The recent focus on the cost of mobile data and calls by both Optus and Vodafone have seemingly forced Telstra to look at their own data pricing, with the largest Telco in Australia advising that from the 14th of October they will introduce some new ‘cheaper’ options.
Whilst not as outrageously expensive as their current data pack offerings, which sees you charged $29 for just 20MB of data, the new Casual Traveler Data Packs now provide five times the data at the same price, although all the packs have a 30 day expiry on them :
- $29 for 100MB to use over 30 days
- $85 for 300MB to use over 30 days
- $160 for 600MB to use over 30 days
- $350 for 1.5 GB to use over 30 days
The packs are able to be added to your plan whether you’re at home or overseas. While not the cheapest, Telstra have fallen back to their usual claim of having the best/largest coverage, advising that their Travel Data packs are available to use in 50 eligible countries and the packs are able to be used in any of these 50 countries.
While the data packs are a great idea, they’ve also reduced their pay-as-you-go rate which currently stands at $15 per MB and will drop down to $3 pre MB.
Telstra is also hoping to help customers manage their data usage, by sending ‘international roaming data usage alerts’ each time you use a 20MB block of data, all in a bid to stop customers from coming home to a nasty surprise.
This seems to be a rather token effort on Telstra’s part, but if you’re going to insist on using Telstra whilst overseas you’re now five times better off. You’re still probably best off looking at a local SIM card for the length of your stay to get maximum value for money, but if you need to keep your number active and you’re a Telstra customer, this is your best bet.
