With cost of living forever skyrocketing, every dollar or ringgit counts. Unless you don’t have to look at price tags every time you dine or shop, without worrying about getting broke, you really have to be smart consumers. While you don’t have much control over monthly petrol prices fluctuation or the 6% GST, you can still scout for new deals.

 

One of your expenses is smartphone bills. Get real, people nowadays are willing to consume dirt cheap instant noodles or sacrifice sex altogether, rather than give up on their Facebook (Nasdaq: Stock, FB), Twitter (Nasdaq: Stock, TWTR), WeChat or Whatsapp. Since you can’t beat the extra 6% GST on phone bills, you can only join them.

So, go join the new “FIRST™ Basic 38 Plan” introduced by Celcom, before the offer expires in – 2 days. In case you didn’t notice, the promotional plan runs from 1 – 31 May this year. At the early stage of this crazy promotions, there were tons of confusion, so much so that Celcom salespersons looked like a fool, simply because the website FAQ kept changing.

 

Let’s nail the juices of this plan. The monthly commitment is RM38 (RM40.30 including 6% GST) with “No Contract”. For that, you’ll get 3GB Internet Data with another 3GB WiFi thrown in, 50-minutes of calls to all networks, 50 SMS to all networks. That’s an awesome deal simply because that’s the best deal in town so far.

Subsequently, you’ll be charged 15 sen every minute for voice calls and 15 sen for every SMS. But hey, there’re plenty of apps (Viber, Whatsapp, WeChat, LINE) that you can use to make free calls or messages, without burning holes, now that you’ve 3GB of data at your disposal. If that is not enough to convince you, there’re more.

 

Before we proceed, let’s clear one huge confusion here. Celcom has never been good in getting the message across in English, so forgive them. The promotional offering of 3GB Internet plus 3GB WiFi is valid, for as long as you’re active with the plan (FIRST™ Basic 38 Plan). What this means is if you try to change to another plan later, the goodies are off.

And you must sign up within the promotional period, which is from 1-May to 31-May. After 31-May-2015 (another two days), you won’t get 3GB Internet and 3GB Wifi anymore, even if you sign for the same plan. After the promotional period, the same plan will be at 2GB of Internet plus 2GB of WiFi only, while the rest remains the same.

 

Now, back to the goodies. For the first time in the history of Malaysia telecommunication, you can carry forward un-used internet data to next month. There’s a cap though, whereby you can only bring forward maximum of 3GB per billing cycle. Finally, consumers are getting some fair deals after decades of enriching telcos.

What this means is if you do not use any data at all for this month, your 3GB of un-used internet data will be carried forward to next month, essentially giving you 6GB of internet data starting next month. Of course, you can’t carry forward 6GB thereafter to get 9GB. Therefore, if you have balance of 4GB before your next billing cycle, your 1GB will be forfeited since you can carry forward only 3GB at most.

 

Such flexibility, while is not the best in the world (that title goes to Google Fi Network, where you get refund for un-used data), is certainly the best in the country, for now. What if you utilised all the internet 3GB quota? You can still access internet but at reduce speed (64 kbps), the same concept which was pioneered by DIGI.com initially.

To register for the plan, simply walk in to any Celcom branch, Blue Cube outlet or Celcom key dealer nationwide, at least that was what their website claims. In reality, some dealers only entertain new Celcom customers, because they will get slightly more commissions. They might tell you such plan is not applicable to existing Celcom customers.

 

Of course, that is not true because Celcom’s official FAQ says the plan is open to all individuals including new and existing Celcom customers, Mobile Number Portability (MNP) customers, Prepaid to Postpaid conversions and customers who are not under a contract. So, the only reason they will not process your application is if you’re still tied to a contract.

Here’s the deal. You subscribe to the “FIRST™ Basic 38 Plan” before it expires in another two days, don’t ever change the plan and you can practically enjoy the 3GB of Internet plus 3GB of WiFi, which comes with 50 minutes of free calls to all networks, and 50 free SMS a month – all for only RM38 per-month – FOREVER.

 

Another attractiveness of this plan is that there’s absolutely “No Contract”. Obviously this is important because should Celcom tries to short-change customers with inferior internet speed, for example, customers can always terminate the plan and go elsewhere. Most importantly, such plan forces competitor – Maxis and Digi – a run for their money.

It’s only a matter of time before both Maxis Berhad (KLSE: MAXIS, stock-code 6012) and DIGI.COM Berhad (KLSE: DIGI, stock-code 6947) counter offer with similar packages, if not better. For now, DIGI’s SmartPlan 50, the most economical Postpaid plan comes with 2GB of internet data plus 100 minutes of free talks and 100 free SMS. Heck, Celcom should pay us for promoting their products here.

 

As for Maxis, well, forget about them because they’re a big time player in ripping off consumers (*grin*). The age where they could offer premium services are long gone. Their coverage is no better than Celcom, although still ahead of DIGI. Even in Klang Valley, Maxis’ 3G or 4G-LTE reliability is miles behind Celcom. Need we tell you how congested Maxis bandwidth is, due to perception that its “012” is a premium product?

 

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May 29th, 2015 by financetwitter

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