Vodafone Idea (Vi) recently announced new postpaid plans with Vi Max branding. The telco brought in four new postpaid plans for the users. Vi has also brought back the REDX branded plan. It removed all the REDX plans from the platform a couple of days back in a silent manner. Now with the new Vi Max, postpaid plans from Vi have been loaded with additional benefits. Even the concerns around a lower amount of SMSes have been addressed by Vi. The postpaid tariffs seem to be lowered with these new plans as they offer more benefits and cost nearly the same as some of the old plans. But the question is, are these plans good enough to help with subscriber churn? Let’s find out. Let’s now analyse what has changed between the Old and New Postpaid plans, tabulated below. While these plans appear like a hike with the Rs 2 increment on every rental, they are actually further lowering the postpaid segment tariffs by offering additional data and unlimited night usage and other components. Although we feel these plans will not help any significant ARPU rise, considering the nature of the postpaid segment, this is a surprising move as the management, on multiple instances, commented that the current Industry tariffs are not sustainable. With the New Plan Benefits, it is clear that the tariffs are lowered further with a Rs 2 nominal increase in plan rentals. Also, we believe the postpaid segment of users look for Network Quality, Voice Experience, VoLTE, and Vo-Wi-Fi experience first, followed by the ‘miscellaneous’ benefits of the plans.
Vodafone Idea Old Vs New Postpaid Plans
1. Vi Plan 399 vs Vi Plan 401
2. Vi Plan 499 vs Vi Plan 501
3. Vi Plan 699 vs Vi Plan 701
4. Vi Plan 1099 vs Vi Plan 1101
Vi Data Benefits:
As plans Rs 701 and Rs 1101 come with unlimited data benefits, 10GB and 15GB extra data are added to the Rs 401 and Rs 501 monthly rental plans, respectively.
Vi SMS Benefit:
The telco has added 3000 SMS/Month on all the plans for the first time after many years. So far, was providing 100 SMS/month, and when customers got habituated to using Instant messengers, we feel this move in the SMS segment is no help.
Vi Night Unlimited Benefit:
As Rental plans Rs 701 and Rs 1101 already come with Unlimited Data benefits, the Night unlimited component is added to the two lowest plans Rs 401 and Rs 501. Night Unlimited, a tariff component, which may be of help to some users, only if the Network is good for them. If Unlimited Night does wonders, the subscriber numbers should speak that by now. As 12-6 am is an odd time, savvy users may take advantage of the benefit to get the max out of the plan. We believe a maximum of the postpaid segment of users don’t fall under this usage category and are a premium segment. However, it depends on specific users and instances.
Vi Unlimited Data benefits Usage:
Data usage by any Individual subscriber on a GSM POSTPAID plan with ‘UNLIMITED DATA’ & Voice benefits having data usage greater than 150 GB along with voice usage less than 50 minutes (including incoming calls) in a billing cycle will be termed as commercial/Non-Retail usage of Data.
Netflix:
While Netflix benefit is removed, SonyLiv is added to the RedX plan.
Vi Games:
All the plans now come with Vi Games.
Vi RedX:
No changes in Airport Lounge and IR Access packs. Priority customer service, 20-sec call pick up and skip the queue at Vi Store benefit. We believe any unlimited offering would make sense to postpaid users only if they experience a quality Network with Voice and Data followed by other QoS parameters and benefits. No customer would be happy to stick with a telco without the core objectives getting served.
Vi Wireless Subscriber Base: TRAI
Conclusion:
Usually, postpaid is the high ARPU driving segment for any telco. The wireless subscriber numbers as per TRAI for the last six months show that subscriber loss is happening every month. So, with these numbers, we can infer that the lucrative benefits offered by the telco are not holding subscribers. Only time will tell if Vodafone Idea’s New Vi Max Postpaid Plans will help the telco increase its ARPU and reduce subscriber loss. We need to wait and watch till then.
