500MB Data Allowance Only for New Customers, T-Mobile UK Says

In the beginning of this week, mobile phone carrier T-Mobile UK announced officially that it has made some changes to its policy regarding data use on its airwaves, and that it limited the amount of data users can consume freely on its airwaves to only 500MB.

According to the wireless carrier, the main reason for which it put in place such limitation was that that it did not approve with the fact that customers are increasingly using their mobile phones to stream videos or games while on the go.

In other words, the 500MB of data that T-Mobile UK users have at their disposal is suitable for checking emails, sending them, reading news and the like, but should not be used for streaming content on handsets.

The carrier won't charge users for the data exceeding that allowance, and they would also be able to access email and Internet browsing but file downloading and streaming services will be restricted, the carrier announced officially.

However, it appears that the new policy, which comes in place starting with February 1st, 2011, would affect only new customers to the carrier, and that existing ones would continue to take advantage of the offer they are benefiting from at the moment.

“On Monday 10 January 2011 we announced that, in line with the rest of the industry, T-Mobile would be reducing its Fair Use Policy for data usage to 500MB a month for all mobile phone customers,” the wireless carrier notes in a recent post on its website.

“Following a further review of our policy, these changes will now be introduced from 1 February, to new and upgrading customers only - not existing customers,” the company continues.

Moreover, the wireless services provider continues the statement with saying that existing customers would benefit from the same data package they had before, until their contracts end.

“There will be no change to the data packages for existing customers for the duration of their contract and we apologize for any confusion caused. The revision to the Fair Use Policy is designed to ensure an improved quality of service for all mobile Internet users,” the company concluded.