The July edition of the quarterly Tariff Consultancy Ltd (TCL) Global Mobile Internet/Mobile Broadband Price Tracker(Q2-15) subscription service highlights the increase in the size of Data bundles available as data usage intensifies worldwide.
TCL has tracked Mobile Internet and Mobile Broadband prices since 2007 and provides tariffs and analysis for 140 MNOs in 66 countries including 2,117 plans and options. TCL has seen a continued increase in mobile data packages of more than 10 GB which now accounts for almost 37 per cent by all number of plans surveyed.
The ” average inside the bundle rate GB (Giga-Byte) for the 10 GB+ plans is now €1.60 per GB, almost 1/10 of the entry-level (500 MB) plan of €15.88 per GB “.
TCL finds that MNOs are introducing “unlimited” data plans during the last quarter, which in fact have a very high data allowance, including:
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• Bahrain: 4G LTE Home & Mobile Broadband with a 1000 GB data allowance
• Denmark: with a 500 GB data allowance
• Bahrain: with a 500 GB data allowance
• Kuwait: with a 500 GB data allowance
Other new mobile data price trends identified in the Q2-15 survey include:
- New Pre Pay services: For example with Bulgarian operator provides a one day or one week internet add on for Pre Pay customers.
- New Data Sharing: For example with Hungarian operator providing data sharing (with a charge for an extra SIM card).
- An increase in Data download speeds: For example with Irish operator providing a claimed 225 Mbps download speed.
- New night-time services: For example with Italian operator providing free surfing at night between the hours of midnight to 7:59 am for its 8 GB & 30 GB allowance.
- Data roll over: Allowing users to roll over data to the next month’s period.
- Out of allowance pricing: Moving away from Per Mbyte pricing to higher bundles
- Data roaming: For example with US operator allowing their customers to use their existing data allowance in Canada and Mexico.
In the chart below TCL shows the average pricing per data allowance bundle – from 500 MB up to 10 GB+.*
Figure 1: A table showing the average pricing (Cost per month in Euros incl. tax) per mobile data allowance – Q2-15 – in the TCL survey* (Source TCL)
500 MB 8.29
1 GB 11.56
2 GB 14.32
3 GB 16.80
5 GB 22.47
10 GB 31.02
10 GB+ 37.15
Average pricing for the 10 GB plus data allowance has fallen by the most of all allowances, by 15.8 per cent for the quarter period.
In the Table below, TCL shows the average pricing per GB for each data allowance in the TCL survey.
Figure 2: A table showing the average pricing (in Euros incl. tax) per 1 GB inside the bundle for each data allowance – Q2-15 in the TCL survey*(Source TCL)
500 MB 15.88
1 GB 11.5
2 GB 7.07
3 GB 5.6
5 GB 4.51
10 GB 3.1
10 GB+ 1.6
Average pricing per GB has also fallen over the quarter, with the largest fall, of almost 21 per cent per GB, for the 10 GB plus segment.
*based on monthly postpaid data bundles accessed by PC/Laptop/Tablet
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