EE Announces 4G Price Tarriffs
Ahead of its official UK launch on October 30th, EE have revealed their variety of phone, SIM only and mobile broadband price plans for its 4G LTE network.
Smartphone prices available at launch along with contract tarriffs are as follows:
| £36 (500MB) | £41 (1GB) | £46 (3GB) | £51 (5GB) | £56 (8GB) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Samsung Galaxy Note II LTE | £179.99 | £139.99 | £89.99 | £39.99 | £29.99 |
| Apple iPhone 5 16GB | £179.99 | £109.99 | £49.99 | £29.99 | £19.99 |
| Samsung Galaxy S III LTE | £149.99 | £49.99 | £29.99 | £29.99 | £29.99 |
| HTC One XL | £149.99 | £49.99 | £29.99 | £29.99 | £29.99 |
| Huawei Ascend P1 LTE | £19.99 | Free | Free | Free | Free |
All of these come with unlimited calls and texts on a 24 month deal, and an extra £10 per month will grant you a 12 month contract. Luckily, BT's Wi-Fi hotspots will be available to customers at no extra charge; you will be inevitably using these religiously to preserve what data you have. However, those looking for more will have to move up to a £60 business tarriff for 16GB of data. SIM only plans are available from £21 for 500mb, and mobile broadband from £15.99 for 2GB (although I feel this could be a typo as the 18 month plans are actually cheaper than the 24 month...that is unless this is some misconception of a business plan).
In terms of migration for existing Orange and T-Mobile customers, customers can switch out their recently obtained 3G handset (eg, Galaxy S III or HTC One X) and swap it with an LTE enabled device for a £99 flat fee. Those still in contracts can pay off their final months at a 33% discount, provided you've been with the aforementioned networks for six months or longer.
At the pricey lowest data allowance of 500mb, with the theoretical speed of 38Mbps, you can expect to deplete your data in a record time of 1 minute and 45 seconds. Suffice to say people aren't impressed, reverting back to finding unlimited 3G data a mighty tempting premise for the time being, at least that's what people on Twitter have vocalised.
Still can’t believe @ee plan to launch their 4G/LTE network at 38Mbps speeds with a 500Mb download limit. Gone in 1 min 45 secs. #4gee #fail
— Paul Lomax (@PaulLomax) October 23, 2012
Olaf Swantee told me EE had hit the consumer sweet spot with its 4G prices - as far as I can see,Twitter begs to differ
— Rory Cellan-Jones (@ruskin147) October 23, 2012
I'm going to wait for @o2 in January to roll out 4G. For it appears that @ee aren't mature enough to handle data plans.
— Ash Chetri (@_Ashtopher) October 23, 2012
Customers will get the Orange Wednesday service included, so at least they've got that going for them... Just wait for the competition to drive the prices down.
Source: EE
Jason England
