Hi basedwellers, recent events forced me to go through the offers of the emerging virtual operators and I wanted to share a couple of interesting facts I've discovered. If you're not interested in knowing what finally pushed me over the edge, skip the following paragraph.
I was fed up with having to pay for the extra minutes I used beyond my undersized Vodafone tariff, so I decided to increase my monthly payment. Since I have the special ČD bonus tariff, I had to call a special line where we arranged the change. A week later, they called me back to tell me that my internet package "is incompatible" with the offer I've been using for two years, and that I'll have to use a different package that is only almost twice as expensive, but that it's not a problem and they will even be so benevolent that they won't charge me back for all the cheap internet I've used. I got mad and decided to do the only thing a customer can do - vote with my wallet and show them what the terms "show-stopper" and "rage quit" mean.
While researching the available offers, I noticed a few noteworthy facts.
Tesco Mobile is the cheapest provided you let them snoop on your eating habits via ClubCard (you can avoid this by simply not using ClubCard when buying stuff in Tesco). If you use ClubCard, they double all the credit you purchase. After reaching the FUP limit, they do not slow down the internet so drastically (200kbit/s), but they prevent certain traffic, such as FTP, P2P or video streaming services. I'm really curious about how they do that and looking forward to circumventing it :-) Prices: 2.90Kč/min, 1.50Kč/SMS, 150Kč/150MB (divide by two if using ClubCard)
Mobil.cz is really interesting because they offer free internet. If you think 16kbit/s can still be called internet, that is. The only catch is that you have to recharge the credit once a year. This could be useful for all sorts of automation on places without internet connection. Prices: 2.50Kč/min, 1.50Kč/SMS, Free slow internet, fast internet 30 days after recharging at least 250Kč
99Mobile is just a cheap, honest operator based in Brno, without any noticeable catches in the ToS. Prices: 1.49Kč/min, 1.49Kč/SMS, 79Kč/100MB
I'm omitting the rest of the operators because of things like high prices or being bastrads in one way or another.
Yours sincerely, HonzaH