I surely do not blog a lot but today I experienced what I feared for a long time: Orange is evil (at least compared to One, the mobile network operator which was absorbed by Orange last year).

Once upon a time there was this fresh, young, stylish, really great Austrian mobile network operator. It was named “One”. If I remember correctly One was the third mayor mobile operator in Austria at that time and a pretty good alternative to the existing operators. They started at a time when competition was just going to blossom out and rates were falling to a level where also students could afford a simple mobile phone with a cheap prepaid card. Right at the beginning I knew it was the right operator for my needs. I loved their service and I even liked the brand they created. All was perfect for almost a decade (or was it even more than 10 years?).

Last year One was rebranded to “Orange”. I think the international Orange network operator was the major shareholder of One right from the beginning but they just let them do their business. During the process of rebranding there was total progpaganda. On TV, on the radio, in print media… just everywhere. At first sight the image still was the same. A theme song which perfectly fit the target group and still working with the image of a somewhat alternative, unusual mobile network operator.  But the corporate colors changed from white backgrounds and blue colors to black backgrounds and orange colors. Today I think I should have seen it earlier: the evil was penetrating a company I once liked.

Today I was calling the Orange helpdesk and tried to do something I did many times before at my old operator: asking about the possibilities to switch to another network plan and getting a new mobile phone. Back in the old days it was great to be able to re-negotiate your plan and maybe even get some price reduction on a new handset. Even if the switch was before the end of any minimum duration or special contract obligations you just paid a small additional fee which allowed you to switch to another in-house plan without any problem.

But not so at Orange. You simply cannot switch to another contract early – not even if you pay an extra fee. That option just does not exist. Even if they offer better plans with more features for new customers for half the price of what you are having now for a lifetime duration. You just are stuck at the old contract as long as the minimum duration period of your old contract is lasting. I also would have loved to spend some money on a new mobile phone. But that would just extend my current obligation by another few months. And if they are that inflexible I am just not going to stick with them longer than absolutely needed.

The purpose of this blog post is not to rant about my current contract. I’ll stick with it – no big deal. Also my current phone does it’s job very well. Who needs an iPhone or G1 (which they don’t even have) anyway? But to all of you who are considering joining the big happy Orange family: please don’t. Seriously. You’ll regret it. You’ll be stuck with terrible plans forever and there is no chance to get out earlier. Also the new “Bonus” system is terrible… compared to Ones. You have to wait forever or spend a fortune to get any profits from it.

Sadly ihateorange.com and orangesucks.com are already registered. I was so looking forward to put my counter till contract end online. Anybody else having similar thoughts?

Only one thing left to say: One – I miss you.

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 6th, 2009 at 18:07 and is filed under technology and has . The entry is tagged with orange sucks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.