It’s undeniable that the iPhone is one of the most coveted smartphones in Malaysia, but its price is often a barrier for many who intend to purchase one. This means that if you’re an iPhone fanboy or girl, it would mean forking out a few thousand bucks every six months to a year to get your hands on the latest model. Not a happy thought.
Understanding the biggest pain point faced by their customers, U Mobile is now offering more attractive instalment plans for iPhone. The latest UPackage is probably the cheapest mobile plan for you to get your hands on the latest iPhones.
Buying an iPhone off-the-shelf can burn a huge hole in your wallet. An iPhone 6s 16GB costs RM3,199 at the store, and that is equivalent to a month’s salary of a web designer in Malaysia, according to Payscale. While an iPhone 6s Plus is even more expensive, retailing at RM3,699.
While there’s no real way to bring that price that far down, what you can do is take away the pain of paying for it upfront. The UPackage by U Mobile allows you to do just that.
With a choice of two mobile plans, i90 and i130, you can own any of the iPhone models on a monthly pay plan, from the iPhone 5c all the way up to the latest iPhone 6s Plus.
Here are the reasons why the UPackage is a win in our hearts:
1. Save money with low cost of ownership
We’ve already established the fact that an iPhone is an amazing piece of hardware but it also costs quite a lot for the average Malaysian.
For example, if you get an iPhone 6s 16GB from a retail store, you will be paying RM3,199 up front for the device. But an iPhone means nothing without a good data plan. Furthermore, the iPlans offered by U Mobile are only available with iPhone bundle. If you were to purchase a phone elsewhere, plans that are available for you are the P50 and P70.
To get a plan with 7GB of mobile data (like what the i90 is offering), you will have to go with P70 which costs RM70 a month. That comes up to a total of RM1,680 over 24 months.
The total spend on your smartphone and mobile plan over 24 months (provided you do not change your phone in that period) is RM4,849!
However, if you take up the UPackage with the i90 plan, here’s how much you will be spending over two years:
= RM2,352 | = RM2,160 | = RM4,512 |
Based on the calculation above, you will be saving a whopping RM847 on the device, or an overall savings of RM367 by getting your iPhone 6s 16GB on UPackage i90!
We’ve also done the calculation of the total savings for all the iPhone 6s models on the i90 package, compared to the U Mobile P70 package:
Comparison of total cost of ownership and savings over 24 months
i90 | P70 | i90 vs. P70 |
|
|---|---|---|---|
| iPhone 6s 16GB | |||
| iPhone 6s 64GB | |||
| iPhone 6s 128GB | |||
| iPhone 6s Plus 16GB | |||
| iPhone 6s Plus 64GB | |||
| iPhone 6s Plus 128GB |
2. No interest rate
We are already charged interest on our credit card balance, our car loan, and almost every financing item in our life. You don’t need another interest charged every month just to own an iPhone.
The UPackage does not come with interest, and that proves to help your lower your total cost of ownership significantly. This definitely gives you way better option of purchasing an iPhone via your credit card and at the end of the day, unable to clear your balance when the statement comes.
We all use our credit card with the best intention, but sometimes things happen and we find ourselves in financial dire straits and our credit card balance snowballing into a monster that we can no longer hide in our closet.
Missing credit card payments spells many financial troubles. First of all, it can result in higher interest rate, from 8.88% or 15% to 17% and eventually 18%, and also due to the nature of compounding interest on a credit card, your interest will snowball into a larger amount.
By just making the minimum payment of 5% every month at 15% per annum, you are incurring RM891 in interest charges, and it will take four years and five months to pay off the full RM3,199 amount and interest.
The UPackage allows you to spread out your payment over 24 months with 0% interest, making payment easier to manage and keeping your cost low.
3. Doesn’t hurt your credit report
Buying a big ticket item on your credit card on instalment sounds like a great idea to manage your expenses, but do you know that the full amount is typically locked in to your credit limit?
For example, if you are buying the iPhone 6s Plus 16GB at RM3,699 on a 24-month instalment plan on your credit card, and you have a credit limit of RM10,000, 37% of your credit limit will be used.
The more credit limit you use up, the poorer your credit score will be, and it will affect your chances of getting your next application of credit facilities like credit card or loan approved.
With UPackage, though you need a credit card to make the purchase, your credit will not be locked based on the full device amount. The monthly payment will appear as a transaction every month leaving your credit limit free for other purchases.
4. Comes with high data quota and unlimited calls to all networks
To make your new iPhone purchase more meaningful, you need data – and lots of it.
Depending on your telcos, data can cost quite a lot, and if insufficient, it can be quite a pain dealing with speed throttling, or worse having to fork out more money for more data every month.
Streaming a YouTube video on Standard Definition (SD) takes up between 2-3MB per minute, based on the data collected by WhistleOut. This means watching 10 cat videos totalling 30 minutes would have used up 90MB of your data. We all know that cat videos are a necessity so this can quickly use up your monthly quota.
If you are an avid Facebook user, on average, you could be spending about eight hours per month online. That’s 720MB at 1.5MB per minute, if you only access your feed using your phone. That’s most of a 1GB data quota!
From the example above, it proves that mobile data has become increasingly important to any smartphone users. But if you are heavy user, it could be the only thing that you look for when you choose a mobile plan.
The UPackage understands your need for high data and offers the i90 plan that comes with 7GB data and the i30 plan that comes with 10GB of data every month. With high data, you don’t have to worry about exceeding your limit and suffer truncated Internet speed thereafter, or constantly hunt for free WiFi everywhere you go.
Here’s what the U Mobile plans offer:
| Data | ||
| Calls | ||
| SMS |
Starting from only RM188 a month, you can get your hands on the latest iPhone 6s. It’s not only friendly to your monthly budget, the UPackage also helps save a significant amount of money for you. It is not just limited to those who do not have enough fund to pay for an iPhone upfront, but it presents a smarter and more cost efficient way to own an iPhone.
With savings up to RM403 for one of the latest iPhone 6s models, your additional cash could be spend elsewhere! So, what’s not to love about UPackage?
