Fairer & Simpler Enhanced QFF Optus Plans effective 12 April 2024

[SYD]

Not quite. There are some legacy plans (no longer available to choose, but still active for those one them).

Optus customer service have tried to convince me to change, but when they looked at the old plan, conceded that they can see why I wouldn't.

The larger versions of the Optus Choice plans had unlimited roaming calls in Zone 1 countries (covers all I care about), unlimited calls / text to selected overseas number (again all I cared about) and either 2 or 4Gb per month roaming data per month (so as long as the account rolls during a trip, can be double that). Not huge amounts of data, but perfectly adequate for what I need.

Multiple devices pool data allowance in Oz, so have more data than we can possible use - only have to watch when OS, but never had any dramas.

Unfortunately, they gradually shutting them all down. Make the most of it while you have it!

I really do miss my old $50 pm plan.

 

[craiglloyd74]

Hi everyone. I just received an email advising that the deal between Optus and Qantas for mobile plans earning Qantas Points will end at the end of June. Points will still be paid quarterly for the next 12 months (upfront quarterly), but then that’s it.

Any ideas if there is something new in the wings? I’d love to be able to convert Telstra Points to Qantas Points!

 

[serfty]

Hi everyone. I just received an email advising that the deal between Optus and Qantas for mobile plans earning Qantas Points will end at the end of June. Points will still be paid quarterly for the next 12 months (upfront quarterly), but then that’s it.

Any ideas if there is something new in the wings? I’d love to be able to convert Telstra Points to Qantas Points!

There are some options, scroll through the thread above.

Fairer & Simpler Enhanced QFF Optus Plans effective 12 Apr

From 12 April 2024 Qantas Frequent Flyer members can no longer sign up to aQantas SIM Only Plan by Optus. Existing Qantas SIM Only Plan customers will continue to earn Qantas Points for a period of 12 months after 11 April 2024. As a current subscriber, don't believe I've had comms on this yet...

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

 

[RSVKanga]

Any ideas if there is something new in the wings? I’d love to be able to convert Telstra Points to Qantas Points!

Fingers crossed. It wouldn’t make sense for QFF to not have a partnership with a telco in the long-run, and Telstra is the premium, Australian-owned telco that the majority of QF customers use, so an imminent QF-Telstra announcement is not unrealistic.

If anything the new QF chairman being from Telstra gives more hope

 

[AIRwin]

Just received an email notification of a price increase:

From 5 August 2024, the price of your $59 Medium Optus Choice Plus(Jul 22) plan will increase to $62/month. To provide you with more value, we'll also be increasing your monthly data inclusion to 180GB/month.

This change will not affect any add-ons, special discounts, bonus data or other promotions which you may have on your plan.

 

[serfty]

$36 a year increase.

Data over 50GB per month is basically, meh.

I had an Optus apology for data breach last year in the form of 200GB for each of the three phone services on the account, so 600GB shared rather than 90GB.

Still only used the standard 25GB for three services.

 

[AIRwin]

Just received an email notification of a price increase:

From 5 August 2024, the price of your $59 Medium Optus Choice Plus(Jul 22) plan will increase to $62/month. To provide you with more value, we'll also be increasing your monthly data inclusion to 180GB/month.

This change will not affect any add-ons, special discounts, bonus data or other promotions which you may have on your plan.

New pricing has taken effect - I know someone who contacted Optus and was offered a $20 monthly discount for the next 12 months and even an additional $1 per month for 36 months for a new Samsung Galaxy A15

 

[Lynda2475]

Telstra is the premium, Australian-owned telco that the majority of QF customers use

What evidence do you have for this claim? There is no reason to suggest that QFF members are more likely to choose Telstra over other providers, certainly no points incentive to do so. One is safer to assume the spread of mobile network usage by QFF members reflects national usage.

Industry data stated in 2023 Telstra had 43% of Mobile subscribers in Australia, Optus has 29% and VHA/TPG have 17%, the final 11% are Virtual Mobile Network Operators (VMNOs) which leverage either Telstra, Optus or VHA networks.

So whilst Telstra has the most customers outright, they do not have an absolute majority of Mobile customers overall as Optus + VHA/TPG = 46% of the market. So more likely that majority of QFF members are in fact not with Telstra.

 

[Berlin]

Been with Amaysim for a while now and their roaming plans are amazing value.

No issues with them at all despite the low pricing, easy e-SIM activation and straight forward app (unlike Telstra which is a disaster with these things) and I’ve used their roaming in plenty of places including pretty much anywhere in Europe and even mainland China and never had an issue.

 

[Franky]

What evidence do you have for this claim? There is no reason to suggest that QFF members are more likely to choose Telstra over other providers, certainly no points incentive to do so. One is safer to assume the spread of mobile network usage by QFF members reflects national usage.

Industry data stated in 2023 Telstra had 43% of Mobile subscribers in Australia, Optus has 29% and VHA/TPG have 17%, the final 11% are Virtual Mobile Network Operators (VMNOs) which leverage either Telstra, Optus or VHA networks.

So whilst Telstra has the most customers outright, they do not have an absolute majority of Mobile customers overall as Optus + VHA/TPG = 46% of the market. So more likely that majority of QFF members are in fact not with Telstra.

The poster did say Australian owned - is that applicable to Optus and the others mentioned?

 

[Lynda2475]

The poster did say Australian owned - is that applicable to Optus and the others mentioned?

Semantics (FYI VHA/TPG is Australian owned too), the punctuation used doesn't read as if he meant the Aus owned with most QFF customers. Also IME nothing premium about Telstra except the price.

VHA and Opts have wider roaming partnerships than Telstra.

 

[Franky]

Semantics had nothing to do with my comment, unlike yours...

 

[justinbrett]

I dare say frequent travellers are more likely to be with Telstra than other carriers.

Too many people burnt by Optus and Vodafone. It may only be marginally more and I’m not sure it would be an outright majority, but I’d be shocked if it wasn’t higher than the national average.

The 43% market share was before the Great Optus Outage where I know a lot of people jumped ship.

 

[Lynda2475]

Semantics had nothing to do with my comment, unlike yours...

I posted publicly available facts about Telco share of the Australia market, no semantics in that whatsoever. RSV Kanga has provided no such evidence, just their opinion that most QFF members are with Telstra.

This thread is to discuss changing Optus Plans, not meant to be a platform for extolling the virtues of Telstra being partly Aussie owned.

In my recollection (and Im happy to be corrected) Telstra have never offered QFF points earning plans.

About 20 years ago one could earn QFF points on all Optus post paid plans, then that stopped for a while before they launched specific QFF plans again. Things change. Just like FFP there is no one best option for everyone and Im pretty sure most people select their provider based on network coverage and price and less so on who the owners are on any given day.

 

[Lynda2475]

I dare say frequent travellers are more likely to be with Telstra than other carriers.

Maybe frequent travelers within Australia as Telstra has 1% more coverage than Optus in regional areas BUT most people I know that travel internationally for work are not with Telstra because the other two have more roaming partners especially in Asia and Europe.

I was in New Caledonia last year with a friend who has both Telstra and VHA sims in her phone, no coverage at all. Optus had no at a roaming but at least supported calls and SMS coverage there.

The 43% market share was before the Great Optus Outage where I know a lot of people jumped ship.

Sorry this is incorrect, the Data breach was Sept 2022, the figures I quoted were for June 2023. Googling for 2024 seems to indicate Telstra is now 42%.

The data breach effect was temporary lots of complaining but Optus actually picked recovered most lost customers by end of last year according to the annual report.

Anyway people will choose what is right for them.

 

[justinbrett]

Maybe frequent travelers within Australia as Telstra has 1% more coverage than Optus in regional areas BUT most people I know that travel internationally for work are not with Telstra because the other two have more roaming partners especially in Asia and Europe.

I was in New Caledonia last year with a friend who has both Telstra and VHA sims in her phone, no coverage at all. Optus had no at a roaming but at least supported calls and SMS coverage there.



Sorry this is incorrect, the Data breach was Sept 2022, the figures I quoted were for June 2023. Googling for 2024 seems to indicate Telstra is now 42%.

The data breach effect was temporary lots of complaining but Optus actually picked recovered most lost customers by end of last year according to the annual report.

Anyway people will choose what is right for them.

I’m not talking about the data breach. I’m talking about the major outage late 2023.

2023 Optus outage - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org