Almost half of Australia’s mobile phone users considered switching carriers last year, but less than a third of those consumers actually did so. What’s driving us to want to switch mobile providers, and what’s holding us back?
Picture by Daniel X O’Neill
A study of 1,600 mobile customers by Macquarie University found that 41 per cent had considered switching in the last year, but just 16 per cent actually did so. There’s obviously a variety of reasons why consumers might change, and in many cases more than one reason will apply.
The dominant issue uncovered in the research (sponsored by Amaysim) was poor network coverage, cited by 39 per cent of those surveyed. It’s probably fair to assume that Vodafone’s network woes were a major factor here.
The next most common reason was wanting to switch handsets or poor customer service, both of which scored 30 per cent. We’ve often advised that signing up for a 24-month contract is risky, and clearly the urge to shift is affecting many people. Many of the other reasons (as you can see in the infographic) relate to changing needs and usage patterns.
So why don’t we switch? Again, the research highlights a number of reasons, but a major recurring theme is inertia and difficulty:
Again, it’s worth noting that being locked into a contract is the dominant reason for not switching.
We’re going to run a more detailed analysis on the whole report later this week on Lifehacker, but in the meantime we’re interested in your experience. Have you contemplated switching? Did you actually switch? Tell us in the comments.
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