The Home of Ben May, Hervey Bay, QLD, Australia. Personal Blog of Ben May, Hervey bay

I’ve been a Telstra customer since I got my first CDMA prepaid mobile phone probably 9 or 10 years ago. To be honest, I really didn’t have any problems with my Telstra phone. I had reception anywhere and everywhere I needed it, and if I prepaid $30 here or there, it would last me the month.

When I started running a business and relying on it more and more I used a “cap” which I think are a great idea. I started on the $49/month cap, which included $250 worth of calls plus $100 telstra credit, so basically $350 credit of calls, but I started using that up as work got even more intense.

About a year ago I upgraded to the $79 cap, which included about $550 worth of calls, and if you’re a reader of this blog, you’ll know I purchased an unlocked iPhone about a year ago. When Apple released iPhone firmware 2.0.1, I had the ability to receive email and surf the internet, even if it was at dial up speeds. For only an extra $10 a month for 150mb data.

There was no real reason for me to upgrade to a 3G iPhone, however I knew Telstra’s plans are INSANELY dear, and with Optus, I can now pay $10 a month LESS, receive the same amount of call caps, 7x the amount of data (700mb) and unlimited SMS’s to any mobile phone.