June 26, 2006 at 10:17 am · Authored by Ewan · Filed under Mobile

Roger Kondrat posted a comment on my ‘Google banned by Three‘ post noting that mobile phone companies are a ‘little nuts’ here in the UK.  Yup. 

He’s written a blog post about his experiences which gives an interesting international perspective on our UK networks.

First off, he made the mistake of allowing himself to be lured to Three:

As a foreigner, I didn’t know ‘3′ had a reputation issue (at least in the past) - bad service, poor reception, etc.  So I shopped around on price and of course 3G features didn’t hurt.

So Roger has been hunting around as his Three contract is almost up.  Like me, he’s admired the new Nokia E61.  I kid you not, the Nokia E61 is available on Three!   Have a look here.  He did a super deal negotiating with the Three upgrade people:

Got her to offer me 9 months at half price on a 12 month contract. Awesome, customer satisfied, on to the phone. ‘Sir what phone is that that you would like? Yes I want the Nokia E61 with icing sugar on top.’

This is when my jaw hit the floor, excuse me sir but we don’t offer that as an upgrade. WHAT!!! Yes right now its only available for new customers.

Yes, you’re an existing customer, so we don’t have to fight as hard for you, Roger.  That’s your basic marketing message.

I’m surprised that Three introduced the E61. What with their ‘no Google, no proper internet access’ strategy. 

Roger, dump them and get a service provider that gives you proper internet.  T-mobile’s unlimited internet Web N’ Walk option is a pretty neat deal.  I’m sure Vodafone would be delighted to have you — they offer the E61.  If you call them and say you’re thinking of swapping from Three, I’m sure they’ll be even more delighted.

Don’t reward the ridiculous marketing policies by continuing to give them your business Roger.  However, the grass is never greener.  They’re all, basically, as bad as each other

PS. If you too, like Roger, are a Three customer looking to escape, phone up the Three customer services line and press the option for ‘I’m thinking of leaving’. 

Fascinating.  Fascinating that there’s a whole single option dedicated to ‘If you are thinking of leaving us, press 7′ — surely that’s not the sort of thing you should have at the top of the menu when your customers phone up?

Anyway, phone up, and do as Roger did.  Negotiate a good half-price deal for yourself and a nice shiney new handset.   As for the E61, I can’t believe they’re giving that with limited internet access to only ‘Three selected websites’.  If they are, they need their heads examined.  I’ll need to do a bit of research on this.