How not to pay for mobile communications and enjoy unlimited communication? It’s simple about finance: how to pay less for communication How to pay less for mobile
Herewe have collected tips and life hacks on how to stay connected without paying too much.
Knowledge is power
Let's start with the obvious. Try to quickly answer the question, how many minutes, SMS and Internet are included in your tariff plan. How much are you actually spending? How much exactly do you pay per month for a cell phone? If you hesitate to answer at least one of these questions, there is a high probability that you are overpaying for communication. Your needs and traffic consumption change, and operators often release new tariffs or change the conditions for old ones. So at some point, the previously optimal tariff suddenly ceases to be so. Take 20 minutes of your time to answer the above questions and get familiar with your carrier's current tariff line.
Your consumption and expenses can be found in your personal account (LC) on the operator's website, and you can see the current tariff line on the same operator's website or profile portals. If mathematics has never been your forte, and rummaging through sites is boring, you can use special services. For example, the Tariff Analysis service on Banki.ru. By specifying your phone number and password from the operator's personal account, you will receive an accurate calculation of your costs and needs, as well as recommendations for more favorable tariffs from both your own and other operators. Life hack: now the service is absolutely free!
Cut off all excess
Imposed services and "accidental" connections are the scourge of modern telecom. Monthly checking the availability of paid services, it is very easy to control the situation. This can be done with special commands, regular checks of the personal account on the operator's website, or with special programs and applications. Five minutes a month is not so much for peace of mind and cost optimization.
Two in one, three in one...
What does the company do to tie the client to itself? He tries to penetrate as much as possible into all spheres of his life. Business diversification is a good tactic to keep a customer. And for us it is an opportunity to save a lot. So, if you use Beeline cellular communication, pay attention to the so-called convergent tariffs of the All-in-One line, where home Internet is provided completely free of charge for connecting a cellular tariff. For example, the All in One 2 tariff, in addition to the package of minutes, SMS and Internet, includes home Internet at a speed of 40 Mbps. A more "older" tariff provides the subscriber with free home Internet at a speed of up to 50 Mbps, as well as 82 home TV channels and 25 mobile TV channels.
Similar packages can be found at providers. A good example here is the Moscow provider MGTS, which provides packages from home Internet, cellular communications (virtual operator MGTS), TV and home telephone with maximum discounts. It turns out that if you take the full set, then one of the services is free. In addition, some package offers include a smartphone for 1 ruble, which gives not only a discount on communication, but also a modern gadget almost free of charge.
Lots of opportunities to talk
What to do when you love to talk so much that voice traffic quickly ends? Or you need to talk for a long time with other countries. At the same time, there is a lot of Internet traffic at the end of the month. The answer is simple: communicate via the Internet! When making calls via Skype and other applications, the phone consumes Internet traffic and does not take into account borders and distances. And it is convenient to correspond in various messengers. Moreover, operators are creating more and more tariffs with unlimited traffic on social networks. "Voice" is not wasted, roaming is not included, there is a sea of communication. The beauty!
Catching stocks
It is very useful to follow the news of your operator. If you set yourself the goal of catching stocks, you can save a lot. So, the Tele2 operator gives a 10% discount on communication when connecting auto payment, and MegaFon makes a cashback in megabytes when using the operator’s bank card.
And if you decide to change your home Internet provider, this is a good opportunity to look at special offers from other providers. In this way, you can get good conditions and new speeds at very low prices.
Flexible rates
Most communication tariffs are some kind of average packages designed for typical users. But for people with non-standard needs, there is also a way out. These are the so-called flexible tariffs, when the terms of the tariff or the set of services in the package are chosen by the user himself. This category also includes special tariff plans that are suitable for various user groups: online players, active users of social networks, music lovers, etc.
One of the first flexible tariffs was offered by the Yota operator. Using the operator's application, the subscriber can independently set the tariff conditions without overpaying for unnecessary traffic.
For the youth audience, MegaFon recently offered a new line "Turn on", created on the basis of an analysis of the traffic consumption of the most active communication users. Music lovers, gamers, and bloggers will find their own version here.
As for gamers, they are traditionally loved by Rostelecom (in Moscow it operates under the Onlime brand). The provider has long and firmly established tariffs for fans of online games with special bonuses in popular games.
Welcome Complain!
The most important thing to always remember: do not be silent! Operators and providers value user loyalty and take a lot of steps to retain subscribers up to special discounts and individual offers. Therefore, if something does not suit you, raises questions and does not work as it should, be sure to tell your operator or provider. Because no one will force you to make you happy, but if you apply, they will definitely help you.
Chat, ask and be happy!
Recently, the number of unpleasant news related to mobile operators and their services has increased by an order of magnitude. The reason for this is the new tariff plans, which led to an increase in prices for communications and mobile Internet. Fortunately, sometimes not only bad news comes from operators, but also good. Among such news are promotions and profitable offers that allow you to save on communication services or even not pay for them at all. Thus, the largest mobile operator MTS provided its subscribers with the opportunity not to pay for their tariff plan.
Of course, in order to use the tariff for free, you will have to meet several conditions. They are pretty simple. To begin with, the subscriber needs to issue a bank card "MTS Smart Money". In the future, in order to completely get rid of the monthly fee, there are several ways to choose from. The first is to simply keep a certain amount of money on the card account. The second is to make ordinary household purchases with the card - you can pay with a card for anything, from groceries in the supermarket to orders in online stores. After you spend more than the specified minimum, you can not pay for the tariff.
The amounts of money in both the first and second cases differ depending on the selected tariff plan. So, for the free use of the Hype tariff, the subscriber needs to keep 50,000 rubles on his account or spend more than 10,000 rubles from the MTS Smart Money card. But for the more expensive Smart Unlimited + tariff plan, you will have to store more - 70,000 rubles, you will have to spend twice as much - 20,000 rubles.
However, such a system is not available on any tariff plan, but only on those indicated by the operator. These included Smart, Smart+, Smart NonStop, Smart Unlimited, Smart Zabugorishche, Our Smart, Hype, My Unlimited, as well as a separate MTS Tablet option.
The MTS Smart Money card itself acts like a standard bank card. After a one-time payment of 199 rubles, the card is serviced free of charge. Also, the card has one nice feature that distinguishes it from similar ones - an absolutely free notification system, available by default. You can forget about monthly debits for mobile banking services - you won't have to pay to find out who, how much and from where transferred to you. You can apply for a card in any Mobile TeleSystems store, you just need to have your passport with you. Moreover, the entire registration process will not take more than 15 minutes.
Many may be concerned about the commission issue when withdrawing money from the MTS Smart Money card through an ATM. However, MTS provided for everything here too - there is no commission at all through their branded ATM. Summing up all of the above, we can conclude that MTS has provided a really profitable opportunity for subscribers who decide to switch to the MTS Smart Money card and make regular purchases with it or simply keep money on its account.
I almost never paid for telephone communications. From the early 90s, when my employer forcibly handed me a pager with corporate services, and until now - when the phone is needed mainly for mobile Internet. So I never had thousands of phone bills. But some of my friends had, and even now many of them have mobile communications - a rather serious expense item. Therefore, this post is about how not to pay for mobile communications at all or manage with very little spending.
Scheme No. 1: Tele2 + Uralsib
Everyone has their own needs, and I’ll say right away that they are very modest for me: 2 GB of mobile Internet per month is enough for me. The main thing is that the Internet should be fast and, if possible, always and wherever I want. Therefore, for almost two years now I have been using Tele2. Yes, he does not catch the subway, but to be honest, I rarely go to the subway, and when I do, the local Wi-Fi suits me. But I like everything else: fast and stable Internet - throughout Russia (I travel a lot), normal coverage, cheap roaming abroad and a beautiful number that I chose for 1 ruble. Until recently, all this pleasure cost me 99 rubles a month, until the evil people from Tele2 decided that I live too well and raised the subscription fee to 149 rubles. Now this tariff is no longer given to new subscribers, but a similar one costs 199 rubles, and still this is one of the most profitable offers on the market.
In order not to pay these 199 rubles, it is enough to get a "Phone card" of the bank Uralsib and spend at least 6666 rubles per month in supermarkets, and you will receive 200 rubles per month (3% cashback) on your phone bill. Accordingly, if you spend more, then more will be returned to the account. This offer is valid not only for Tele2 subscribers, but also for all other major Russian operators and even owners of some international SIM cards. Maintenance of the "Phone card" is free of charge for the first year, then 900 rubles a year. Until the end of August, there is a promotion under which, in addition to 3% cashback, you can also get 10% cashback for any first three purchases (but no more than 2,000 rubles will be returned), so now is a good time to get such a card if you don’t have one. And if you still don’t use Tele2, you can go there with your number, and you will still be rewarded with 300 rubles for small expenses (on the Tele2 website it says that the promotion is over, but as recently as yesterday I was offered to use this in their salon proposal, so it may still be valid).
Tele2 has another affiliate program - with touch bank. According to the terms of this program, being a Tele2 subscriber, you can get a Touch Bank card, and it will cost 49 rubles per month, and communication costs will be 10% cheaper. I don't think this is a very good offer, given the rather sluggish conditions for Touch Bank cardholders, especially since they raised the minimum cashback withdrawal amount to 2000 rubles. But I can’t help but write about this proposal - suddenly someone will like it.
Scheme No. 2: MegaFon + Mu-mu
For many years in a row, since 2000 and until recently, I have been a subscriber MegaFon and at the same time the owner of a co-branded card MegaFon-Citibank. They had a good loyalty program - for a long time I did not pay not only for my phone, but also for the phones of all family members and some of my friends. Over time, the program began to gradually deteriorate, and then the partnership with Citibank ceased altogether. Now the MegaFon-Bonus program still exists, but its conditions are so non-trivial that at some point I got completely confused and stopped to understand them. I still have a MegaFon SIM card, and even have some money and bonuses on it (which gradually burn out), but I don’t use it, because so far there hasn’t been a situation that Tele2 couldn’t handle.
Apparently, MegaFon itself has long since given up on its bonus program and has focused its efforts on a bank card of its own production, which also gives (more understandable) bonuses to MegaFon subscribers. Now, in order to save on telephone conversations, it is enough to get a free MegaFon bank card, put all your money on it (just kidding, of course, not all) and receive cashback and interest on the account balance (8%). Cashback is given for purchases from partners (now these are Shokoladnitsa, Mu-mu, Wabi-sabi, Niyama, Lunch buffet, Delivery Club, OneTwoTrip and others), plus 100 rubles are credited to the account for any first purchase in a month, plus for every 100 rubles spent the card gives 10 MB of mobile Internet, and for each first purchase in a month more than 1000 rubles, they give an additional 1 GB (according to the "Turn on" tariffs). In other words, if you use the card, the phone will be free or almost free.
Scheme No. 3: Beeline + cashback
At Beeline also has its own payment card, which is called: Beeline MasterCard card. It differs from the megafon one primarily in that it has a stable 5% cashback on goods in three large categories that the client himself can choose (the most profitable categories: restaurants, public transport, entertainment and leisure; food, unfortunately, among them no), as well as 1% cashback on all other purchases.
You can spend the returned money - correctly, on paying for Beeline communications, and not only mobile, but also home Internet. If there is so much cashback that there is nowhere to put it, they can be partially compensated for the tickets purchased in the service Biletix shopping in supermarkets crossroads and in some other places. That is, you can’t just withdraw cashback to spend it anywhere. So it makes sense to get such a card for Beeline subscribers and those who fly a lot (Biletix has quite competitive prices). If you are too lazy to start a card, and the card Tinkoff or Uralsib If you already have one, by connecting auto payment, you can save 10% on communication costs.
Scheme No. 4: MTS + weekend
Once upon a time, I was also an MTS subscriber. I left them after money began to disappear uncontrollably from the account. The printout of the conversations contained a bunch of unfamiliar numbers, on which, according to MTS, I talked for literally hours. To all my questions, the employees shook their heads reproachfully, and it was read in their eyes: "If you, a guy, are so talkative, then pay as much as you need." Basically, I left them. And after a while, when they got a favorable tariff with the Internet, I decided to give them another chance: I bought their SIM card, put 200 rubles on it and, intending to spend it on super-fast and super-cheap (at that time) mobile Internet, went home. But while I was walking, 196 rubles out of 200 suddenly disappeared somewhere. Natural curiosity did not allow me to break the card into small pieces in my hearts, instead I re-registered in the Internet bank and ordered an extract, in which it was dispassionately said that I spent 196 rubles sending MMS (!) to a certain Vodafon subscriber in Spain. And then I broke the map into small pieces.
But the story did not end there: about a year and a half later, I received a letter from the bailiffs, which says that if I do not pay the debt of 600 MTS rubles, but polite people will come to me and describe all my property, and I will be sent to Siberia clear snow. Of course, I rushed with all my might to the MTS office on the other side of the city (and then, as in Sberbank, you had to go exactly to the office where you started the SIM card), where I found out that you had to not break the card and throw it away into the garbage chute, but come to the office and terminate the contract, despite the fact that this card is prepaid and does not imply any monthly fee. 600 rubles were accumulated for some kind of connected after the fact service, which sounded something like "Catch Smeshariki while you are riding the subway." I paid the money, closed the card, but I won’t be surprised if tomorrow I receive another letter from the bailiffs that I owe money to MTS again - for example, for seeing their ads on TV and laughing at Nagiyev.
Anyway, I know some hardcore fans MTS, who will never, for anything in the world, betray their beloved operator, so I will write about MTS. The MTS Smart Money Debit Card provides a 100% discount on the subscription fee at Smart tariffs for any purchases on it in the amount of at least 10,000 rubles per month or with a minimum balance on the card account of 50,000 rubles. Plus, 7.5% per annum on the balance of own funds on the savings account (not on the card!) And 3% cashback for all purchases on the mobile phone account, but not more than 1000 rubles per month (the option costs 500 rubles per year) or 3% cashback to the card account (not to the phone) for any purchases with the card, except for those specifically stipulated (the cost of this option is 1500 rubles per year).
The MTS Money credit card (issued only to existing MTS subscribers) gives 2% cashback on all purchases credited to the mobile phone account and 7.5% per annum on the account balance. The first year of service is free.
And finally, the third product is the MTS Money Weekend debit or credit card, for which you can receive 5% cashback to your card account in the categories: cafes / restaurants / bars, sports goods / sports clubs and taxis with a weekly (!) payment. Plus 1% cashback for all other purchases and 7.5% per annum on a savings account. The debit card is free for purchases in the amount of 15,000 rubles or more per month or while maintaining a balance of 30,000 rubles on the account, otherwise - 99 rubles per month. A credit card will cost 900 rubles a year.
Not so long ago, the mobile operator MTS made a statement that soon mobile services for users of the MTS Smart Money bank card should become free. Holders of these cards will have the official opportunity not to pay for MTS communication services.
However, in order not to pay for the use of communication services, the cardholder must make monthly purchases for a total amount of 10,000 to 30,000 rubles. Or make sure that the amount of 50,000 rubles or more always remains on the card account.
More about MTS Smart Money
As mentioned earlier, holders of the MTS Smart Money card will have the opportunity not to pay a single penny for cellular communications. However, certain conditions must be met for free communication. So, for example, its user must make purchases using this card in the amount of 10,000 to 30,000 rubles per month.
The amount of purchases will depend on the tariff that will be set on your phone number. In the event that the Smart tariff is set on your number, the amount of purchases will be from 10,000 rubles. In the event that you use the Smart Nonstop tariff, the amount of purchases will be 20,000 rubles. And if you have a Smart + package connected, then the total amount of purchases should be 30,000 rubles.
However, there is a second way to get a free connection. To do this, you need to maintain a constant amount on the balance of your card. For different tariffs, the amount will be different. So for the Smart tariff, the amount will be - 50,000 rubles. For the Smart Nonstop tariff - 70,000 rubles. And for the Smart Plus + tariff - 100,000 rubles.
In the event that one of these conditions is met, then the card user will not pay for cellular communications.
Description of MTS Smart Money card
If we talk about the MTS Smart Money card itself, then this is an ordinary Visa debit card. Anyone wishing to purchase this bank card can apply for it at the nearest MTS communication salon or special branches of MTS Bank in St. Petersburg and Moscow. However, from July 1, 2016, this opportunity will appear for MTS subscribers, not only in Moscow, St. Petersburg and throughout Russia, but also abroad.
For cardholders, it will be necessary to connect any tariff from the Smart line and deposit a mandatory amount of 199 rubles on the card account. This amount is mandatory, as it is charged annually for servicing the card.
You should know that if the cardholder can fulfill all the conditions for free communication, then the monthly fee will not be charged. Also free of charge for you will be SMS notifications to your phone number about transactions with the card and the ability to withdraw funds from your card without commission.
According to the mobile operator Tele2, this offer was created in order to print information about free communication in large letters on the advertisement. However, as it usually happens, MTS will prefer to hide the main information on how to get a free connection and what conditions must be met for this under the small print.
It should be noted that this offer is valid only on the tariffs of the Smart line, except for Smart mini. And it will not be active on other tariffs of the MTS mobile operator.