A year ago, I was still subscribed to the 1.5GB 3G mobile data plan but I was exceeding it by some 300-400MB a month. After Minister Boutros Harb approved the new 3G/4G rates my account got upgraded to 5GB but it still wasn’t enough for me as I had moved to a new place and I didn’t have WIFI so I ended up upgrading it to the 10GB plan which costs $49 monthly. Moreover, my last two smartphones were 4G enabled which means more consumption and I wasn’t willing to drop my speed to 3G anymore as 4G is super quick.

In all cases, I can’t really complain about the 3G/4G speeds as the coverage and the speed are perfect but my problem is with the extra consumption rates which are still unacceptable and ridiculously high. If we take what I’m currently paying for, it’s $49 for 10GB yet 1 extra MB costs 0.07$ which means that 100MB of extra consumption costs $7.

So the 10GB normal plan costs as much as 700MB of extra consumption which is quite ridiculous to be honest. I made sure to check with my Dubai friends to see if the extra MBs cost a lot and they are also expensive there but not as much as in Lebanon. I think the common sense would be to charge 0.07$ for every 10MB not 1MB and allow users to add MBs in the same month for a set rate. For example if I have 5 days left I will be able to add 1GB for $10 or $15 instead of paying almost $100 for it.

I think someone needs to raise this matter to the Telecom Minister Boutros Harb and ask him to change these ridiculous rates ASAP.

PS: Let’s not talk about data roaming rates which are out of this world.