In Summer 2012, Virgin Media and London Underground rolled out a programme to introduce WiFi at London Underground stations.
Well, the roll-out is mostly there, and in the first instance – it was offered free of charge.
The free-for-all period has now come to an end, and now comes the part we all hate… paying.
If you’re on one of the following UK Mobile networks, you can escape paying:
- Virgin Media Broadband
- Virgin Media Pay Monthly Mobile
- EE (Everything Everywhere)
- Orange UK
- T-Mobile UK
- Vodafone UK
For those of you on O2, Three or are roaming in the United Kingdom, then its time to pay (unless all you want is transport information)
The prices that Virgin Media are on the face of it – not that bad:
- Daily – £2
- Weekly – £5
- Monthly – £15
- 3-Month Special – £15
The full station list can be found at http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/corporate/wifi-map-jan.pdf, and you can buy online at http://my.virginmedia.com/wifi/index.html
The WiFi service is available in selected stations (100 or so of the network) in the ticket halls, corridors and platforms. It is NOT available on the trains themselves.
Whilst the charge was coming, it’s not as expensive as I feared, putting it into commodity pricing. My only concern is that people will be taking their time, walking and entering their card details/logging onto the WiFi rather than not standing on the right or not watching where they’re going…..