GiffGaff: We've got no iPhones, but here's how to cut down your SIM
And hey, we'll give you a new one if you cock it up!
While O2's discount wing, GiffGaff, isn't offering the iPhone 5, it is providing instructions for those willing to take up the scissors and give their existing SIM a trim.
The step-by-step guide comes complete with a video, and shows how a traditional SIM can be cut down and squeezed into an iPhone 5. GiffGaff won't take responsibility for the wounding and downtime the cack-handed snipper is likely to incur, but the virtual operator will provide a free replacement for the butchered SIM.
The nano SIM, which was first pushed out by Apple but is likely to spread quickly, moves two contacts from the bottom to the middle of the pattern, but as those two contacts are reserved for USB communications, which no one uses, that's not really important.
The new SIM is thinner too, and GiffGaff notes that some reports suggest sanding down the back – though its own experience is that the iPhone 5 has enough tolerance for the thicker original.
GiffGaff reckons its unlimited data deals are ideally suited to the iPhone user, who'll have to shell out more than five hundred quid for the handset to avoid being tied into a different operator's contract. The chaps over at Hard Reg reckon even the cheapest pre-paid deal for an iPhone 5 will end up costing £781 over the course of a year, so £539 (for the handset) plus a tenner a month to GiffGaff should work out cheaper, assuming one has five hundred quid lying around the place.
But at least SIM snipping will give one something to do while waiting the three-to-four weeks for online orders of the latest iThingy, even if success won't be known until it's too late.
COMMENTS
Honestly...
...I'm sick of this sort of thing. You know tethering breaks the agreement you signed up to, yet you do it anyway. You know that tethering uses more data, but you do it anyway. Then you bitch that because you, and others like you, abuse the service, the service is having to be curtailed or cost more. While still abusing it. Meanwhile, GG customers who follow the Ts & Cs, don't tether and don't abuse the service are going to either have to pay more or have our service curtailed. Because of you. Thanks for that.
So people like you who abuse the "no tethering" rule have now cause GiffGaff to reconsider their unlimited data option. Nice one.
Every decent option GiffGaff have provided have been abused by idiots, the unlimited minutes goodybag for instance.
Re: ...network run by you
Good for you. I prefer cheaper monthly mobile bills, piggybacking O2 as a carrier, but you do your own thing, and good luck to you.
Hmmm
Am I the only one thinking that iPhone 5 owners are the least likely segment of society likely to be looking for a cheap network provider? Let's be honest, if you value form over function that much then money/performance is likely to be of little object to you, you'd go to the network with the best logo surely?
Not really. GiffGaff's unlimited is currently genuinely unlimited. If they restrict it, I'm sure they'll stop calling it unlimited. They are pretty good like that.
Personally I've seen better coverage and far better customer service* with GiffGaff than I ever did with Vodafone or Orange. My phone bill has dropped to the point that I'm already saving money on my outright handset purchase less than a year ago compared to the 'free' 18 or 24 month contract I could have got elsewhere. Other people's mileage will, of course vary. I do recommend GG to my friends and those who have signed up seem happy - and I can call/text them for free, which is even better.
* it's hard to have a call-centre phonetard mess up your seemingly simple request when there are no call centres. Same same for being on hold for hours being told every thirty seconds how important your call is.
