Idea Cellular has finally launched its 3G services in India in 3 circles Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh , Madhya Pradesh and Chattisgarh. They have also announced their 3G tariffs and plans. They have announced sachet plans for light usage and there are usage based, time based plans. There are also separate plans for heavy users who wish to use USB dongles.The various plans are listed below
Sachet Plans
These plans are just for those who want to get a taste of 3G. We don’t understand what one can do with 10MB on 3G though.
| MRP | Free Data (MB) | Validity | Overage |
| 8 | 10 | 1 | 10p/10kb |
| 51 | 50 | 3 | 10p/10kb |
Usage Based Plans
Here you have plans which offer free data ranging from 100 MB to 5GB.
| MRP | Free Data(MB) | Overage |
| 103 | 100 | 10p/10kb |
| 200 | 250 | 10p/10kb |
| 450 | 600 | 10p/10kb |
| 650 | 1280 | 10p/10kb |
| 750 | 2048 | 10p/10kb |
| 1275 | 5120 | 10p/10kb |
Time Based Plans
Similar to Airtel , Idea also has Time Based plans which remind us of the days when one used to pay by the hour to browse at a cyber cafe. The time based plans seem attractive if you suddenly wish to download some data quickly.
| MRP | Time (Min) | Validity (In days) | Overage |
| 45 | 30 | 1 | Rs 3/min |
| 80 | 60 | 3 | Rs 3/min |
| 150 | 120 | 7 | Rs 3/min |
USB Dongle Tariffs
The company has separate plans for users who would use the 3G connection on their PC or laptop. The tariffs are similar to Usage based plans but is overage is cheaper in Dongle plans at only 5p/10Kb.
| MRP | Free Data (GB) | Overage |
| 599 | 1 | 5p/10kb |
| 750 | 2 | 5p/10kb |
| 1275 | 5 | 5p/10kb |
Idea is also offering a Data Rate Cutter at Rs.55 which will reduce overage charges to 1p/10kb which is valid for 30 days. What do you think of these tariffs ? Can Idea beat them all as it claims ?