Save money by doing Research

It is the *mobile* world and wherever you go you can see people speaking in their mobile, even while driving!! There are many service providers in India,

• Hutch (I prefer this one, cos of its low cost)
• Airtel (Better coverage all over India next to BSNL)
• BSNL (Public)
• Reliance and Tata Indicom (Using CDMA Technology)

You can get your monthly rental amount from net and according to your usage there are many plans available. For this you have to do a great research in finding the lowest rent. For example, Recently Hutch announced OneIndia plan (Re. 1 all over India) for Rs. 125/-, if you go to retailer every month. But When I asked for the same to be taken from my balance they are charging the double of it. What will you choose here? (If you are really in need of taking oneIndia plan)

I have also seen Hutch giving me Full Talktime for specific recharges with validity (Ex. Rs.875/- recharge, where I will get 6 months validity and 787/- as talktime.) They use two different words like Full Talktime for which they will take only the service charge of 12% and Complete Talktime for those which you will get the complete talktime without any service charge.

Go for Postpaid or Prepaid?

There are advantages in both the schemes. But do a high research. Dont lose your money by having unnecessary offers/plans which cost you high. Compare it with your usage and choose the best plan available with your service provider.

• There is a refundable deposit in the case of postpaid, which you should have to pay even before getting a connection.
• My friend has a postpaid connection and used to say they have charged for a missed call. I cant find any truth in that. But he showed the detailed billing where he was charged for some calls with call duration of 0.01 minutes.
• In postpaid, the only advantage I can see is, you can pay your bills at the end of every month or once in a month, where you know your exact expense for your mobile phone per month.
• The sim card charges apply for both prepaid and postpaid.
• In prepaid you have to go and recharge everytime, anywhere (through Internet, ATM and also a dealer shop)

In Airtel, there will be some offers at the end of every validity which will be applicable for only those two days or so and only to you. It is like catch the offer soon!.

How I lost Rs. 70/- during recharge?

Two days before, I was talking to my sister at about 10 PM and my balance got over. Then I went to the nearest ATM and recharged my mobile for Rs. 550/-. There is a reason for this recharge. I had validity and I wanted only talktime and I had received many Complete Talktime offers from Hutch. I thought Rs. 550/- also is having complete talktime offer. Alas! , I got only Rs. 478/- . I enquired Hutch care to find that the offer of complete talktime is valid only for Rs.222/- , Rs. 333/- , Rs.555/- and Rs. 777/- and this is where my research failed.

If I had called Hutch care before (not possible,I was in the mood of continuing my talk with my sister that day), I would have got the information.

My advice is, either recharge it before your talktime ends after doing much research or go to the dealer whenever you recharge, so that you can recharge with what amount you need.

As always, Do a good research in finding which plan suits you and go with that plan. Keep you eye open in seeing any new offers to shift. Take my word. It is easy to shift if you are using GSM prepaid providers.