I recently spent a week in London as a tourist from NYC. Before leaving the US I called Vodafone in London and told them I wanted a sim card for my iPhone so that I could use it to tether my laptop (I wanted to use my phone as a hotspot for my laptop). They told me that their "international freebie" card would be perfect for this purpose. When I got to Heathrow I bought the sim card, they installed it, and all was supposedly great. As I was leaving the terminal the salesperson caught up with me and apologized, saying that they had just realized the tethering plan wouldn't work. I followed him back to the shop, and they told me that I'd also need to buy a dongle. They didn't have them in stock, so the next day I bought one in the city. I initially had 500Mb of data, which the Vodafone salesperson assured me would be enough for a week of websurfing, email, and Facebook (no movies or music streaming). I attached the dongle that evening and it worked fine. That first night I spent perhaps two hours online. The next evening, after another sightseeing day, I returned to my hotel and went online again, and after about an hour the dongle disconnected, telling me I had exhausted the data plan! I was in shock--this 500MB of data had run out in around 3 hours. Vodafone customer service isn't available after 8, so I had to wait until the next day to contact them. They were very unhelpful, saying they had no way to know what I was doing online, etc. Insult to injury, while a foreign credit card was perfectly fine to purchase their sim card and dongle, it wasn't acceptable as a way to top up online or over the phone! So I went to a tobacco shop and bought a $50BP voucher, and, unbelievably, this lasted for about three more hours!! What an incredible rip-off! Once connected, the counter would show data download when there was nothing at all running on the computer--the browser closed, no updates, no email programs running. I called to complain about this and while waiting for someone to answer the counter showed I had used 20Mb of data!!
I would say avoid Vodafone dongles or data plans like the plague. They're a scam, pure and simple.
Vodafone mobile broadband
Vodafone overview
- Good range of pay monthly mobile broadband packages from 1 to 24 months, plus 'free' laptop deals
- PC protection security and backup capability with monthly contracts.
- Free delivery for online orders; 7-day returns policy
Best selling Vodafone mobile broadband deals
- Payg dongles
iPad micro-SIM PAYG
- £5 one off cost
- Pay as you go price plan*£5/250MB
/30 days
£15/2GB
/30 days - Up to 7.2Mb max speed
ONLINE OFFER
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Tablet deals
iPad with Retina Display: 16GB Wi-Fi + 3G
- £99 tablet + SIM
- £27/mth for 24 months
- Up to 7.2Mb max speed
ONLINE OFFER
- Pay Monthly dongles
Business Mobile Wi-Fi: 3 month Business Constant
- 47 dongle + £19/mth
- 5GB/mth downloads
- Up to 7.2Mb max speed
ONLINE OFFER
Vodafone Broadband Genie Road Test results
- Downloads
3 stars- Uploads
5 stars- Streaming
4 stars- Stability & coverage
- 4 stars
- Feelgood factor
- 4 stars
- Dongle & software
- 5 stars
- Overall rating
- 4 stars
May 2011
Vodafone’s previous Road Trip results have been mixed. After a strong showing in '09 and '10 last year’s outcome was weaker, with Voda’s dongle failing many of the tests, demonstrating an unreliable performance on the move.
This year Vodafone showed improvement in the reliability stakes, sitting in the middle of the pack with over 50% of the tests completed, just behind T-mobile and Three and significantly higher than the worst performers.
Vodafone supplied its very latest model and unlike the other devices the Vodafone R205 is a Wi-Fi dongle, but to keep everything fair we had it tethered with a USB cable rather than connecting wirelessly. Installation was painless, the dongle was ready to go within minutes and the software lightweight and very easy to use. So top marks for the dongle package.
We recorded some acceptable though not outstanding numbers. Once again uploading was a high point with Vodafone being the only one to complete all file upload tests, and record the second fastest time in the process. Downloads were average, it got the best result in one test but otherwise sat at the mid-lower end of the scale. The fastest speed test clocked in at a competitive 3.08Mb though overall average was only 1.31Mb.
While it didn’t show amazing speeds in standard file downloads, streaming audio and video were surprisingly smooth. Half the streaming tests were a success matching T-mobile and just behind Three. It added a slight wait for buffering in several cases, up to a max of 44% additional time, but otherwise watching YouTube and iPlayer on the move is painless with Vodafone.
Aside from a minor uptick in reliability on the move, which is definitely a big plus, our experience with Vodafone largely mirrored last year’s outcome. It's dependable, which is important, though performance remains average even when it's got a solid connection.
Overall analysis of the Mobile Broadband Genie Road Trip 2012
by May 2012
About Vodafone
When it comes to standing the test of time, Vodafone wins hands down. It has been in the mobile business since the start and the same goes for 3G mobile broadband: it has a good name across the board, from reliability to service, and much like its branding it relies on reputation rather than flashy bells and whistles. Vodafone is pretty much the only choice right now for overseas mobile broadband data deals, although it is still expensive. It also offers mobile broadband laptop deals
Vodafone is the only British owned mobile broadband UK network: it has operations in more than 20 countries and is in fact the biggest mobile network company in the world (by turnover). Launched in 1985, it was one of the UK's original two mobile networks (alongside BT Cellnet, now O2). Vodafone helped pioneer mobile broadband, launching mobile broadband for business customers in 2004 and for consumers shortly afterwards. October 2008 saw the first of its so-called 'free' laptop deals, throwing in a Dell laptop and dongle on a long term mobile internet contract. It launched 'top up and go' in December 2008.
Vodafone announced a network infrastructure collaboration with O2 in March 2009 - the biggest deal of its kind in the world to date. The two mobile internet providers will build future mobile sites together, as well as merging existing ones, aiming to improve coverage, future-proof their network and of course cut costs.
2010 saw Vodafone branch into both mobile Wi-Fi units and SIM cards/deals for handheld tablet devices. In 2011 it introduced its ‘data test drive’ service, letting new smartphone customers use as much data as they like for the first three months of their contract so they can more easily set their required data limit going forward.
Vodafone customer reviews
Show all 283Vodafone Mobile Broadband reviews»
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Report abuseIt is very good
Grt speed connectivity.
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Be aware that the £3 / month for 250MB is a cleverly-worded scam. The implication is that you pay £3 line rental for 250MB, then after that £2 per day for additional usage. What it really means is, you buy our dongle outright. Then pay £3 a month for '250MB', but then you can't actually access it without then paying an additional £2 per day that you use the device. For a light occasional user, this could turn out to be a very expensive way of accessing the Internet. And that's if you can even get 3G coverage in the first place - in most cases you can't
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My experience of the Vodafone dongle has been pretty disappointing. When it works at 3G its great, but it very often doesn't, often appears but doesn't actually.
I've been told I need to remove the SIM card, put the dongle into a different USB port, take it back to a Vodafone shop to have it 'reprogrammed', put it in a handset to referesh it, and most frustratingly of all that the service is working perfectly as I've stared at a screen taking 4 minutes to load.
Thankfully my contract is up in March, and I'd rather use two tin cans and a piece of string than Vodafone again.
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