BT Mobile UK Launch New Family Tariff – 5 Cheaper SIMs on 1 Contract

Customers of BTMobile (EE) may like to know that the operator has launched a unique new Family SIM service for mobiles and tablets, which offers families up to five SIMs on a single contract and the value of discount applied increases with the number of SIMs taken.

The new service provides each SIM with individual allowances and increasing discounts, plus the flexibility to “add and remove SIMs with ease.” On top of that there’s also the usual -£5 per month discount if you happen to be an existing BT Broadband customer.

The maximum number of SIMs that you can take under this contract is five and thus a BT Broadband customer could, for example, buy five 2GB Family SIMs for £36 a month (equivalent to £7.20 per SIM). By comparison the normal price for a single BTMobile 2GB Plan is £10 per month (or £15 if you’re not an existing broadband subscriber).

The Family SIM plan also adopts a 12-month contract term (only applies to the first SIM), but each individual SIM in the plan after the first one only adopts a 30-day flexible term and thus you can add or remove SIMs as required. All of this can then be incorporated into one single payment plan.

John Petter, CEO of BT Consumer, said:

“We believe our new Family SIM deal offers a simple way for households to purchase mobile services and is the best value deal on the market today. UK families will be able to make substantial savings on mobile bills, freeing up much needed household budget.”

According to BT, “Each household can get up to five SIMs for their mobile and tablet devices as part of the new offer, each with their own individual allowances, meaning there is no need to worry about sharing data with other members of the family.” But while this might be true for the default allowance(s), it’s not clear who pays when excess use charges apply (we’re checking).

The other issue is that BTMobile only offers two plans for their Family SIM deal, a 2GB data option (500 mins / unlimited texts) and a 15GB data option (unlimited calls / texts). Unfortunately a quick test revealed that you can only choose from one of the plans, thus it doesn’t seem possible to have a mix of 2GB and 15GB plans, which is important because we all have different needs.

UPDATE:

Apparently the account owner can set caps for all of the SIMS, which will limit any problems from excessive use charges.