May 12, 2008 4:05 PM | 5 Comments

The bandwidth-slurping Australian iPhone is set to bring the issue of mobile data costs to head.

Vodafone and Optus have announced Australian iPhones, and surely Telstra won't be far behind. They'll all be pushing it as the perfect mobile internet device - but recent surveys don't look promising. A third of Australian consumers own a 3G-capable phone, yet two thirds of these people don't use 3G services, according to a recent report from the Australian Communications and Media Authority. Those people who don't use 3G services cite lack of interest and data costs as key reasons why. I don't blame them.

On most phones, accessing the internet is like spanking the monkey with a cheese grater - slightly amusing but mostly painful. The iPhone in my pocket right now offers by far the best mobile internet experience I've encountered, and it will be even better once it goes 3G. Once the 3G iPhone is available over Australian shop counters, rather than under the counter, I think our opinion of 3G services will start to change.

Then there's price. While Vodafone and 3 have exchanged blows in a mobile data price war since Christmas, it's mostly around HSDPA adaptors for computers rather than data packs for mobile phones. 3's X Series phone data plans are very good, but of course 3 has very limited coverage and roams onto Telstra's extremely expensive mobile data network (although not at 3G speeds). While Vodafone's national network means you'll never face roaming data charges, Vodafone's metro 3G coverage is very patchy compared to Telstra and 3.

Finding the pricing for handset-based data takes a little digging, but here's what I found from the major providers;

Optus: 1GB per month for $20

3: 1GB per month for $29

Telstra Next G: 1GB per month for $89

Vodafone: 1GB per month for $99

Telstra and Vodafone's charges are ridiculous, although they do have better coverage than the others. Most of these prices are under the telco's business plans, because if you trawl through their websites they don't seem to recognise that consumers want mobile internet access on their phones as well. You can bet they'll start spruiking it heavily to consumers when the iPhone is unleashed, but you'll want to read the fine print.

Australian iPhone users face the risk of data bill shock not only because the iPhone makes mobile data services more tempting to use, but because the iPhone starts chewing through mobile bandwidth as soon as you take it out of the box. To quote a friend using an iPhone in Australia since last year; "My first phone bill was 27 pages long". That was just thanks to the Stocks and Weather apps running in the background. Automatically checking for new email every few minutes would further exacerbate the situation.

When the iPhone is connected to a wifi network it overrides GPRS/EDGE, but don't make the mistake of thinking you're not chewing through mobile data. When the phone goes to sleep it shuts down wifi to save power and uses the mobile phone network to monitor your email and run other background processes - racking up your data bill.

On an unhacked first-gen iPhone there is no way to disable this, but this isn't a problem in the U.S. because the phones are linked to AT&T unlimited mobile data plans. In Australia, this is a huge problem and it will be interesting to see if the local telcos allow GPRS/EDGE/3G disabling, alter their mobile data plans or just happily rob their customers blind. Based on Telstra's track record, I suspect Sol and his amigos will opt for door number three.

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tesseractau May 13, 2008 10:28 AM	I agree totally with you!! BTW,isn't there a rule somewhere that ALL fees and charges relating to a contract should be available at all times, and doesn't this rule bind the telcos since they are all public companies? Also, since Telstra is one of the major wholesalers of internet data, why are their retail costs way higher than most others? CASH COWS can moo here....
nix May 13, 2008 1:17 PM	Looks like you can turn off data when roaming. Pretty much a killer feature for those of us on 3 -- assuming we get to use the iPhone on that network at all.
Adam Turner May 13, 2008 2:44 PM	nix, sorry but the Data Roaming switch doesn't kill the GPRS/EDGE link, it just stops you roaming on to other networks. You're right in that it would be an important feature for 3 users who don't want to pay Telstra obscene prices just to access its GRPS network.
geller May 13, 2008 5:09 PM	Are you sure there's no 3G "kill switch"? check this out: http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2008/05/second-gen-ipho.html
Adam Turner May 13, 2008 11:36 PM	That looks interesting, but it appears to only scale you back from 3G to EDGE/GPRS (basically turning a 3G iPhone into a 2G iPhone). It doesn't look it actually disables wireless data completely. It's possible Apple could add such a feature to v2.0, but only if they give a stuff about non-US users. Even then, the telcos might lobby against it because they make so much money from excess data charges.