I have immense respect for war veterans, from my father there are several orders and a large bag of medals. Of these, he contemptuously called all jubilee ones “fifty dollars,” I remember. But do veterans need special rates now? Few of them are alive, alas. Veterans either do not need mobile communications at all, or, if they do, they have been there for a long time. Somehow the children and grandchildren have mastered together and continue to overpower the monthly fee of 200-300 rubles, so as not to strain the person with problems, let alone drag him somewhere to the salon …

May God grant the veterans health, but estimate the age of the veteran in the year of the 75th anniversary of Victory, hello, garage! Are you all for show, or did you get a “recommendation” from the government, did you do it, and the officials happily reported back? Okay, let’s wait. If I see at least one life-affirming and bravura press release on this topic, I will swear loudly.

By and large, the operators would not have become impoverished by providing veterans with completely free and unlimited communication, how many of those veterans do we have left? The trouble is that the veterans themselves would not have used such a tariff. So the operators are trying to find a compromise that would completely satisfy not God knows what the needs of old people, but at the same time would not seduce their young relatives.

MTS, tariff “WWII Veteran 2020”

You can connect from April 14, 2020. The veteran will definitely not be able to find this tariff product on his own, children-grandchildren are also unlikely to master the search. I found with the help of professionals, a search on the MTS website returned “no” results. The link for Moscow is here. You need to go to the section “Support” (hmm …), then to the subsection “Useful information” (twice, hmm …), then to the sub-subsection “List of archived tariffs”. Bingo! Then search for the required pdf file by the name of the tariff. If, of course, you know the name of the tariff. At least cut me, but by chance such a quest could not have formed. This is a malicious intent of the enemy of the people, and under Stalin this person would at least be exiled to those regions where the MTS does not work. To be completely honest, I describe in detail the search path for the “Archive Rates” section on the MTS website more for myself, for the second or third time I have been painfully searching. Now remember only “Veteran of the Second World War”, and you can set Google on the MTS website, optimization!

As far as I understand, it connects only through a tariff change through a remote support service. With scanning of all documents and other crap. And with a visit to the salon by the veteran owner of the room. About the option of buying a SIM card with a new number, I just keep quiet, this is a natural mockery of an elderly person, and I don’t even want to discuss this.

You can see the tariff parameters yourself in the screenshot above. Free calls to all city phones in Moscow and the Moscow region and to MTS phones throughout Russia, after the free package of 300 minutes has been used up, calls at 1 RUB / min. to all other mobile networks in Moscow and 3 rubles / min intercity. The option “Veteran of the Great Patriotic War” can theoretically be disabled through the support service (you cannot on your own), but I have no idea who might need it. Without the “WWII Veteran 2020” option connected, the cost of calls to the MTS network in the home region is: to MTS in Moscow and the Moscow region and all city numbers in Moscow and the Moscow region – 0,75 rubles / min, to MTS Russia – 3,5 RUB / min, for other cellular operators and landline numbers and regions – 2,5 RUB / min, for other mobile and fixed-line operators in Russia – 5,5 RUB / min.

Mobile Internet at the tariff is disabled by the special service “Mobile Internet Ban 2”. If the prohibition to disable and activate the “Mobile Internet” service, then the Internet is provided on the basis of basic tariffication, the Internet package is not provided in the tariff. One could assume that the Internet was turned off for reasons of caring for the veteran, so that he would not accidentally click something, but I don’t really believe it. If we wanted to show concern, we would have connected the “Restriction of infotainment services” (formerly “Content Ban”), but they did not. So a more probable assumption of mobile Internet disconnection is insurance against misuse of the tariff. The 95-year-old veteran does not really need the Internet, and the grandchildren, on the contrary, do not need a tariff without a mobile Internet, even with free minutes and SMS.

It is written that you can go to minus up to 3 rubles: “If the subscriber’s balance becomes equal to or below zero (but not lower than 000 rubles), then within the next 3000 days he will only have access to incoming calls, receiving SMS and calls to service MTS numbers “. But this is clearly a misprint, at other MTS tariffs not lower than 61 rubles.

The tariff is, of course, good, but the main question is: is it really needed and to whom? I found my review of veteran tariffs already in 2013, you can read it here. Surprisingly, nothing has changed in 7 years, and the questions remain the same. So I’ll just copy / paste the summary with minimal editing.

Questions instead of summaries

To our sincere regret, there are very few veterans left, and it is not so easy for them to cope with modern devices and technologies. The task is to make their life a little more comfortable, easier and safer, without adding unnecessary questions. It is clear that operators are afraid of “inappropriate” use of the tariff, but it would be quite possible to come up with a reasonable scheme.

In a situation of general operator concern about earning money on additional services, it would be necessary to provide for such numbers with absolute bans on the connection of any “useful” additional and content services. There was still not enough to mock the elderly with all sorts of “beeps” with horoscopes.

Priority access to contact centers would also be useful. One should hardly be afraid of the significant expenses that give the right to quickly dial to a “live” operator.

Subscription fees and “inactivity” blocking, you also need to do something about this on such numbers. If a person nevertheless gets out once a year to a dacha or a sanatorium, and before that he did not use a mobile phone (was not required), then it is useless to arrange a surprise for him in the form of a zeroed account and a blocked phone.

Finally, the connection method. The obligatory visit to the office or the execution of a notarized power of attorney looks, I apologize, a natural mockery. It is clear that there are legal requirements for the execution of contracts and again the risk of “misuse”, but it was possible to come up with something. For example, negotiate with social workers who visit veterans anyway. Or use the delivery scheme, which is currently used for the delivery of SIM-cards to replace the lost ones. There would be a desire, but you can find a way out.

Still, there is a glimmer of hope that the issue of connecting or registering a tariff change at home was thought out by the veteran and the operators simply did not advertise their schemes out of modesty. Otherwise, all promotions with special rates are strongly reminiscent of “for show” events. It’s good that on May 9, MTS (MGTS) allowed veterans to make free long-distance calls from home, this is important.

Telephone tariff

A kind man shared a link to an article a month and a half ago in Izvestia, you can read it here. It turns out that it has long been planned to present veterans to the Victory Day with push-button phones complete with free mobile services. Apparently, the discovered tariff “Veteran of WWII 2020” by MTS is from this holiday set and other operators already have similar tariffs in store. Perhaps the operators have agreed on the parameters of the free package and even the cost of services in excess of this free set, and I would not be surprised if the corresponding tariffs for all operators turn out to be very similar.

Strangeness and seeming absurdities with the connection are becoming understandable, probably no one expected to connect the veterans individually in the salons, something is planned in a centralized manner. We have about 60 thousand veterans, phones will be push-button and with a “panic button”, they will cost about 48 million rubles. Eldar estimated the cost of donated communication services at 50-80 million rubles a year, it turns out an average of 90 rubles. per month for each veteran. Judging by the free dialing in the MTS tariff (300 minutes and 300 SMS), it looks like the truth.

Photo from the site vm.ru

As for the choice of phones for a gift, then they do everything right here, and you should not sniff contemptuously. An “panic button”, convenient keys and a simple interface are exactly what an elderly person needs and, paradoxically, what he often does not receive. There are children and grandchildren who every year and a half want a new phone number, but what to do with the old one? Of course, grandfather / grandmother! At the same time, no remorse: this is no longer indulging your own expensive Wishlist, but a noble gesture. So old men and women with incomprehensible interfaces are tormented, if they master the answer to a call, then it’s already not bad. And here’s a gift, don’t throw it away? I think that for many veterans such a phone will come in handy.

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