Last week we told you that cost wise, Airtel UnlimiNET is the best mobile product that Kenya has ever had, and a few of you are still in doubt. To remove any iota of doubt, we want to show you just how much money you stand to save with the monthly Airtel UnlimiNET compared against standard charges for voice, data and SMS services as offered on Airtel, Safaricom or Orange networks.
Typically, the standard charges for voice calls in Kenya is Kshs 3 per minute, although if your network is Safaricom then you mostly pay Kshs 4 per minute for both off-net and on-net calls. The standard charges for SMS services is Kshs 1 per SMS. There is no standard data charges and this varies with the amount of data purchased. In most cases, buying data worth Kshs 500 will give you 500 MBs whereas buying data worth Kshs 3000 may give you 20GB. On average however, many standard data users like myself prefer to purchase the 7.5GB for Kshs 2000 and for the purposes of this article, this is the data rate that we’ll use.
Given the above rates, the question one should ask themselves is, “how much money would I normally spend to access the voice minutes, data, and text messages that the monthly Airtel UnlimiNET offers for Kshs 2,000?”
Related: The quest for mobile unlimited Internet should land you on Airtel Unliminet
Technical/Ideal Scenario
The monthly Airtel UnlimiNET for Kshs 2,000 offers the following:
- Ability to make both on-net and off-net phone calls for up to 1,200 minutes
- Access to 7.5 GB of data
- Ability to send 10,000 text messages.
Normally, at the rate of Kshs 3 per minute, you would have paid Kshs 3,600 to make phone calls for 1,200 minutes. You would also have paid another Kshs 2000 to access 7.5GB of data, and spend additional Kshs 10,000 to send 10,000 text messages. What this means is that the value of the monthly Airtel UnlimiNET which costs only Kshs 2,000 is actually Kshs 15,600, the value of which goes up to Kshs 16,800 if Safaricom voice rates were put into consideration. The implication thus far is that the monthly Airtel UnlimiNET for Kshs 2,000 saves you Kshs 13,600 each month which translates to 87% savings. On the flip side, the standard rates becomes 7800% more expensive compared to the monthly Airtel UnlimiNET for Kshs 2,000.
Realistic Scenario
The Technical/Ideal Scenario assumes that you would actually find the 10,000 text messages useful; but unless you are someone who earns from sending bulk SMSes every minute, the 10,000 text messages are never going to be of use to you. Let’s assume that on average you send 20 text messages daily. Over a 30 day period, the number of SMSes you will have sent is only 600 SMSes. These SMSes would cost you Kshs 600 at the standard rate.
Thus, on a realistic sense, the monthly Airtel UnlimiNET for Kshs 2000 offers you voice, data and SMS services worth Kshs 6,200 (Kshs 3600 voice + Kshs 2000 data + Kshs 600 text messages). Realistically therefore, one would have to spend Kshs 6,200 each month in order to get the same value provided by the monthly Airtel UnlimiNET and at the cost of Kshs 2,000 only. This means that by using the monthly Airtel UnlimiNET for Kshs 2,000, you will actually be saving Kshs 4,200 every month or Kshs 50,400 every year.
Related: Safaricom Internet Bundles vs Airtel Unliminet
General Case Scenarios
Not many Kenyans opt to spend Kshs 2000 on Airtime. Majority of people I know would rather buy credit worth Kshs 20, or Kshs 50 or Kshs 100 to spend on airtime. Assuming that most people spend Kshs 20 on Airtime every day, each month a typical Kenyan will therefore spend Kshs 600 on mobile services excluding expenses related to mobile money. At the rate of Kshs 3 per minute, the Kshs 600 will allow the average Kenyan to make calls for 200 minutes – no data, no SMSes.
To spend at the same rate, Airtel UnlimiNET offers the Airtel UnlimiNET 20 which allows subscribers to make daily calls of up to 8 minutes, access 20 MBs of data, and send 20 text messages. After a month, the Airtel UnlimiNET will have allowed the subscriber to make calls for 240 minutes (worth Kshs 720), access 600MBs of data (worth Kshs 600 at the rate of Kshs 1 per MB) and send 600 text messages (worth Kshs 600). The value of the daily Airtel UnlimiNET would therefore come Kshs 1440 yet the subscriber would have spent Kshs 600 only – enabling him to save Kshs 840 or 58% of the cost.
Conclusion
When it comes to cost, it is very obvious there is great savings with all the packages offered under the Airtel UnlimiNET product; be it the monthly Airtel UnlimiNET, the weekly Airtel UnlimiNET or even the daily Airtel UnlimiNET. For example, for what reason would you want to spend Kshs 2000 to buy only 7.5GB of data via Safaricom yet for the same amount you can buy the same amount of data and in addition get free talktime worth Kshs 3,600 and free text messages worth Kshs 10,000?
Related: Unliminet has brought happiness to Airtel Kenya subscribers
