There are some shops that only sell unlocked phones or your network may unlock your phone if you ask them to because you need to put a foreign sim in it whilst on regular business trips.
Goody Bags
giffgaff has come up with the term a goody bag, which gives you the advantages of PAYG, with some of the benefits of a contract. giffgaff don't do contracts, they don't want to tie people down, once you join you might not leave but that would be because you've realised how much you were being ripped off by previous companies.
A goody bag is a bundle of calls, texts and internet , generally the latter two are unlimited (where unlimited really is unlimited, not 500MB as some networks call unlimited)
These start at £10 for 250 minutes of calls. These do not include your giffgaff to giffgaff calls that are free, or calling freephone numbers which are also free but does cover calls to any other uk network and landline numbers starting 01, 02 or 03.
There is a £5 goody bag which just gives unlimited texts for those that just use texting as their means of communication.
Worth also noting here is that texts to update your twitter or facebook status is also free with giffgaff.
Please also note similar to a contract that if you use all of your minutes for any one month, you'll start being charged at the standard rate until your goody bag expires one calendar month from when it started. The difference from contracts being that on giffgaff that'll be 8p/min rather than 20+p/min
giffgaff also send out monthly a review statement, which highlights how much you used and will recommend which goody bag you should be on if you continue to use your phone as much.
Another advantage of giffgaff is that if you know over the summer holidays you are going to use your phone more or less each month you can change which goody bag you buy, or not buy one at all for a few weeks.
Freedom to change as you wish.
If you'd like a sim you can order one with £5 free extra credit upon activation from http://bit.ly/freeggsim
The Calculator allows you to enter the number of minutes to expect to make and recieve over the next month and suggests which goody bag is right for you.
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Reply #3 on : Tue March 27, 2012, 15:10:45
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Reply #2 on : Tue August 16, 2011, 09:12:56
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Reply #1 on : Tue June 28, 2011, 08:42:49