New Zealand, land of LotR and high-priced data plans
Over at CG we’ve been watching the iPhone pricing plans whiz by, from the onerous Rogers tariff to Vodafone New Zealand’s $200 per month for 1 GB data plan. A lot of folks have been complaining about these prices but in light of these international plans, including nasty plans from Europe, AT&T’s pricing isn’t that bad.
Another interesting point: all of us expecting to waltz into AT&T stores and pick up an iPhone for $199 will be sadly surprised. The $199 price is for new contract-holders only. If you’re an AT&T subscriber you’ll be paying $399 and $499 for your iPhone – about $100 less than the non-contract price. AT&T’s thinking behind this – although a bit mercenary – is clear: there’s not much else in AT&T’s line up that will bring in new customers the way Jobs’ space phone will.
UPDATE – Just to set the record straight, here are the prices straight from AT&T:
$199 /$299: for new customers, current postpaid iPhone customers in good standing prior to July 11, and AT&T non-iPhone customers who are currently eligible for an upgrade discount. Requires two-year service agreement.
$399/$499 (early-upgrade price): for non-iPhone customers who are not currently eligible for an upgrade discount but who want their iPhone 3G now. Requires two-year service agreement.
CrunchGear’s Peter Ha gets a bit more forceful in his defense of the pricing.
I’ve been hemming and hawing about doing this post since last week when AT&T revealed all the pricing info for the iPhone 3G. With the release of Vodafone NZ’s pricing today, I can no longer keep my mouth shut. The Kiwis are paying $190 for 1GB of data, 600 minutes, and 600 texts! Not to mention the fact that if they opt for the cheapest plan ($60), they’ll have to shell out $415 (8GB) or $527 (16GB), respectively. I really want to know what you people are bitching and moaning about over AT&T’s plans? As far as I can see, it’s cheaper than every other country that’s getting the iP3G in every respect. Of course, you might be hammered if you’re ineligible for an upgrade, but you should have known this was going to happen.
You do know that any current AT&T customer eligible to upgrade can also get the subsidized pricing ($199/$299) as well as anyone who currently owns a iPhone.
Why, WHY, do I live in New Zealand? *sob* *sob*
I knew I waited for a reason.
I will be the proud owner of a $199 3G iPhone.
It’s pretty sad when your cell bill is higher than a monthly lease payment for a brand new luxury car.
I am pissed. I am not getting an iPhone – not before we’ve figured out how to hack Rogers network and suck data from them till they bleed and beg for mercy. Watch out Rogers, we’re working on it.
A Grumpy German in Canada
This doesn’t sound right. I’m an existing iPhone / AT&T customer and, according to my online AT&T, I qualify for the discounted pricing ($199/$299).
New Zealand has a duopoly in the mobile business, with just Vodafone and the orginal national carrier, Telecom, offering mobile service. Which is why they can get away with this kind of pricing.
Interestingly about 75% of the New Zealand mobile market is on pre-pay too which is unusually high…meaning the carriers are really making hay on those expensive pre-pay minutes.
This is about to change though, with atleast two players due to launch this year…hopefully it will introduce some much needed competition.
John,
The $199/$299 price is also available for existing AT&T subscribers who qualify for an upgrade and will have to extend their contract for 2 years. Not only for new subscribers.
The terms as to whether you get the $199 price include:
- iPhone customers who purchased before July 11
- Customers activating a new line with AT&T
- Current AT&T customers who are eligible, at the time of purchase, for an upgrade discount
So it isn’t strictly true that current subscribers do not get the $199 price.
Even though Sergey and Larry are watching us trough their secret T-Frame technology (see http://tinyurl.com/6pydc9) I still can’t wit till they release Android to kick some ass. Then I hope that their brothers decide to start a telco company and take Canadian and New Zealand’s phone network providers out of business.
“Watch out Rogers, we’re working on it.”
http://www.thom...le-data-access/
No you’re not. Rogers and Bell Canada practically own the politicians in Ottawa lock stock and barrel so you can forget about that. They are the modern day East India Company.
I have $300 extra a month.
Do I pay for a 2 year iPhone plan or do I get a lease on a new Lexus?
hmmmm…..
I would do neither because I already have a nice car. I can’t see why people would do that though. I’m going to use pure emulation to develop for these phones.
Funny seeing that the ‘Twice as fast, half the price’ ad gimic is up on Apple’s site right now. Asterisk sold seperatly
@Chris
I don’t care about politicians in Ottawa. I live in a country where people drive huge trucks with a rubber scrotum hanging off of their trailer hitch. So we do it the cowboy way and hire the best hackers and show Rogers …
As others have pointed out, you are incorrect about current AT&T customers, especially those who have iPhones (it wasn’t subsidized so it’s not on the usual upgrade cycle).
Vodafone NZ charges are even higher when you remember no free wifi minutes are included. And NZ doesn’t have a good (any?) network of free wifi spots in the cities (anywhere?)
Those prices are probably in NZ$ not US, therefore the price will be 25% lower.
What about people who bought the iPhone but never activated it through AT&T? My friend bought an iPhone and used it on AT&T but jailbroke it so he never had to sign a contract.
One problem with New Zealand is the low population density, and thus the cost of infrastructure needed per person.
Even so, the NZ prices are a total rip off. And there are no unlimited data plans available from any company. I currently have a 1st gen iPhone on a PrePay account, with no data plan, and only use it answer calls and use the wifi. It costs about $10/month, primarily from text messages.
So would pay $6000 for 24gb of data?
@13, again, good luck.
“I live in a country where people drive huge trucks ”
That’s a pretty big change from Germany. I may be going there again this month for Wacken near Hamburg where I went last year. The smart is considered a huge truck over there and there are no lights on the highway at night.
People lose sight of what $300 per month really represents though. It’s a chunk of change for sure. I’m sticking with go-phone $29/m
>>It’s pretty sad when your cell bill is higher than a monthly lease payment for a brand new luxury car
It’s pretty sad to think of leasing a car, period.
Add to that: no downloadable TV shows or movies, rubbish regular broadband, higher prices for most things anyway and the iPhone pricing hardly came as a shock to many Kiwis. Any of the hard-core mac nuts have been using their Jailbroken 1.0 phones for months now anyway, and the rest of us can wait for NZ to get real…like we always have to!
If i live in new zealand, i would be a sheep farmer. I wouldn’t need to call anyone.
Really, if people were so concerned about the state of mobile carriers and their lack of consumer friendly services maybe the iPhone wouldn’t be in this situation. People complain if it costs an up front $500 and now they complain that it costs more monthly or they can’t upgrade. News flash! You wouldn’t have been able to upgrade to any phone….it’s not just an iPhone issue. AT&T is using the same tactics that every other carrier uses. (Aside from smaller local carriers that might not require contracts.) So if you were going to buy a BlackBerry you would be in for the same deal and it’s been this way for years. The only difference is that the iPhone has made n00bs that have never owned a mart phone prior to the iPhone more aware of how the smart phones, carriers, data plans etc all fit together. It’s one big money pit; we’re all aware; but please suck it up…they are all the same and have been for years!
At least Apple didn’t choose Sprint or Verizon and lock the phone on a CDMA network leaving no possibility of GSM unlocking and popping in any SIM.
I live in New Zealand and Vodafone here have handled the launch and communications appalingly and are taking New Zealanders for a ride price-wise – this reflects poorly on Apple and the “great deal” message from Steve Jobs. We may be the first place to receive the new iPhone but a hell of a lot of us are feeling ripped off.
Did TechCrunch just eat my comment? Sigh…I guess I’ll have to post via seesmic then.
Hey guys. iPhone has nothing to do with it. This is about local conditions and market size. Make the same comparison using a Nokia handset across multiple territories and you’ll get pretty similar gaps.
To use international as a reason why ATT’s deal doesn’t suck is a lame argument. Compared to the 1st gen iPhone deal, it is a rate increase. Don’t use irrelevant international data to try to mask that. It is intellectually lazy at best and dishonest at worst.
Hey guys. iPhone has nothing to do with it. This is about local conditions and market size. Make the same comparison using a Nokia handset across multiple territories and you’ll get pretty similar gaps.
To use international as a reason why ATT’s deal doesn’t suck is a lame argument. Compared to the 1st gen iPhone deal, it is a rate increase. Don’t use irrelevant international data to try to mask that. It is intellectually lazy at best and dishonest at worst.
@16 Those prices are NZD. And most of us Kiwis here are annoyed at Vodafone – not apple, and would have happily paid more for the handset itself rather than getting a second mortgage to pay for unreasonable data rates and excessive monthly fees (to get awful speed and slack service).
Going by the comments we’re receiving on our blog, the ones we’ve seen on other blogs and forums, and what the mainstream press are saying, Vodafone are taking a hammering over this – as they should.
The prices are appalling – one can buy the unit from AT&T, pay the disconnect fee, and have an untethered iPhone for less than NZ$500. They’re retailing for ~$1000 here – I don’t believe that Vodafone’s buy price would be that much more than AT&T’s – especially considering Vodafone are purchasing for a large number of markets.
As one perceptive commentator stated on our blog – marketing is perception, and Vodafone are being seen as greedy, monopolistic thugs.
Mothership, at the mercenary rates Vodafone are charging, you can be sure that is *exactly* what I will be doing.
They could have gotten up to $400 bucks from me, they now get zip from me or anyone who I give tech advice to (a *lot* of people).
beginning of the flattening of the vurve in the us market
Ok, AT&T is not the worst plan, do anybody have a a list of all the best deals in town? Thanks.
Here’s more fuel for the fire:
The vodafone iphone plan prices for Portugal https://loja.vo...Phone/tarifario … reasonable compared to US AT&T.
And here I thought T-Mobile Germany’s iPhone plans were the worst. NZ is getting screwed!
iPhone is being launched in India in couple of months. Service providers have already started booking advanced orders. Something tells me we will have the lowest pricing in the world for iPhone. Somehow we have managed huge competition in telecom with Vodafone, Airtel and at least 6 more providers fighting for market share. My cell phone bill is less that $40 / month. Incoming calls are FREE everywhere in India.
HSDPA data plans have unlimited bandwidth in Denmark and Sweden for around $40 per month. And by unlimited I really mean unlimited, I’ve heard about people using hundreds of gigabytes per month on HSDPA bandwidth on those plans.
The iPhone is stupidly expensive. People who buy it cause they think it is cheap are plainly stupid. The iPhone is not $199, it costs thousands of dollars over the two years you have to use it cause you sign a contract that you have to use it for two month no matter how limited it’s hardware is. The iPhone costs about the same as a 42″ HDTV LCD flatscreen. It is pure BS to feed the idiots.
While the prices in Finland aren’t as bad as in some places, the really ridiculous thing is TeliaSonera’s limitations on data. Their cheapest 30 euro package gives you a grand total of 150MB/month which, on an iPhone, may as well be nothing at all. You have to go all the way up to the large package to get an almost reasonable 1000MB/month, but with that you are also paying a steep price for 1000 SMSes and 1000 minutes, which I’d never be able to use in a month. None of the basic packages have unlimited data, which is all I wanted in the first place!
They do offer a “build it as you want” package, but then you get to pay the full 500 euro price for the 16GB iPhone, and it’s still not unlocked. Plus the packages aren’t exactly bargains even then. I have yet to understand why Apple wouldn’t just sell the iPhone unlocked as-is, take it or leave it, direct from their own online store and retailers. Let me decide who I want to operate with.
Still the first people in New Zealand have started queueing. I captured this earlier this evening. (Sorry for the poor quality). The security guards near the end were pretty funny.
First video of iPhone queue in Auckland
iPhone is expected to be priced even higher in India. Here’s what a leading magazine rumours will be the cost of the handsets only – 8gb ranging from INR 16000 to 18000 (USD 400- 450) and 16gb from INR 24000 to 28000 (USD 600 to 700). No minutes, messages, data added in the plan – all that is additional! Read the article at – http://tinyurl.com/62eqsm
And yea, India has yet no 3G capabilities. The Telecom Regulator and Government are at loggerheads on the policy decisions, but hopefully by start of next year we will have 3G in India!
geeez…you guys make it sound like it’s the first time in the history of cell phones that you need a new contract in order to get a phone cheaper.
Who needs a data plan with iPhone anyway?
There is so much Wi-Fi out there, you can get all the iPhone internet you can eat and more by just connectng to your home wireles network or just any open Wi-Fi spot out there.
Go for the lowest possible plan, I say, and the heck with AT&T. Wi-Fi is for real Internet.
I wouldn’t worry about it, the free market forces will sort it out.
Kiwi here. I’ve been ready to get an iPhone from the moment they announced an NZ release, going so far as selling my iPod touch. I was willing to fork out a lot more money than I’d normally spend on a phone, I think a lot of people were, but this was just… unbelieveable. I’d be spending $6200 (US$4636) over two years on a phone with 1GB of data a month!
http://www.yout...h?v=291gK1ikf1w
@Charles (#7)
Vodafone is the only GSM network in NZ. Our other carrier, Telecom, is on CDMA. It’s part of the reason why they can charge so much.
@ #44: yeah, right, take another blue pill.
@ #43: Wi-Fi? Not much happening in NZ – check back in another 10 years and maybe you can leave the auckland airport with your laptop.
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This is ridiculous! Yes, compared to the other countries carrying the iPhone, AT&T’s pricing is great. But compared to all other cell providers in the U.S., its HORRIBLE! I understand noone else carries the iPhone, but Sprint carries VERY comparable products and they have a package that includes all services (i.e. Blackberry, Palm, Web, whateva), includes unlimited EVERYTHING(data, text, voice, email, picturemail, etc)
and allows it to be added to ANY phone they have. All for $99.99/month.
AT&T has setup specific packages for use with ONLY the iPhone that are $40-$50 more expensive than their own other plans and $30 more expensive than those of Sprint.
I think I’ll wait for the AT&T/Apple contract expiration before I buy an iPhone. Sucks, too cause I was planning to do it this week and saw all this while researching the right plans… oh well.