Vodafone slashes 3G prices further, adds pay-a-day plan

In a bid to capture the lead in the ongoing 3G price war among telecom operators in India, Vodafone has further reduced its 3G tariffs. But instead of simply slashing the prices of its 3G plans, the telco has taken a mixed approach, which involves reducing the tariffs of existing plans, retaining the current tariffs but increasing the data limit of existing plans and also adding new plans to the mix.

Prepaid

For prepaid customers, an all-new pay-a-day plan has been introduced where the company is offering 25 MB of 3G data for a price of Rs 26, but the validity is only for a day. There is also a plan of Rs 44 that has been added and it provides 150 MB of 3G data for a week. These are good options because they allow subscribers to get a feel of 3G before opting for it full time. Most of the other operators already offer such plans.

As for the monthly plans, a new one has been added that gives you 300 MB of 3G data for Rs 102 and finally, a plan worth Rs 1,501 has also been introduced that offers 10 GB of 3G data. But this plan only has one-month validity, compared to the two-month validity period of Rs 850 and Rs 1,250 plans. So it is obvious that this one targets people who are frequent surfers and download a lot of stuff (video, music, movie, etc.) on a regular basis.

Post-paid

For post-paid subscribers, the company has kept the pricing of the 3G plans same as before but increased the data benefit. A post-paid subscriber paying Rs 100 (the cheapest available plan) will now get 300 MB of 3G data but earlier, it was only 200 MB. And for the most expensive plan (Rs 1,250), subscribers will get 8 GB of 3G data, instead of 5 GB (60 per cent increase) that they were getting earlier.

The price slash and addition of new plans do improve Vodafone's position, compared to other players in the market. You will also find detailed information on the plans offered by the other telcos here, here and here.

As we have mentioned before, there may be a host of reasons behind the price war (Bharti Airtel probably did it because of the launch of its 4G services in the country while others did it in a bid to stay in the competition) but finally, the users will benefit the most from such a move. But as of now, we need to wait and watch how other players respond to Vodafone's move to make 3G data all the more affordable.

(Edited by Sanghamitra Mandal)

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