With a message of “We thought rationing ended in the 50s”, BT has weighed into the unlimited mobile data debate. It's started offering BT Total Broadband users unlimited access to 1½ million BT FON and BT Openzone WiFi hotspots across the UK. A downloadable mobile application to find these hotspots is also planned.
The company points out that many of its customers are also O2 mobile users "who are about to have their 3G access rationed as they upgrade to new devices".
BT Total Broadband users were previously able to use the community-based BT FON and commercial BT Openzone hotspots for a certain number of minutes, depending on their broadband package.
John Petter, consumer managing director for BT Retail, said "Because of the growing number of BT customers with mobile devices such as tablet computers and smartphones, we know that mobile access to the internet is needed more than ever before. Now that operators like O2 are rationing 3G, BT Total Broadband customers can find fast WiFi connections all over the UK’s towns and cities with unlimited internet access from 1.5 million hotspots. Our BT Fon and BT Openzone networks expanded by 800,000 hotspots during 2009 and we expect to have over 2.5 million hotspots by the end of 2011. This continuing level of expansion means that these networks are rapidly becoming the simplest way for people to access the internet when out and about. And not only is this level of WiFi coverage unique to BT, it’s automatically included with our BT Total Broadband options."