How Filipino Telcos make a killing from wireless broadband

For more than two years now, three major Filipino telecommunication companies have been marketing their brands of mobile wireless broadband.

I have bought all three brands and have stopped using all but one.  The reason is simple, the first two are totally useless in my area.  

Tato

The first of the two that I have stopped using hardly gets speeds higher than 45Kbps in my corner of Sampaloc, Manila and if broadband is a relative term, then this one really is probably a relation so distant that you'd wonder if it was still in the same order of species.  

I bought it because it seemed to have a better prepaid pricing scheme and the unit was cheaper.  The user rate was pegged at 5 pesos for every 10 minutes of use, better because the competing brand had a rate of 10 pesos per 30 minutes.  

Now, this is better because there are times when I only need to log on for 10 minutes, just to browse through my e-mail.  If I were to use the competing brand (10 pesos for 30 minutes), I would have spent 5 pesos more if I didn't use all of the thirty minutes.

But then, with speeds so slow you'd wonder if it was really broadband, you'd probably use up 30 minutes anyway just trying to open your e-mail.

Eventually, I let my then two year old son use it to poke stray kittens and worms in the garden.

To be fair, a few friends say that the device actually works great in certain areas of Makati City, Taguig, Las Pinas, etcetera...

Saan?

Here's how I think Saan got it's name...

A Saan user received a call from a friend while he was walking down the middle of a street.  He picked it up and on the other end of a line was a friend shouting frantically.  Because his friend's voice came through so badly garbled, he could only make out one word and that was hole.

The five minute conversation went like this: "Butas? Saan? Saan?" (Hole? Where? Where?)

Seconds later, he fell into an open manhole and was never heard from again. 

Like Tato, Saan offered a great price scheme.  The so-called VALUE or CHEAPER proposition got me.  It actually offered unlimited broadband use for one day at 50 pesos!

The thing seemed to be a White Knight and it worked quite great for a few days.  Then for some reason unknown to me to this day, it just stopped connecting.

The last time I saw it, my kid's Nanny was using it as a wedge underneath a door to keep it open.

Bro

The one that I am currently using is only slightly better because the service is intermittent and the quality of that service ain't all that great.

Sometimes it just refuses to connect to the server.  Yesterday was a particularly annoying day because the plug-it unit just refused to connect and only kept getting a GPRS signal which also failed to connect me to the internet.

Some times it connects to the server but in spit of indicating that it is receiving a 3G or HSPDA signal, the speed that one actually gets is just 54 to 75 Kbps -- only very rarely does it get speeds of up to 2 Mbps as advertised.

There was one time that I thought I was experiencing its "super fast speeds", but then I realized that my laptop apparently picked up a wi-fi signal and connected automatically to it.

So, I guess, advertisers ought to craft more truthful claims by making use of the words "sometimes", "in certain places", "when doing a certain yoga position", and "by hanging outside your window while doing an Indian Squat with a fork in your ear".

TO BE CONTINUED

A few words about Globe Tattoo

It was a couple months ago when I bought a Globe Tattoo prepaid broadband modem along with a Smart Bro prepaid broadband modem in order to test out both wireless broadband services.

What attracted me to Globe Tattoo was supposedly its faster speeds both in uploading and downloading. The secondary consideration then was the cost of the actual unit (which is lower than that of Smart Bro) and the cost of per block of wireless internet time (which is the same as Smart Bro but is segmented into 15 minute blocks instead of 30 minute blocks).

I initially found Globe Tattoo, on the face of its packaging to be a good buy. But when I plugged it in at my house in Sampaloc Manila, the internet speeds I experienced were hardly any better than the dial up connection I get using PLDT Vibe. In fact, it was a bit worse as the signal often cut out -- which is almost a happy event because that would mean I actually got a signal at all.

As it happens, my location (from the looks of it) is not within the so-called wireless internet hotspot of Globe, ergo, the slow connection speeds.

As for Smart Bro, the connection speeds that I get from where I live are great. I tried it out in several other places and it worked quite well too. I tried Globe Tattoo in the Makati but still experienced slow speeds.

However, in recent weeks, my Smart Bro failed to log on to the wireless internet network and at times the load I put into the prepaid account magically vanished. This happens once in a while and I haven't really kept track of the dates (as well as locations and times of the service outages), but suffice it to say that generally (most of the time) Smart Bro provides good service.

I have since given away my Globe Tattoo and stuck with smart.