Telcel Amigo Plan Rates (in English)

[John]

I am overdue in providing this information about the Telcel Amigo calling plan, but better late than never.

Purchasing Credit for your Phone

Amigo credit can be purchased in a variety of ways. The most common is Amigo cards, which are available at almost every tienda in town. You can rarely walk more than a block or two without seeing a Telcel store - stop in, say hi, purchase your card. Easy.

You can purchase in amounts of $100, $200, $300, and $500 pesos. Along with your purchase of $200 pesos or more, you get bonus credit as well. Here's a simple chart showing the bonus offered:

Purchase Price -> Credit (including Bonus)
$100 -> $100
$200 -> $260
$300 -> $450
$500 -> $900

How long does your credit last?

Your credit is typically valid for 60 days. Purchasing more credit will extend expiration of ALL your credit. If you do you purchase more credit before it expires, you will not be able to make calls or send messages. Your phone will continue to work for receiving calls and/or messages. Purchasing more credit will re-activate all previous unused credit - credit continues to rollover as long as you add new credit every 60 days. If you do not add more value to an expired number, Telcel will eventually cancel the account and the unused credit will vanish. Sorry, I don't know the cutoff period.

Checking your Credit Balance

The Amigo service number is *333. Dial that and follow the menu. Option #1 is to check your balance and Option #2 is for adding new credit by entering the number from your Amigo phone card.

An alternate way to check your balance is by entering *133# and pressing your call button. You will receive a text message with your balance and expiration date.

Please note, you cannot use *333 or *133# if your credit has expired!!


Recharging your phone vs Amigo cards

It appears that the Amigo card may be phased out shortly. You can now recharge (recarga in español) your phone at a variety of locations: Oxxo, Walmart, Mega, Telcel stores, banks, etc. All you have to do is provide your phone number and the amount you'd like to add. I believe you can add any amount, not just the amounts listed above. Paying at a bank may be more difficult, as you may need to provide the Telcel account numbers. If you have a Mexican bank account, you can also pay online from most of the bank's online service websites. At this time, I cannot find a place to pay online using a credit card.


Benefits of registering your phone

You should register your Telcel phone by calling *264 and providing registration information. When we tried to do this 3 years ago, it was only offered in Spanish. You can also go to the Telcel main office in Playa del Carmen, located at Centro Maya. They have English speaking staff who will assist you.

Registering your phone (actually registering your SIM card) benefits you in at least 2 ways. The first, you no longer have to listen to the recording "Estamado usario..." each time you make a phone call. The second benefit, if you lose your phone, you can transfer all remaining credit from your account onto a new SIM card and keep the same phone number. Again, this service can be performed at the main Telcel office at Centro Maya.



Ok, now you have credit. How much do calls cost?

Quintana Roo is in Region 8 for Telcel. Region 8 covers Yucatán, Tabasco, Campeche, Quintana Roo, Chiapas.

A call within region 8 costs
$0.00 to initiate, $3.83 each minute, and $1.10 to check your balance in Cancun, Playa del Carmen, and Tapachula - these are frontier rates.

$0.00 to initiate, $4.00 each minute, and $1.15 to check your balance in all other locations.

Roaming rates outside of Region 8 are higher and not included here.

Recently, Mexico instituted a "caller pays" policy. The caller is charged for the entire cost of a phone call, the recipient pays nothing.

Please see Post #5 below for more information on different Amigo Rate Plans. It can save you money!


SMS and MMS Rates

SMS (also known as "text") messaging costs $0.85 per message to send.

MMS (also known as "multimedia") messages to an individual costs $1.81 per message to send. Other rates apply for other MMS services.


These rates are valid as of Nov 19, 2008 and are subject to change.

There is plenty of other information available at the Telcel website. It's all in Spanish. If you are looking for something else, in particular, respond here or through a PM, and I'll see if I can help translate.

Enjoy.

[Tony&Cheri]

Great info, John, especially the part about what it costs to make a call. Thanks for posting! Off the top of your head do you know anything about the plans where you get to choose something like 10 phone numbers, and the calls to those people are cheaper? I heard about this awhile back and never had time to research it.

~Cheri

[PlayadelSoul]

I am a Movistar guy. They give you the same sort of bonus credits. One day a week, however, they will double whatever you buy, from 30 to 500. They text you on the day that it is double bono day.

Also, the calls are not by the minute, but by 20 minutes. So, a one minute call costs the same as an 18 minute call. It runs about 5 pesos per call, locally and 11 pesos to other part osf Mexico (or, I am pretty sure, the US).

I have used both Telcel and Movistar and find the latter to be better. Only drawback is with coverage. Some areas of Mexico (Mahajual, for example) have been spotty.

[Tony&Cheri]

Originally Posted by PlayadelSoul

I am a Movistar guy. They give you the same sort of bonus credits. One day a week, however, they will double whatever you buy, from 30 to 500. They text you on the day that it is double bono day.

Also, the calls are not by the minute, but by 20 minutes. So, a one minute call costs the same as an 18 minute call. It runs about 5 pesos per call, locally and 11 pesos to other part osf Mexico (or, I am pretty sure, the US).

I have used both Telcel and Movistar and find the latter to be better. Only drawback is with coverage. Some areas of Mexico (Mahajual, for example) have been spotty.

Do you have to sign a contract with them or just "pay as you go" as you do with Telcel? Can you use Movistar with regular phones or do you have to buy their phones? As you can tell I know pretty much nothing about Movistar.

~Cheri

[John]

Originally Posted by Tony&Cheri

Great info, John, especially the part about what it costs to make a call. Thanks for posting! Off the top of your head do you know anything about the plans where you get to choose something like 10 phone numbers, and the calls to those people are cheaper? I heard about this awhile back and never had time to research it.

~Cheri

Cheri, good questions. I did stumble across this information while digging up the information in the first post, but I thought I'd simplify things. But, since you asked!

Telcel does have alternative pricing schemes for Amigo users. If you consistently use your phone for certain types of calls, one of the other options may better suit your individual needs. The four plans are By The Second, By The Minute, By The Call, and Combined.

By The Second
With this plan, you can choose to pay for each individual second you use, AFTER the first minute, which is billed a flat rate. The first minute costs $5.175, and each consequtive seconds costs $0.086. In my opinion, I can't really see how this is beneficial, since each minute after the first costs $5.160, an increase from the standard rate. If each call was x minutes, and between 0-30 seconds, this may save you a bit, but that's too much effort to be worth it.

By The Minute
Es la forma de cobro predeterminada para Sistema Amigo. El costo por minuto es de $4.00 y podrás activar tus 10 Números Frecuentes a los que puedes llamar por $1.15 por minuto y después de un año, obtener el beneficio de Amigo Fidelidad en el que podrás llamar a todos los números locales Telcel por sólo $1.15 por minuto.

I've kept the Spanish here so someone can validate my translation. This is the standard plan, as mentioned in the first post. (Playa rates are $3.85 per minute, by the way). This states that you pay $4.00 per minute. But, you can add 10 frequent numbers and call those for $1.15 ($1.10 in Playa). And, after a year, you obtain the benefits of "Loyal Friend", and all of your phone calls are only $1.15 ($1.10 in Playa) per minute.

So, Cheri, it would appear that if you've had your number for more than a year, you should only be paying $1.10 per minute, regardless of a 10 frequent friends list!

By The Call
I believe this would be called their "international" plan. You can call anywhere in Mexico for $5.75 for each 15 minute period. International calls to the US and Canada cost $11.50 for each 15 minute period.

Combined
Kind of a mix of pay-by-minute and pay-by-call. The first 2 minutes cost $2.88, and each consequtive 15 minutes costs $5.75.


I believe the $5.75 rate would be $5.35 in Playa, Cancun, etc., but the website does not specify (it's the difference between the 10% IVA we pay vs the 15% IVA paid elsewhere in Mexico).

Disclaimers... you can switch plans one time for free. Each time you change after that will cost $23.00. Pay By Call durations are limited to 8 hours.

This change can be made by calling *264 or by visiting the central service center at Centro Maya.


Again, in my opinion, if you plan to use your phone for less than 1 year, the Pay By Call or Combined plans are probably the best. If you plan to use your phone for more than a year, the standard plan is probably the best, with the best rates when you are automatically enrolled in the Loyal Friend plan.

Hope that helps!

[John]

Originally Posted by PlayadelSoul

I have used both Telcel and Movistar and find the latter to be better. Only drawback is with coverage. Some areas of Mexico (Mahajual, for example) have been spotty.

This is one of the reasons we chose Telcel. We thought that we'd be travelling all around Mexico and the better coverage was important. After 3 years, it seems that the only travelling we do these days is within QR. Occassionally, we may make it to Merida. Next year we'll find ways to travel outside QR again!

Thanks for the info on Moviestar. I was always curious about their pricing policies as well. It sounds like it's a better choice for those who average between 3-20 minutes per call.

[Tony&Cheri]

Originally Posted by John

Hope that helps!

Yes, that's very helpful! Thanks a bunch.

~Cheri

[Michele]

So, I went to Walmart yesterday to "recargar" and was informed that it was no longer possible to purchase 500 pesos credits anymore. 300 pesos was the highest amount I could get so, of course, I bought two of them. I haven't been able to find the 500 pesos cards for several months. I think that denomination may be getting phased out.

[Tony&Cheri]

Originally Posted by Michele

So, I went to Walmart yesterday to "recargar" and was informed that it was no longer possible to purchase 500 pesos credits anymore. 300 pesos was the highest amount I could get so, of course, I bought two of them. I haven't been able to find the 500 pesos cards for several months. I think that denomination may be getting phased out.

Did you get any free credit with your $300 pesos?

[Michele]

Originally Posted by Tony&Cheri

Did you get any free credit with your $300 pesos?

I was in such a hurry to place the call I needed to make that I forgot to listen to the "mensaje".

[Francis]

Do you have any info on voice+data plans?

[John]

I had a feeling you'd have some additional questions, Francis.


Telcel does offer Internet service for Amigo plan customers. If this is something that you plan to use frequently, it may be a cheaper option to sign up for one of the monthly plans. However, since this thread is for Amigo plan information, I'll just stick to this information for now.

The Telcel internet plans are valid for 3G, EDGE, and GPRS networks.

You can activate your service by sending an SMS message containing the appropriate keyword below to # 5050 (regular SMS message rate of $0.85 applies). Or, you can activate the service by calling *264 or by visiting the central service center.

Package    Keyword    Price (IVA included)   Data Limit (*)
1 day      BAT1       $ 69.00                100 MB
7 days     BAT7       $299.00                  1 GB
15 days    BAT15      $499.00                1.5 GB
30 days    BAT30      $799.00                  3 GB

(*) - The data limit is for data transferred at maximum transfer rates. If you exceed the limit included with your plan, you can continue to utilize the data plan for the remainder of your subscription, however, your data speeds will be limited to 128Kbs.

The only speed referenced on their website is for 3G, which is 1.5Mbps.



There are also data plans for on demand use (WAP or WEB). The cost for this service for GPRS and CSD (9.6 kbps) is $1.73 per minute.



Telcel also offers monthly plans for data access that may be more cost effective for frequent users.

[Francis]

Thanks John

[Maverick69]

Thanks for the info Amigo.

[JEZ]

Originally Posted by Michele

I was in such a hurry to place the call I needed to make that I forgot to listen to the "mensaje".

I'm sure you know this, but recagar your cell at the Oxxo type supermarkets at the cash register, and get the full bonus points as per the cards. Oh and you dont have to mess around with scratching the damned card and entering all the numbers at the tone...