Multi-SIM bundles

Zevvle Chat đŸ”„
#1

Hello!

Bundles
 again?

Last time we spoke about bundles, our data was £5/GB. We polled that thread with 4:1 in favour of offering bundles, and that was with potential out-of-bundle charges and 1 bundle per SIM. Instead, we decided to lower our data price by 60%. However


We aimed for simplicity with multiple SIMs, but with the additional charges, minimum top-ups, voice bundles, etc., it hasn’t landed where we wanted. Although we like the PAYG model, we’ve had a number of people say how they’re now hyper-aware of everything they use – thinking “This costs money!” for every second they’re on the phone, or the anxiety of having a low balance.

Even with auto top-ups, it’s not the “set it and forget it” we hoped for. The comfort of a predictable price is real, kind of like a fixed-rate mortgage. This time, we’re thinking of something a little different:

1 account, 1 allowance, 1 monthly price, many SIMs

And that’s it, really. We’ll include unlimited calls & texts across everything, and there’ll only be 2 numbers to consider: your data allowance, and the monthly price (additional charges like international calls and non-EU roaming will still cost extra). There’ll be no ridiculous out-of-bundle charges, either.

This does re-introduce the problem of ‘data waste,’ so we’ll make it trivial to change your allowance, and even recommend it for you. In the future, we may look into money back on unused data or something similar.

It certainly brings us closer to “the others,” hence our focus on multiple SIMs. We want to be the best place to go if you need SIMs for family, extra phones, tablets, cars, WiFi routers, etc. Fellow networks are no strangers to their customers asking about extra SIMs/accounts. In fact, I was just banned from one of their forums for talking about it
 :star_struck:

On transparency

This has been one of the cornerstones of Zevvle from the beginning, and we’re not changing that. You’ll still be able to see everything you use, and access all your data as well.

Fundamentally the incentive-alignment flips completely – currently we’re better off the more you use, whereas with this new model we’ll be better off the less you use. Along with keeping your usage at the forefront and recommending or automatically switching you to a lower allowance, I hope you’ll trust us in navigating this line.

I don’t like this

And nothing will change for you! We’ll grandparent everyone on the old plan, and switching to the new one will be optional. For new customers, this will be the only choice (we need to focus).

I don’t need multiple SIMs

The plans will work whether you need 1 SIM or many.

What if I use more in some months?

This was one of the benefits to PAYG – you can save up credit in low-usage months for a time when you use a lot. With this new model, we’ll make it easy to increase your allowance in any month.

What will it cost?

We’re still finalising the pricing, but along with the convenience of everything in one place, we want the whole to be better-value than the sum of the parts. For example, 5 SIMs on one account sharing 5 GB will cost less than 5 individual SIMs with 1 GB each.

Excuse the essay; what are your thoughts? Love, hate, something in between? :blush:

- Nick

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Advice on options
Upcoming changes to Zevvle [outdated]
Data Bundles
Zevvle paym or payg
#2

I feel overall that switching from one idea to the next feels incredibly legacy and something that other providers would do; I hate the idea that I’ll now have to go away and work out what style is better and then do the maths on it.

I assumed the old “everyone is on the same plan/tariff so everyone pays the same.” that was stated previously on the main website up until a short while ago would ring true for at least the foreseeable future.

I also want stability, the fact that this has been announced without any prices or examples for the new style bundles is not a good thing in my opinion.

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#3

Thank you for the feedback, Thom. I should’ve used “could” instead of “will” throughout – this isn’t a 100% commitment, and we haven’t started working on it yet (hence no concrete pricing).

Personally I do like the current model, but it’s an up-hill battle for us with the stigma of PAYG. We’re trying to balance everyone’s feedback, and we won’t be right all the time.

We’re in a difficult spot with low and high usage, and we could have tried to solve that with tiered data rates, but that gets even messier. As far as everyone paying the same, that would still ring true – there’d be no offers or negotiating a different plan, and everything would be out in the open. It wouldn’t be much different than tiered data – the more you use, the cheaper it is. For people on the 2 separate plans (bundle vs PAYG), you’re right they would be different.

I’m sorry about this; I should’ve been more clear. We wanted to open a discussion about it and gather feedback (as you’ve helped with!), as opposed to announcing a new direction.

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#4

I do see points for both PAYG and bundles, I am one of the more paranoid about my usage and before switching I never realised just how many companies only have 03 numbers or have moved from 08 lines.

As I go on through I do seem to be using more and more both data wise and in calls, maybe a bundle would be good
 I do feel that it’s possibly going to be difficult to match the competition as the unlimited calls and texts bundle price can be beaten.

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#5

I would love single allowance and price across multiple Sims, as I’ve found it hard to predict how much I’ll use each sim, whereas I have a better idea of my overall usage. Call allowance across all sims would be great

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#6

I think I’d need prices to work out which is better

Is grandfathering going to be automatic? Should it not be I’d like to be put on it if possible - I liked the idea of £2/GB and PAYG for everything else

Question: will our grandfathering stack? For instance those of us who have the exemption from the ÂŁ15/3 months and then those of us who want an opt-out from this new move away from PAYG?

Thanks

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#7

I didn’t even know some had this (or even if I do or not!?) Simplicity was one of the reasons I jumped ship from my previous provider in the first place. :weary:

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#8

For single SIMs yes; I don’t know of anyone else doing it across multiple SIMs though.

I think anything over ~7GB will work out cheaper :slight_smile:

It will be, yes – we wouldn’t move you to this unless you ask.

It will!

It applies to you as well (see here). We can’t sustain £2/GB at low volume, and it felt less-bad than tiering data at the time. Granted, it wasn’t well received


I agree with you though – things have become more complicated, and it feels icky. What we’re thinking with the above would remedy some of that.

#9

I’m at roughly 2GB a month as it stands so I’ll be sticking to the grandfathered plan by the looks of it

No plan to kill it off in the future is there? :sweat_smile:

Edit; just checked and I’m at 1.2GB since 15th of October so I probably won’t even hit that

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#10

No :slight_smile:

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#11

I like that you’re trying out different things. I think for me (ignoring grandfather) , as a low data user I would put off if the cheapest plan is more than £10 a month. I’d hope the cheapest plan is below £10.

Can you explain why low gb users cost more? Naively I would have thought you pay your supplier the same price per gb

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#12

It will be, including unlimited calls and texts.

The more data a SIM uses, the less we pay per GB. The economics don’t work out for us on very low usage, which is why we added in the minimum top-up requirement.

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#13

How much are you thinking the lowest plan would be? :no_mouth:

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#14

We’ll finalise that soon!

#15

Excuse my essay of a reply.

I can only give you thoughts from my perspective, experience and needs.

My needs are 3 possibly 4 sims.

  1. For my phone - the priority being reliable calls, ideally Good 2G network for rural areas and 4G calling for cities.
  2. The wife’s phone - connectivity, she isn’t a huge data or calls user, ideally for redundancy on another network.
  3. My caravan tracker - 2G coverage, very low usage, don’t want to have to worry about disconnection because of the low usage.
  4. ?Tablet - currently we hotspot when away with the caravan, but my laptop is getting on and I might get a tablet that has a sim slot.

On both phones I want seamless roaming within Europe and a reasonable deal worldwide.
Obviously price is a factor or I would just use the main players.

Network reliability isn’t sufficient at the moment to rely on one provider (we spent a wet 2 weeks in October in the caravan in the Dales. Great EE 4g coverage until it failed then we had very patchy 2g for 2 days meaning no calls or data. Not the end of the world but annoying.) Therefore, because EE’s 2g coverage is secondary to their great 4g coverage, that means I use Vodafone (Voxi). The package with Zevvle works great for me because for £2 a month the tracker SIM is connected and my wife’s usage is minimal. When we hotspot we consider £2 a Gb very reasonable compared to the Caravan Club’s wifi charges.

Big picture: I think that Zevvle at least has to be in the ball park for price. CS, app control and transparency means it doesn’t have to be the cheapest. I think it has to include many features as standard. eg roaming (Vodafone basic doesn’t for example). Unlimited tethering. Multi SIM on one account. I find it a bit creepy that I can see my wifes usage - I don’t know if there is a simple fix for that. I would like DD rather than continous credit card.

I don’t think that any of the bundled proposals will make any difference to me but I can see it bringing in many new subscribers (assuming the right price) which is obviously important for the success of Zevvle.

PS I realise that Voxi doesn’t support 4G calling but after a years experience with BT which did I am in the situation of poor 4G coverage more often than poor 2G

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#16

There already is, you can setup and additional user in the app and ask @nick to move the SIM over. You’ll just then see the total amount used and not the individual usage:

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When you click on the user you get:

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The numbers are shown, I’ve just removed them. The usage is currently £0 because I’m waiting for her BT contract to expire.

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#17

Appreciate that, thank you.

Assuming that includes data outside of the EU. How often, if you don’t mind me asking?

That it will. DD with this would be a lot easier; we’re implementing it for a business this month so can carry it over.

We need to make that process clearer (adding a new user vs activating a SIM), and we’re going to add a verification for extra SIMs before showing call records.

Thanks again for your input!

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#18

I’m very interested in this.
It’ll come down to pricing by far!

A wonder; could it be a 2 option system to choose PAYG or the bundles and switch between them with some notice maybe? I’m worried if I don’t like it that I could loose what I have now!

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#19

To save on confusion we wouldn’t offer both, however if you don’t like it we’d happily switch you back; i.e., you won’t lose it. :slight_smile:

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#20

As you probably know I’m quite interested in worldwide data too - probably only once or twice a year for no more than 4 weeks total :clap:

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