O2today announced a new tariff aimed at its small business customers, claiming to give "practical help and value" to controlling the cost of their mobile contracts.
The philosophy behind the new tariff named On & On it to enable small businesses to take advantage of what mobiles bring to their company, being always available and having ready access to work data, whilst not having to panic about the costs spiralling out of control.
"Devices like smartphones have revolutionised the way we do business because they enable us to stay constantly connected," said Claire Darley, head of small business sales at O2. "These tools and technologies add an enormous amount of value, but also make cost management more complex."
"Small businesseswant to know exactly what they are going to be paying each month to run their communications and connect their staff, suppliers and customers. On & On helps business customers to get the best of both worlds by keeping costs fixed whilst allowing employees to use their devices freely, without the worry of phone bills weighing them down."
On & On is touted as unlimited and lives up to this title when it comes to calls and texts, which have no cap. However, as with most "unlimited" contracts, users are restricted with mobile internet data, allowing for 1GB as part of the package.
Devices like smartphones have revolutionised the way we do business because they enable us to stay constantly connected.
The price of the tariff starts at 30, but goes up to either 34.17 or 38.33, excluding VAT, depending on the handset. The example the company gave was the iPhone 4S 16GB which comes at the first price point with 59.99 up front, the second price point with 19.99 up front or for free on the most expensive rate on a 24 month contract.
However, customers can get a SIM-only contract on the tariff for just 12 months, rather than the full two years, at a cost of only 21.67, excluding VAT.
"O2 has been talking to small business customers and we know that they want better value from mobile networks, as well as simple tariffs," added Darley.
"We believe that On & On will be the most competitive tariff in the SMB space for some while."
Any small business can go into store or order the tariff online. However, businesses with over 10 employees are entitled to their own business advisor from the UK Business Technical Service team, so should get in touch directly.
Customers can start buying On & On from today.
@It's always worth any business, or even individual consumer for that matter, doing a periodic assessment of what they need from their telecoms especially mobile where there are a lot of choices both of device and tariff," said Rob Bamforth, principle analyst at Quocirca.
"Even a 1GB data limit may seem unlimited to those users for whom the priority is email and other comms with a little light browsing rather than heavy or rich media consumption. I've not seen identical services but this type of pricing fixed by user per month is typical of XaaS (anything as a service) or cloud service pricing and these often appeal to SMBs for reasons of price predictability, flexibility and outsourced complexity."
