KEY POINTS:
It's a little-known fact that Telecom has let its broadband and mobile broadband customers have access to its national network of wireless hotspots for free for the last couple of years. Everyone else has had to buy coupons or use credit cards to pay for access ($10 per hour).
Walk into a Starbucks or one of the hotels that Telecom has partnered with and as an Xtra customer you simply log in with your Xtra account details and you're surfing for free for as long as you want.
I tapped the service extensively last year and was hoping as Christmas approached that Telecom would announce it was extending free Wi-fi hotspot access for a further year. I was disappointed when the free service was pushed out to March 31 only.
And a new deal between Telecom and NZX listed company SmartPay suggests the days of free Wi-fi for Xtra broadband customers are running out.
I mean, just look at the name SmartPay. Doesn't quite have the ring of free access about it, does it? The company specialises in merchant e-commerce systems and in December bought Wi-Fi operator Fivo. That gave it the capability to pitch for the contract to manage Telecom's hotspot service. SmartPay claims there are 600 sites now under management with an additional 1500 venues interested in having hotspots installed.
Will Xtra's hundreds of thousands of broadband users continue to get free access? I doubt it.
Telecom hasn't been advertising the service at all, even though it would be a real selling point when trying to drag people off dial-up or away from other ISPs. SmartPay will want reasonable margin on the service and I doubt that will be provided by casual Wi-Fi users buying coupons or paying with their credit cards. So the free-ride may well be over.
When I travel overseas I usually buy access to Wi-Fi hotspots rather than use more expensive hotel internet connections. Of the providers I use, the likes of BT and T-Mobile, few seem to offer free Wi-Fi hotspot access to their own broadband customers.
So what Telecom as an incumbent telco has been doing has been slightly unusual. But I'm sure I'm not the only Telecom customer who sees it as a decent value add. It's basically kept me from moving to another ISP to take advantage of better internet and phone packages.
If Telecom was smart it would be pushing a package of DSL broadband with free unlimited Wi-Fi hotspot access and a free Flickr Pro account. Xtra users already get those things currently, but they are so poorly marketed no one knows about them.
I'm using more Wi-Fi than every before, thanks mainly to the iPhone which handles internet browsing over Wi-fi extremely well. But it would be a different story if I had to pay by the hour to log on.
Are you an Xtra broadband customer taking advantage of the free Wi-fi service? What are you willing to pay for Wi-fi hotspot access?
