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**discountviagraman** · 08-02-2010, 06:30 AM

I mean, why would you want to buy a phone out-right, when you have the phone fully yours at the end of the contract anyway? Yes it would give you some flexibility to move around providers I guess, but that isnt worth the effort or extra money it would cost

When I bought my 16gig iPhone 3G it was either

£400 PaYG
£160 w/ 18month contract @ £30 (lowest they offered) a month and some pathetic amount of texts and calls

Since buying my iPhone my monthly cost has plummeted - top up a tenner and I get 200 free texts anyway plus that £10 worth of credit. Furthermore the cost of the phone included a year free internet and WiFi which replaced so much of my usage of phone calls / texts as I could just hop on MSN or Skype and do it for free.

I think I've ended up spending around £450 total on my iPhone (so £400 + £50 credit) over 12 months, against a minimum of £520 it would have cost me on contract. Buying the phone outright certainly isn't for business customers or those who use the (phone part) a lot, but for light / medium users or those want an internet / gaming / iTouch / shiny gadget it can be useful

That said, Simplicity also isn't for me ^^ but it is a pretty good deal if you were say running to the end of your contract now - you could extend it on Simplicity for 6 months until the new iPhone launches without getting tied down and retaining the discount of having lots of minutes and texts contracts afford over PaYG.

08-02-2010, 06:30 AM	#28
discountviagraman Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 457 Senior Member	I mean, why would you want to buy a phone out-right, when you have the phone fully yours at the end of the contract anyway? Yes it would give you some flexibility to move around providers I guess, but that isnt worth the effort or extra money it would cost When I bought my 16gig iPhone 3G it was either £400 PaYG £160 w/ 18month contract @ £30 (lowest they offered) a month and some pathetic amount of texts and calls Since buying my iPhone my monthly cost has plummeted - top up a tenner and I get 200 free texts anyway plus that £10 worth of credit. Furthermore the cost of the phone included a year free internet and WiFi which replaced so much of my usage of phone calls / texts as I could just hop on MSN or Skype and do it for free. I think I've ended up spending around £450 total on my iPhone (so £400 + £50 credit) over 12 months, against a minimum of £520 it would have cost me on contract. Buying the phone outright certainly isn't for business customers or those who use the (phone part) a lot, but for light / medium users or those want an internet / gaming / iTouch / shiny gadget it can be useful That said, Simplicity also isn't for me ^^ but it is a pretty good deal if you were say running to the end of your contract now - you could extend it on Simplicity for 6 months until the new iPhone launches without getting tied down and retaining the discount of having lots of minutes and texts contracts afford over PaYG.
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