Is it worth getting Orange Care?

[Guest mattscholey]

Hi,

I'm hoping to buy my SPV E100 this afternoon, and am wondering if it's worth getting Orange Care. What I'd like to know is if my phone is lost, damaged or stolen and I don't have any insurance, how much will it cost to replace to phone? Also, do you think my house insurance will cover it at all?

Thanks,

Matt

[Guest goinnuts]

if your phones faulty within 14 days they replace it in the shop, after that its manufacturer. if its lost or stolen you can paya one off fee £100 :x coz its a smartphone.

a fiver a month for care, replaced the next day well worth it. :)

[Guest chickster]

The longer you have been with Orange the cheaper Orange care is. I have been with Orange for over 5 years now so my care costs £2.50 instead of £5, it goes down in years of service :)

[Guest mattscholey]

if its lost or stolen you can paya one off fee £100 :x  coz its a smartphone.

So am I right in thinking, it will only cost me £100 to buy a new E100 if the phone is lost or stolen? Is this correct?

Thanks for your quick responses,

Matt

[Guest goinnuts]

only if you have no care.

ther is another option if you dont have care, usually one off £30 payment then £5 amonth for 12months. could be wrong on the £30 though, could be more coz its a smartphone.

the £100 pounds is normally only £70 if you a not-so-smartphone.

hope this helps.

[Guest Sculli]

Mmm.... Both answers are right!

I had Carphone Warehouse insurance and had the old "Headset Mode" problem, which meant the phone was unusable withouth the handsfree kit. Unfortunately, CW had no stock of refurbished SPVs, which meant they couldn't fulfill their "24 hour replacement promise". They had a brand new one in the shop, but couldn't give it to me under the terms of the agreement. They would give me a pants loan phone while my SPV was away for repair, but I was leaving for the States 3 days later and none of their loan phones were tri-band. :evil: :evil:

So I phoned Orange Care - the first lady I spoke to told me that I could join emergency care, for a one-off fee of GBP 100, plus the GBP 5 monthly charge. The reason it was 100 and not 30 was because the SPV is a Smartphone. I didn't take her up on the offer. :o

But realising that I desperately needed a phone to come away with, I phoned back 2 minutes later, spoke to somebody different and the one-off fee had dropped to GBP 30 - even though it is an SPV. It was simply added onto my next bill - along with the monthly O Care charge. :)

My replacement phone was with me the next morning (Sunday) and is working happily over here in sunny California.

Moral of the story..... keep phoning until they give you a price you like!

Oh... and don't take out Carphone Warhouse's insurance policy at nearly GBP 9/month.... they're a bunch of useless b*stards!

Sculli

[Guest cyrilthefish]

yep, i agree sculi, i was with carphone warehouse insurance for over two years!. they replaced my old siemens SL45 twice when i broke it on the spot without hassle. (walked out the shop with a new one)

As they had been so good, i changed to orange to get an SPV but stayed with carphonewarhouse insurance. after 9 months, i dropped my SPV and buggered the SPV casing + headset/keypad. when i last did this with the SL45 they replaced in on the spot, a year later with the SPV, they quoted a minmum 4 week(!) replacement time!

needless to say i cancelled the carphone warehouse insurance, took out orange care and got it replaced in less than 24hours!

moral of the story:

carphonewarehouse used to be great.

carphonewarehouse are now absolutely shite.

:S

[Guest amo]

simple answer...its excellent. get it today if u dont have it already. and orange are changing the cost os care to loyal customers. there will no longer be discount for having it over a year etc...

[Guest Coucou]

Got home yesterday to find a nice letter from Orange Care telling me about the changes. I had mine down to 3.50 so am a bit narked to find it's gone up to 5 rather than down to 3. That's an extra pint of beer a month! Plus there's a charge of 15 for every claim. I reckon it's all those people making false claims, if you're one consider me cross with you :evil:

Posted from my SmartPhone!

[Guest JoelRae]

I've not got my letter yet but from reading this thread expect it to be arriving soon ... I've had Orange Care for a couple of years, and am down to £3.50/month I think. This seems to be another case of Orange treating its customers like idiots :x

Does the letter go something like this??

"You've been a customer of ours for years, you've not abused your insurance, thinking you were benefitting yourself ... you foooooool, you could have had a free new phone every year and be in exactly the same position as you are now!!"

:evil:

[Guest hatton33]

well after checking my househould insurance on personal possessions, i am covered for loss, theft of accidental damage and the policy is new for old. so if they cant replace the modal of phone i have, i get a more expencive modal! ;-) think ill ask the nice mr. burgular if he can wait till the new new spv e200 comes out before steeling mine ;-)

[Guest rogerbates]

I honestly think that Orange Care is a waste of time and money. I haven't got Orange Care but when my old SPV decided just not to switch on anymore I called Orange up. Told the woman on the phone the problem, she went through some stupid stuff like removing the battery and turning it on then said.

"Are you aware that you don't have Orange Care?"

"Yeah so?"

"Well you will have to pay a one off fee of £75 and then join Orange care for 12 months or pay £300 for a new phone."

"Isn't the phone covered by a one year warranty?"

"Oh yes we will have a replacement sent out to you tommorrow!"

I thought F***king rip off merchants. Trying to diddle me out of some cash. Most people only have their phone a year so it is covered for faults till then anyway so what is the point of 12 months of Orange Care. As for it getting stolen, dropped etc, most home insurance covers that anyway as hatton33 has already pointed out. The Orange Care or phone insurance is just another way for them to make more money out of you.

[Guest squall]

the alternitive to care is a one off £70 if your need to get a replacement.

care is cheaper, but you might not need it, so its a bit of a trade off...

[Guest eyup]

I gonna say care is definately worth it!

Sent phone off to hays for repair under warrenty cause no care :-(

Rang Hays last friday to make sure everything ok and i would get phone back by today (cause i going away). Reply from gal on phone "yes sir - your phone has been repaired and should be with you by wednesday". So i thought fair enough that ok. Wednesday and no phone arrives. Ring again - "payment was accepted and it should have been sent, will send today and you'll have it by friday i should think". Bit pissed off now but hey atleast i get my phone.

Well now its saturday - no bloody phone and i'm off in a couple of hours! thanks a lot hays - so helpful and reliable (as i believe other people have found!)

This is the first phone i not taken out orange care on and now have problem! Moral - always get orange care! no fuss replacement next day - far better than the alternatives i think.

And just to rub it in but unrelated - thought those nice free phones on NEC 808's on "3" would have arrived today but no luck :-(

Oh well a holiday should cheer me up ;-)

[Guest fraser]

I debated this when I bought mine, and decided that the next day replacement was worth it. These repairs can take months, and often they don't even give you a loan phone. The third-party ones that DX and Carphone Warehouse try to flog you are pretty poor, the one year hardware waranty (it's the law) is usually just as good as these.

Coincidently, I'm on hold with Orange Care right now, to get a replacement for a hardware fault with the SD card... :roll: With the probs associated with the SPV (understandable to some extent, it's a completely new product line), Orange Care might come in handy.

[Guest rogerbates]

eyup,

Why did you have to send your phone off? I didn't have Orange Care but they sent me a new phone the next day when mine was faulty. If it is under 12 months old and at fault then it should be covered by Orange shouldn't it? I was only without my phone for one day.

When I first called someone tried to fob me off with the 'It's a warranty company problem, here's the number, call them.' But after I moaned they agreed to send me the new phone the next day.