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We have a Telstra CDMA mobile phone, and an Optus satellite phone. Both are voice, data and fax capable.
Our mobile is a (now obsolete) Qualcomm 860. At the time of purchase, it was the only data-capable CDMA phone available. It can achieve up to 14.4kpbs, which is acceptable for email exchanges or faxes.
Tip: The email packages Eudora and Pegasus both allow you to set a maximum download size. This enables you to ensure you don't waste time and money downloading attachments. It also thwarts the spread of viruses.
By far the best thing about the mobile are the two aerials we have on the landcruiser.
We are unimpressed with the price of calls, especially given the size of the bonuses Telstra pays to Ziggy. We are also unimpressed that Ziggy gets a transmitter in his Toorak home, when so many rural towns still have no reception whatsoever.
Telstra claims to cover about 97% of the population. We earnestly await a time when they cover 50% of Australia's landmass, or even 80% of the major highways. Over the years since the introduction of CDMA, they have been increasing the coverage area. We have been pleasantly surprised by the coverage on the Eyre Peninsula and in southern WA. Despite the improvements, there are still plenty of towns that need improved coverage.
There is a voice mail service on our mobile. Telstra's policy is to delete messages after 3 days. We may be out of range for longer than that. You have the right to expect that if you leave a message, we will respond. Since Telstra may delete your message before it reaches us, the service is of questionable value.
Our mobile can receive SMS messages, but cannot transmit them. We have not inquired about how long Telstra stores SMS messages before deleting them.
Our satellite phone is a NEC S2. It is the most expensive single item we carry, and the ongoing connection costs are also high. The number of breakdowns it suffers from are disappointing, and even minor repairs are expensive. It is the worst value for money item we carry.
Unfortunately, in our fully mobile business, it is an essential communication tool. The coverage is exactly what we require, close to 100% of the country. Call quality leaves a bit to be desired, but it's not bad given how far the signal has to travel.
The initial hardware cost is over $4,000. The connection fee is a daunting $49.50 per month. The call costs are a staggering $2.50 per minute. The data rates are an appalling 2.4kbps. A recent repair bill was over $1,000.
While it is data capable, in practice we don't use it that way. We estimate it would cost about $20 per email. Telstra offer a solution with excellent data rates. At $18,000 for the hardware, and $5.50 per minute for calls, it is beyond the reach of any small business.
Vodaphone's handheld systems offer probably the best combination of cost and features for most people (starting around $1500). Unfortunately the data and a car kits are very hard to obtain.
When we organised automatic credit card payment of our phone bills, neither Optus or Telstra were able to provide accurate billing advice during the changeover period.
For CDMA, there is effectively no competition. Telstra own the infrastructure and have only very recently begun allowing resellers into the market. The only thing that keeps this monopoly in check is the competition with GSM services.
For satellite, the competition seems more like collusion, but is probably just a reflection of the small market size. There is little difference in the prices for hardware, connection or calls. Vodaphone's handheld systems offer the temptation of better value, but the lack of data capability and a car kit, plus the unusual pricing structure, make the package unworkable for us. (It is a very affordable solution for people with minimal requirements.)
Optus charge a whopping $3.30 per minute from the satellite phone to be on hold to their service number. Telstra were providing free calls to the service number from the mobile, but recently began charging for them. We are unsure if this is a bid to prove that collusion really is rife in the industry, or if they are simply trying to be more like our fee hungry bank.
Telstra have some nasty marketing practices. Imagine being woken up by your phone at 4:00 am because your provider sent an advertisement. Unlike previous scams they played, you no longer have to pay to receive their ads, but you have to pay to complain about it. Worse still, after paying to call them to demand that they stop exploiting your phone for their own benefit, they totally ignore the request and keep the ads coming.