Tips to manage your smartphone bill – Featured Durban Blog

Data costs can be expensive at times. 3G, LTE and 4G enabled mobile phones and tablets can easily update applications in the background.  This can quickly cost you more money.

Here are 9 tips to help you manage your smartphone bill:

3 things that use up a lot of data:

Apps such as YouTube, Netflix, Spotify and Dropbox consume a lot of data. So do smartphone apps such as Facebook or Twitter.

Background syncing also uses data.

Did you know that manual updates can save you a lot of data and battery life?

The difference between a Kilobyte (KB), Megabyte (MB) and Gigabyte (GB)

1024 bytes = 1 kilobyte.

1024 kilobytes = 1 Megabyte.

1024 Megabytes = 1 Gigabyte.

1024 Gigabytes = 1 Terabyte.

1024 Terabytes = 1 Petabyte.

Newer models of phones come with a connection booster that uses Wi-Fi and mobile data together to give you the fastest speed. To keep your data usage down, consider switching this feature off.

So what happens if you get an unexpected huge bill?

If you have a complaint about your network provider you can lodge it with ICASA.

You need to lodge the complaint with your service provider first. Your service provider needs to give you a reference number. They need to resolve the complaint within 14 working days. If they don’t or you are not satisfied with the outcome you can forward your complaint and outcome to ICASA.

ICASA regularly resolves disputes between industry players and consumers.

To lodge a complaint with ICASA online visit www.icasa.org.za

You can also email it to: consumer@icasa.org.za or call 011-566-3000

Find them on Twitter at @ICASA_org

You can also post it to them or hand it in at your nearest office.

Their head office is at Pinmill Farm, 164 Katherine Street, Sandton.

Their Durban office is 15^th Floor, Victoria Main Building, 71 Margaret Mncadi Avenue (Ex-Victoria Embankment Street), Esplanade, Durban.

Your complaint needs to be in writing.

Do not stop paying your monthly contract and the service provider should not stop your service whilst your dispute is being resolved.

These tips are brought to you courtesy of ICASA which is supporting the Wireless World Research Forum (WWRF) in hosting the 5^thAnnual 5G Huddle which is running alongside WWRF40 from 30 May – 1 June 2018 in Durban, South Africa.

The conference will focus on the countdown to commercial rollout of 5G technologies in South Africa. 5G is expected to be rolled out in South Africa in 2020.

ICASA Councillor Paris Mashile emphasised, ‘’It is our public service mandate, as a country and regulator, to ensure that we are not left behind as the world is moving forward and embracing new technologies that will benefit consumers, business and government, hence our involvement and participation in these debates and discussions as we look forward to the first commercial deployment of 5G in 2020.’’

When 5G arrives expect automation of device and machine use, through the concept of the Internet of Things (IoT).

The main focus area from speakers at the 5G Huddle was the hope that 5G would bridge the digital divide.

For more information visit www.5ghuddle.comand www.wwrf.ch

#5GHuddle

Article by Fred Felton | Twitter @fredfelton