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Do you need internet while on board an aircraft? If you do, it might just cost you the price of your flight.
As a species, we’ve only had internet in the past 20 or so years of our human history. It’s not to say that the internet isn’t useful or important. It is however not essential to everything we do. Kids born in the 80s will know that you can still have fun without the internet or do your homework without it.
However a recent passenger with local carrier Singapore Airlines received a major shock when he was billed close to $1,500 for a data plan that’s part of SIAs OnAir package. The package bought by Mr. Gutsche was originally thought to cost $37 for 30mb of data. That’s almost $1 for every MB, not very worth it if you ask me. But Mr. Gutsche who was flying from London to Singapore was going to use the internet for work and a little bit of leisure.
He was charged an additional $1,400 for overuse and he wrote in his website that despite the overcharges the internet service was slow at best and he even had to wait hours to send out a powerpoint document that was a mere 4mb in size. According to Mr. Gutsche aside from the powerpoint document upload, he had only browsed through 155 pages and made a few emails, with connectivity not allowing him to watch any videos online.
SIA has released a statement that they have been in touch with Mr. Gutsche and following up on his complaint. SIAs OnAir package charges are as followed, US$9.99 for every 10mb or US11.95 for every hour. It’s also mentioned that when logging in to the service, you have to decide on one of two options, either to keep using the internet after reaching your limit or to be automatically logged off once you’ve reached your limit.
We go back now to the question, do you really need to use the internet on board an aircraft?
[plinker]
