Just dropped into a local Telstra shop. It has a "special" on allowing
people 18 months into their current 24 month contract to get a new mobile
provide that they have a Telstra landline product (Homeline Whatever) and
either Foxtel or Bigpond and will sign up for a 36mth contract. And that
all are billed together.

Anyway, I don't have Foxtel (I'm with Austar). I am not with Bigpond. So I
didn't "qualify". I discussed this with the kid who was prattling on about
how great Bigpond is and how cheap it is (for the first 12mths), etc..

Thing is, all I wanted was to replace my mobile which is starting to play
up - mostly battery problems. It has a few months to go. However, the kid
was either unwilling or unable to do some sort of deal where I could get
out of my current contract early and sign up with a new phone for however
long they wanted. He didn't really seem to care when I mentioned that I'll
wait and see, then. Optus is introducing its 3G service in rural areas and
maybe it will have some good deals going. Kid just shrugged his shoulders.

Obviously he doesn't work on commissions. Certainly he wouldn't last ten
minutes flogging cars.

What I might end up doing now is to let the contract lapse. In the
meantime I'll pick up the phone that I want off Ebay or whatever and when
the contract lapses I'll slot the pre-paid SIM (bought for the mother in
law while she was here visiting) into the new phone and top it up only
when it requires it to stop it expiring.

Now while it won't hurt Telstra, I'll go from paying say, $40 a month to
around $5 or maybe less. Thing is, if other customers do the same thing
then it soon adds up.

I'm no salesman but I thought that the idea was to make every person who
walks into your store a customer, not to let them walk and go elsewhere.