Telecom Informer

    

by The Prophet

Hello, and greetings from the Central Office!

Fall is lovely in Beijing, the hot and sticky summer yielding to crisp autumn nights.  Construction of my new Central Office is well underway, and like everywhere in China, the latest technology is being deployed.  I wish I could say more, but my employer is tight-lipped, and here in Beijing, my union contract doesn't count for much.

It's hard to overstate just how new everything is in China, at least from a technology perspective.  This is necessary just to keep up with the sheer number of people.  Beijing is officially a metropolis of 22 million, but the 2010 census (currently underway) is expected to show a population of nearly 30 million.  Everything is done here on a more massive scale than I have seen everywhere else, from subways to highways to - of course - telecommunications.  China, after all, has the largest number of Internet users in the world, and also has the largest number of mobile phone users in the world.

China Mobile is the largest mobile carrier in China, and with over half a billion subscribers (nearly double the population of the U.S.), it is also the largest wireless carrier in the world.  Although they compete with China Telecom (which operates a CDMA service) and China Unicom (which offers the iPhone exclusively in China), China Mobile claims about two thirds of the market.

Unlike in the U.S., the iPhone isn't hugely popular here; it costs more than the average monthly salary.  Nokia is the most popular brand of phone, and affordable low-end phones are the most popular models.  China Mobile is the king of the low end consumer, with most users subscribing to voice and SMS only.  In this market, 3G doesn't really matter much because 3G services only work well on high-end phones.

Subscribing to China Mobile service is very easy if all you want is voice and SMS service (this meets the needs of most subscribers in China).  Just stop by any newsstand, pay 100 RMB (about $15), and pop in your new SIM.  Note that China Mobile offers two kinds of prepaid service.  The most widely available is called "EasyOwn" or (in Pinyin) Shenzhing.  This product is oriented primarily at voice and text users, and does not fully support GPRS (only a very limited WAP service is supported).

Your prepaid SIM card is totally anonymous and can be used to make calls and send text messages immediately.  When you run out of airtime credit, you can buy additional credit from any newsstand, China Mobile dealer, or China Mobile store.  Of course, payment is nearly always cash (China is a cash economy).  As of this writing, the Chinese government was beginning to crack down on this lax practice, requiring ID to purchase SIM cards in Beijing (although not in other cities).  However, this was only being enforced at China Mobile stores.

Of course, it isn't really as easy as that.

By default, the rates are relatively high, and not all services are available.  You'll pay for both incoming and outgoing calls, and are charged a high default rate for these calls.  Roaming is charged outside of your home calling area.  SMS is billed in both directions, but the rates are cheap (incidentally, this is the most popular way to communicate in China).  WAP data is billed per kilobyte and long distance is billed for all calls outside of the local calling area.  Despite this, a surprisingly high number of China Mobile subscribers pay their highest rates.

For the savvier consumer, China Mobile offers a seemingly infinite number of plans.  These change all of the time.  Plans are published online, but not all of them are published and plans can vary depending on the city (for example, plans offered in Shanghai are different than those offered in Beijing).

Plans can offer anything from additional capabilities (such as roaming in Hong Kong and Taiwan) to lower rates.  To subscribe to a plan, you send a specially formatted SMS to the number 10086.  For example, to get free incoming calls and 20 free outbound minutes per month (in the Beijing market), you can send a text message with the code KTCTWY to 10086.

This costs RMB10 per month, which is about $1.50.  Plans take effect on the first day of the following month, meaning you can only change your plan once per month and you have to wait up to a month to do it.  You can cancel a plan the same way; for example, to cancel the plan above, you can send a text message with the code QXCTWY to 10086.

Although customer service is available in English, it's impossible to change your plan over the phone; the agent will instruct you to perform the SMS-based procedure above.  The only way to change your plan without sending text messages is to visit a China Mobile service center in person.

This, of course, requires your passport and the PUK code for your SIM card - which you hopefully haven't lost.  And the plan change won't take effect any sooner.  Yes, folks, it's just like the bad old days of AT&T.

If you want full GPRS service (which provides EDGE in some areas at no extra charge), a different type of SIM card called "M-Zone" is required.

It was fairly confusing for me to figure this out, because China Mobile will provide you the plan codes for GPRS plans (and charge you for GPRS) even if you don't have a SIM card that is capable of providing the service.  Although they can be found at some dealers, M-Zone SIM cards are generally only available at China Mobile service centers.

These locations require identification and take down all of your details.  This is ostensibly so they can transfer your account credit in the event that you lose your SIM card.  However, you will still need the PUK code along with your passport.  Whether this is just the ordinary level of poorly thought out bureaucracy you'd expect from a giant phone company or something more insidious is left as an exercise to the reader.

M-Zone SIM cards offer different plans than EasyOwn cards.  These offer more data and bundled minutes than the EasyOwn plans, but at higher monthly recurring charges.  Owing to the regulatory environment in China, there are some highly unusual dial plans for long distance and international calls.

Calls dialed from mobile phones the normal way are sent via circuit switched networks under tariffed rates, which are very high (for example, almost USD$1 per minute from Beijing to Seattle).  However, you can use dial-around VoIP services at much lower rates.

For example, China Mobile offers the 12593 dial-around service which offers rates of about 15 cents per minute back to the U.S.  To use it, you simply prepend 12593 to the number you dial.  It's actually not a bad rate given the minimal hassle and the call quality is carrier-grade.

You don't have to use China Mobile for VoIP dial-around, though.

You can purchase IP phone cards all over the place in varying levels of price and quality (which don't always correspond the way you'd expect).  Cards are sold at a face value of 100 RMB, but the price is generally about a third of this.  So, for example, one popular card offers a 2.4 RMB rate from China to the U.S. or Canada.

However, the card is generally sold at a third of its 100 RMB face value (of course, this is negotiable), so the real rate is somewhere around .79 RMB per minute, or about 10 cents.  Confused yet?

To use this card, you dial the five-digit prefix and your international or long distance number.  An IVR then prompts you (in Chinese, and only Chinese) for your PIN, which is another 16-digits.  If you only make a few hundred dollars per month, like many Chinese people do, it's probably worth the hassle to save a nickel.  For me, it's really not.

And with that, it's time to bring this issue of "The Telecom Informer" to a close.  Enjoy your autumn, wherever in the world you are.  For my part, I'll be skipping Halloween and celebrating Thanksgiving with a Beijing duck!