Go Mobile has “forcefully” rejected all accusations made by Vodafone on the advertising of its SMS rates and considers such claims as unfounded. The mobile operator alleges that this exercise is nothing more than an attempt to tarnish the company’s reputation and misinforming customers.

Go Mobile says this without prejudice in its response to the Office for Fair Trading once it was notified with the official complaint by the OFC, and the company’s complaint lodged with the OFC on Wednesday 8 November, prior to the alleged Vodafone complaint.

Go Mobile’s response to Vodafone’s allegations is simple – when shorn of all the frills, the facts regarding the SMS tariffs being offered by Go Mobile and those being offered by Vodafone cannot be disputed. Whichever way one looks at it, the Go Mobile 1c SMS tariffs always work out cheaper.

When a Go Mobile subscriber registers to take part in the 1c SMS package, no fee is charged. This tariff has been in force since December 2004 – its success throughout the past two years speaks for itself. To purchase a 300 SMS bundle at Lm3, subscribers need only send an SMS containing 300 to 4433. Those who prefer the 500 SMS bundle at Lm5 can send an SMS containing 500 on the same number. Both bundles have a 30-day time window, which can be activated whenever the subscriber chooses.

For the sake of clarity, a simple exercise based on Vodafone’s publicly available tariffs on 300 SMS shows that even with its current offer of 100 free SMS, the total comparative cost remains Lm1 more than Go Mobile. Before being allowed to send SMS under the 1c tariff, a subscriber on Vodafone is charged an monthly fee of Lm2. This fee is over and above the cost of the actual SMS (subject to subscriber having enough funds in the account; if not enough funds are available on the first seven days of the month, the charges for SMS for the whole month will be 2c).