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Screenshot by Claire Reilly/CNET
As part of the telco’s new Shared plan offering, new and existing Vodafone Red postpaid customers can now share plan inclusions, including calls, text messages and data, across up to 10 devices, with everything appearing on the one bill. In addition to upping the ante with the Shared plans targeted at families, Vodafone has also partnered the Stan VOD service.
The Shared plans can be added on to any Red plan, from the AU$50 a month SIM only plan, through to the AU$70, AU$80 and AU$100 plans. There’s no activation fee and there’s no contract required (except at the very top tier), but the additional ‘child SIM’ comes with a month-to-month cost ranging from AU$30 a month for 1GB of data up to AU$70 a month for 3 GB of data.
Each Vodafone Shared plan can access the unlimited national call and text inclusions from the primary Red plan, as well as international calling minutes and Vodafone’s unlimited ‘Data Workout’ that comes for the first two months of the primary plan. The Shared plans are also free to take advantage of Vodafone’s AU$5-a-day roaming which is available across 47 countries.
The telco has also introduced new data-only Shared plans designed for tablets, which are in addition to its existing data-only sharing plans. For AU$10 per month you’ll get 1GB, while AU$30 per month will get you 4GB, and as with the above Shared plans, these data plans can take advantage of AU$5-a-day roaming.
Check out the tables below to see full Shared plan inclusions.
While the plans could feasibly be used for a single account holder managing a number of devices, the Shared Plans are really designed to allow families and multiple users to share the one account. According to Vodafone CEO Iñaki Berroeta, the new offerings simplify billing and data usage and allow a primary account holder to “control the usage of the whole family”.
“This will allow more usage from our customers and will bring piece of mind for the whole family,” Berroeta said.
Another selling point that could get customers over the line when it comes to switching to Vodafone was the announcement of new content partnership with streaming service Stan.
Although all the details of the deal are yet to be confirmed, the agreement will see Vodafone customers getting access to either free or discounted Stan access, though Berroeta confirmed that data usage for the app would not be unmetered and would still count towards monthly data limits.
Despite this, he said Vodafone was not interested in promoting excess data consumption to the point of bill shock, saying that the focus was on making content streaming “reachable and affordable by more people.”
“Definitely we want more people to use Vodafone and we want people to use more data, but we want to do it in a way that is great value for customers,” he said.
Berroeta also pointed out that the Stan partnership wouldn’t just allow Vodafone customers to use the VOD service when they were out and about, but also when streaming content at home through Wi-Fi.
Co-owned by Fairfax Media and the Nine Entertainment Network, Stan joins a number of other Vodafone content partners including Spotify and Fairfax Media itself, which offers bonus subscriptions to either the Sydney Morning Herald or The Age as an option on Red Plans.
Plan breakdown
Shared plans for smartphones
| AU$30/mth | AU$40/mth | AU$50/mth | AU$70/mth | |
| Contract Period | Month-to-month | Month-to-month | Month-to-month | 24 months |
| Data in Aus. | 1GB | 2GB | 3GB | 3GB |
| Standard national calls and text | Shared from primary plan | Shared from primary plan | Shared from primary plan | Shared from primary plan |
| Standard international calls | Shared from primary plan | Shared from primary plan | 300 minutes | 300 minutes |
| Choice of Spotify/Fairfax subscription | n/a | n/a | n/a | 12 months |
| AU$5 Roaming | Included | Included | Included | Included |
Shared plans for tablets
| AU$10/mth | AU$30/mth | |
| Contract Period | Month-t0-month | Month-t0-month |
| Data in Aus. | 1GB | 4GB |
| AU$5 Roaming | Included | Included |
