SingTel Colour-Me-Tones: Cancel if you don’t need it
Some of our friends who signed up with SingTel for the iPhone in August found ourselves subscribed to SingTel Colour-Me-Tones in October. Why not September? Because the service is free for the 1st month and was left out from the September bill.
What does this service do? Basically, it lets people who call you listen to some attas music before you answer the phone. As we won’t be calling our own mobile phones, we only realized it when we received our bills or when our more well-informed friends warned us.
This service cost $4.20 per month. That’s about 7-8% more revenue for SingTel from mobile subscription plans that typically amount to $56 per month (like the iFlexi plan). Hence, being in business, it should surprise no one why SingTel wants to push this to as many subscribers as possible.
The scary thing is I cannot even remember when I signed up for the service. It should have been during the iPhone sign-up. If you recall, I went through the iPhone plans very carefully before signing up. Obviously, I do not want any such paid service to add to the monthly running cost of the iPhone. And yet I found myself subscribed, damn.
Anyway, aggressive marketing tactics for this service had been reported in the Straits Times Forum since Dec 2007. That was even worse - it was using the by-the-way-you-have-been-subscribed-cancel-it-or-we-will-start-charging-after-30-days approach. But SingTel doesn’t seem to be too bothered by the public’s reaction. They are still subscribing people to the service “by default” one way or another. Just that this time, it’s more subtle.
Bottom Line: If you had recently signed up a mobile plan with SingTel, remember to check your bill and cancel the Colour-Me-Tones service if you don’t need it.
