David Flynn27 April 2009, 9:43 PM
The ‘Total Business Cap’ is actually a combo of two separate capped plans – one for voice, the other for data – but at least they come on a single bill.
Bundling communications services can sometimes be sales voodoo wrapped up in the promise of savings and a 24 month contract. But provided you do your homework there’s an undeniable simplicity about rolling all your comms together.
Now Optus has taken that a step further by putting everything on its menu – landline, mobile, cable and ADSL Internet plus 3G wireless broadband – into a single Total Business Cap which it promises as delivering “one plan, on one bill”.
Well, not entirely. Yes, you get a single bill – and hurrah for that.
But it’s not 100% accurate when the press release states “Optus is the only full service telco provider that can offer a set monthly value that can be shared across a range of voice and data services to suit small and medium customers’ specific needs”.
Optus actually offers
two separate capped plans – the Total Business Cap Voice Plan covers landline and mobile voice services, while the Total Business Cap Data plan takes care of Optus’ business broadband packages, the 3G-based wireless broadband and mobile data services.
The total capped spend in each plan can be split and shared between the relevant services however you choose. The seven capped voice plans start from $149 per month for $600 worth of voice services (plus a $300 ‘equipment credit’ towards appropriate Optus-supplied hardware), while the seven capped data plans kick off at $79 per month for 4GB with $180 of hardware credit.
But you still have to choose one of the voice plans plus one of the capped plans, which Optus then considers as one Total Business Cap plan and presents on a single bill – and each plan’s cap can be applied only to the respective voice or data services rather than spread across the lot.
For a full breakdown of each plan’s cost and capped spend, check out
www.totalbusinesscap.com.