Steve Perriam

the wife is looking for a deal on a new contract monthly pay phone. vodaphone wont play ball with what she has seen advertised so she's moving to someone else who gives the best deal......incl a nice new phone, prob the Motorola C975 or the V975.

from the web the best deals by far seem to be from 3 - as low as £3.49 a month !!!

these seem to be based on you paying the more 'usual' £30 a month and then after so many months you claim back the difference and they send you a cheque / refund you directly to your bank account.

anyone experienced these types of offer on the 3 network ?

also whats 3 like for standard voice and txt messages? quality of coverage / signal etc ? she does not want any of the fancy 3 video / music etc etc just a cheap deal on a phone and a number of free mins / txt messages.

Thanks

Steve

Stueyb

Well after our experience of 3, i would say you cant run fast enough in the other direction.!!! They really honestly are that poor.

gsm1

I switched to 3 in Jan 2004 and the network was certainly patchy back then. Since, they've certainly improved and coverage is much better and the costs are much cheaper than the other networks. I don't bother with all that video crap either.

corradoboy

They've had a real slating on Watchdog the last few weeks

ron_jon

Ive got one and I can only sum it up with one word. ****e.
Stay well away.
I've had loads of problems. I'd rather pay an extra 20/month and have a good service and phone.

Phone is crap, service reception is crap, and the service they give is shocking....

Steve Perriam

thanks guys.

thats wot i'd heard from a couple of people. although one person we know says its fine at least in his area !

she just likes the look of less than a fiver a month for a couple of hundred free mins and about 100 free txts !

gsm1 : would you recommend 3 to a friend wanting a new phone ?

3 certainly seem to be pushing themselves given all the adverts i hear on the radio with the panda etc !!

anyone else care to add a comment ?

rik1471

I have several friends who were on 3 but aren't anymore. When I used to phone them their phone's would cut off on every single call. Not for me, no thank you.

Rik.

gsm1

Steve, I'd certainly recommend 3 to a friend now, initially it was a pain in the ****, but the best deciding factor is to check what kind of coverage you get at home and work. For me, at home, Orange and T-Mobile are very poor but they are not bad networks otherwise. I've always considered Vodafone to be the best for coverage but they are also the most expensive - if your mobile makes your living then go for Voda.

When I first started with 3 they used the O2 network as a backbone on 2G to help their coverage - so everytime the phone would split between 3G on their own network and 2G on O2 leaving you in No Service for 30 seconds in-between, meaning calls kept cutting off. This is no longer a problem

The issues with 3 on Watchdog have been down to some problems with a LG handset which is no longer an issue.

scooby595

We were with 3, both phones went wrong on the same day, we were told it's a 3 day turnaround to get them fixed. They were picked up, got them back 5 working days later. Customer services are **** !! My advice is steer WELL clear. Signal was good but that's it !!! We phoned cst services to complain, they won't let us talk to a supervisor, we said we would refuse to pay any more bills, the woman said, "ok" we said we wanted to cancel the contract, woman said "ok". We've heard nothing in 2 months !!!

IPKIS

3 is a fookin hopless network
it never works and when it does it cuts off all the time.

took me 3 months to get the cu*ts to cancel the contract and take their piece of shiat phone back WITHOUT blacklisting me.


Don't sign up with them you'll regret it
stick with the decent companys like Orange and T-mobile

GaryCat

They are worth looking at if you are in a good coverage area. They suffer two main problems -

1. Switchover between 3 & O2 networks when you are on borderline coverage. Coverage is getting better all the time but there will never be a seamless switchover between networks.

2. The call centre in India (it's cheap and 3 get what they pay for). I only had to call them once and that was enough.

If you like 3G stuff - videocalls, games, movie clips etc - then they are better than Orange & Vodafone as they have been doing it for two years longer.

Despite Watchdog's feature the LG is an excellent phone as long as it has had a recent firmware upgrade. I wish I still had mine instead of the sh1te Nokia 6230 I have now.

Gary (ex 3 employee)

G00ner

My Orange 6630 has a dead spot for 30ish seconds when 3G service drops out, really annoying so I leave the phone on standard GSM now as I was missing too many work calls.

Steve Perriam

thanks for all the replies.

she's decided she will not be going 3 !!

James Neill

iTrader: (1)

This looks like to deal of the century

http://www.onestopphoneshop.co.uk/ou...PR-1&TAR=METRO

hail-hail

I'll be honest, all this 3 bashing surprises me. I moved two phones from Orange to 3 about 4 months ago.
I have had no problems and my monthy bills have gone from about £100per month to £20 per month

I have been through to customer services twice and had no problems. As far as I know the call centers are based in India and therefore all Customer Support is scripted. Not ideal and I'm sure a pain if you have a non standard issue.

I for one am willing to sacrafice this to save best part of a grand a year

ScoobyJawa

TBH I've had no major issues with them at all.

Stueyb

I suspect its "one of those" really, i.e. as long as you have no probs, you'll be ok apart from crappy reception. However if you do have a problem, you have them big time, if you follow.

ianc

I was a "founder", friend of a friend worked for them, we had two free handsets, and free everything for three months....

After about two months they went back in their box - even free calls wasn't enough when they kept dropping calls. The call centre struggles with anything other than a scripted question and the technology (then, granted, NEC) was pig slow.....

Three words, avoid avoid avoid....

ScoobyJawa

That was ages ago when they first started, you can't state its like that now.

I've only ever had a few calls drop, same with Orange. The Call Centres have been fine the times I've phoned them and very helpful (and queue times much much MUCH better than Orange), with prompt service when my phone hung (a motorola fault not 3). Reception isn't quite as good as the big ones but I've barely ever not had a signal even if it dropped to the 2.5G backup, but its been 3G most of the time.

ianc

I agree, that was then, but the repeated mention on watchdog does nothing to persuade me they have improved.

Ironically, I'm on orange, and never have a problem getting hold of them or them understanding any question I may have.

I still say avoid, just sharing my opinion \ experience, as the original poster asked for.

gsm1

I had one of the first Orange contracts when they started and they were originally owned by Hutchison, remember? They were new and their coverage was crap but as a new kid on the block they certainly taught Cellnet and Vodafone a thing or two. If you called back then to complain about crap coverage they also gave you a script - clean your sim contacts, remove your battery blah blah - they knew coverage was a problem but instead just kept swapping your handset with a refurb one to shut you up. Pretty soon Orange arrived and I think 3 are almost there now.