This is a shame as it was one of the best phone plans available for a moderate data user. The $300 annual plan which still exists, while provides a lot more data, is expensive when most data isn’t used
EDIT: The $150 plan is available up until 10 August 2020…
hopefully this plan is replaced by a similar plan in the future
We have two Optus SIM only plans, purely because of the family data sharing (attached to my large iPhone plan), which is really great. I’ve just noticed they’ve brought out a new “family plan” which is 4 sims for $149/month with 250GB to share. I’m a long term Optus customer because I’ve been really happy with their service and products for a long time (and fed up to the gunwales when I’ve had to deal with Telstra for work).
We also have a Boost prepaid SIM which we use for when my old man goes “out bush” for work. Optus’s coverage is pretty great these days, but way out east of WA you can barely get Telstra 3G, so your only options are Telstra or Boost. I’ve been pretty pleased with the ease-of-use with Boost as far as the recharges etc go
ALDIMobile also have a family plan for up to 4 users but nowhere near that Data allowance but price is $80 per month with the data at 72 GB per month with rollover of data if recharged within 24 hours of plan expiry (or a user can auto-recharge).
Yeah just saw on Whirlpool that its there as a recharge but can’t be bought as a starter pack. Buy a $2 SIM and recharrge with $150 seems to be the go.
I’ve decided that staying with the woolworths $60/6months/12Gb is best for me. I was going to switch to $10/1month/1GB and get the data bank but it will take longer than I will actually live to reach the max bank. LOL! May as well stay with what I have and make do with rollover 
I read the $150/365day plan will continue to be available directly from Boost only, as a recharge to existing ($150/365day?) customers after Aug 10. It is still available today, just not as a kit from retailers.
Wait and see.
Ummm… yeah… I said something similar in my post immediately above yours. 
I was just talking to Boost today and I was advised that the $150 per annum plan will be closed for new recharges as of 10.08.2020, so anyone wanting to get on board needs to act quickly.
For the last few years I was subscribed to Kogan’s 365 day plans but 18 months ago their speed dropped dramatically when Vodafone deemed non capital city / metropolitan areas as regional which dropped speeds back down to 3G which is in line with Kogan offering 3G/4G services. Downloading updates indoors or watching YouTube videos became unwatchable in regional areas and time to bite the bullet by buying a Telstra Prepaid 365 day service for $300. At least the bandwidth is not crippled unlike their MVNOs and VoLTE is enabled by default. There is no returning to Kogan or Vodafone until they improve their network services.
With the merger of TPG & Voda, I don’t know if that will improve the quality (ie now have more money to invest in infrastructure) or degrade performance due to drawing out profits to satisfy shareholders in both old Telco camps rather than putting into improved infrastructure. With the lack of Huiwei 5G and the TPG/Voda subsequent withdrawal from that tech I’m not sure there will be much improvement. This doesn’t bode well for when Telstra’s 3G gets pulled in 2024 (they often share towers).
I changed both our Boost plans to the $150 per annum one before the deadline on Monday so we are paying only $12.50 per month each for unlimited calls.
Today we received offers from the grubs at Optus via Flybuys for SIM only plans for $45.12 per month on their sub-standard network.
Tell ‘em the’re dreamin’.
With Telstra removing 3G services in a few years time then the net effect will be that there should be more coverage for 4G and 5G frequencies. Meanwhile Vodafone will remain in the dark ages on rubbishy 3G that nobody will want to use. TPG will need to improve their customer service and billing practices before many previous customers will ever use their mobile services again.
3G has greater distance coverage than 4G and 5G. For more rural customers whose main interest would be an ability to have signal and thus contact the removal of 3G may be a further cut to their connectivity. Like with the nbn™ I have seen no great rush by any telco to cover these more remote areas with 4G, 5G with it’s possible distance of coverage from a single tower would be multiples of less probability than 4G even.
2G was sadly missed and the removal of 3G will just compound that divide between urban and rural connectivity. Maybe then TPG/Voda may be handed a market that Telstra/Optus no loner want to service.
Was it?
The problem with 2G, GSM, was it was a time division multiplex system designed in Europe for Europe to service small countries with large populations.
It worked by splitting a radio frequency into 8 time slots so as to provide 8 simultaneous calls, with each one having a specific time slot for transmission and reception at a cell site which limited the maximum range to 32km.
With an anologue mobile in our vehicle, we could talk from over 70km south of Rockhampton but whilst a GSM mobile would show a strong signal in the same area, communications were impossible as signals would be sent and received outside of their allocated time slots.
Telstra did some experimination for use at sea by limiting a channel to only 4 users to double the range to 64km maximum.
Telstra boosted both 3G and 4G coverage in regional areas by adding lower frequency bands similar to what the old analogue network used and they apparently already have 850Mhz frequency bandwidth for 5G so hopefully it won’t be a problem, at least for Telstra customers.
Was for our friends in a few places. 3G even now for them requires the use of antennas whereas for 2G the handset was enough. Each experience I guess differs for users but many of my more rural rellies and friends they still mourn 2G’s removal.
" 5G Range
The trade-off for speed at mmWave frequencies is limited range. Testing of 5G service range in mmWave has produced results approximately 500 meters from the tower, meaning a huge propagation of MIMO-enabled antenna arrays would be required for pure standalone 5G deployment. In addition, the inability of millimeter wave signals to penetrate obstructions further limits the range potential because these obstructions would need to be factored into network designs for mobile users.
The range constraints of 5G technology have motivated a trend towards more flexible architectures in 5G with the decomposition of the base station into new logical elements. These facilitate the network to be deployed flexibly using the available real estate with local aggregation of some functions with minimal space footprint and other requirements needed for radio sites where this is limited.
With these prescient range concerns in mind, anchoring with LTE or low-band 5G may remain a component of 5G networks for the foreseeable future, with only users close to the antennas reaping the full benefits. Small cell technology and other creative alternatives to the traditional cell tower can be utilized effectively to make standalone 5G networks viable."
The talk of the Boost 6 and 12 month options going away seems to be unfounded, so far at least, with all four options still available …
International roaming not so available it seems - some new offering suggested for mid 21 - I guess there won’t be huge numbers of people after international roaming for a while anyway …
Boost has released a revised 12 month plan (no longer $150 for 12 months and 80GB).
The new plan is $200 for 12 months and 30 GB (bonus 55GB if prepaid plan is purchased before 26 October)…
While not as attractive as the old plan, Boost in the past often has had special (discounted) prices for its longer plans and it may be worth keeping an eye out to see if they discount this one.
Excepting Boost uses the entire Telstra network not just the wholesale segment, this is one less reason to use Boost instead of buying an Aldi $99 Value Pack. Although the Aldi Value pack only has 15GB of data for the year data can be topped up if exhausted. Best is that once you have a value pack it can be automatically renewed.
The ‘hunger game’ of watching for a sale or finding it on offer is only a once off problem.
The old 6 and 12 month plans still seem to be available for recharge …
A big advantage in remote areas - not so much in the big smoke …
TPG has announced the planned development of a low cost TPG carrier to rival Telstra’s Belong…
It will be interesting to see what this means for TPG pricing as well as TPG has been significantly cheaper than Telstra (and possibly Belong). I wonder if it is also positioning TPG for 5G.
