It has become cheaper to take a taxi to your friend’s house, send the video and take a taxi back home than to buy data and send the video via social networks.
The price of data, especially if you are on a MTN and Vodacom network, will decimate and leave a gaping hole in your pocket.
“I am more conscious of how I use data on my phone.
“I use wifi at work and at home, so I use my cell phone data in between to save money.”, said Noloyiso Mtembu.
We took to the streets to find out what people had to say about the price of data and what they think could be done differently.
Tarra-Lee Collins who networks with Vodacom said, “I just bought 100 megabytes and paid R29 for it. In India people pay roughly R10 for one gigabyte, so where did South Africa go wrong? Did we not get the memo? I spend half the month buying data, so I think it is unfair.”
In Nigeria and Namibia people pay R22 and R32 respectively for one gigabyte and in South Africa it costs as much as R150 for one gigabyte.
Bethodimer Montgomery, who uses Vodacom said this, “I think they are stealing our money, it’s the only logical thing I can think of.
I mean it’s been coming on for sometime now, since last year and I could have bought myself a car if I think of all the R500’s that went for data.
Other African countries are paying something close to R30 for a gig (one gigabyte) and we are paying in the hundreds, MTN and Vodacom are just lining their pockets with our money.”
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The price of data has been affecting the way people budget their monthly expenses, “I am on a monthly contract and I’m suppose to pay R450 a month, however due to data going to quickly and being so expensive I pay about roughly between R800 to R900 a month for my cellphone.
Even the alternatives such as the night express and whatsapp bundles have a catch.
Funny thing is I use wifi at work and majority of the day I’m at work, I’m not on facebook either so how does my data fly?”, said Tamzin Edwards.
Tyler Roodt added, “I can’t think of any alternatives to data. The only solution I can think of is for them to make it cheaper.”
The outrage over data pricing in South Africa is clear, people are fed up with the unfair pricing and how quick their data disappear.
So the question remains: Will data fall or will there be cheaper alternative options?
