Iberia’s ‘Free Wifi’ is part of the #NoCollusion, No Albania for TPOL where I break my 100 country count mark. See the World Map for where I’ve been.
Welcome aboard Iberia. The flight time is eight hours and thirty minutes from San Juan to Madrid. To pass the time you can watch movies, you can eat, and you can drink some great red wine (see Iberia SJU-MAD Business Class Flight Review). However, if you get bored you can also go on the Internet. Iberia offers free Wi-Fi for 30 minutes or 50MB for business class passengers. I knew once as soon as I signed in, I would hit the limit. And that’s exactly what happened. My inbox was flooded with emails, and before I could respond to any of them, I had run out of data.
So, what to do next? Just like a crack dealer who gives you a free sample knowing that you would come back for more, Iberia tricks you into paying for Wi-Fi. Obviously, once I saw all these emails and messages, I wanted to send replies. Against my frugal policy, I ended up paying $23 for three hours of Wi-Fi. However, because of my data use, it only lasted for two hours.
Wi-Fi should be free. If there is a charge, it should be for time and not for data. From WhatsApp to Instagram to Facebook to email attachments, you’ll burn through the data fast and be feening for more. While Iberia’s Wi-Fi pricing is not as bad as Singapore Airlines’ which charged one passenger $1200 for Wi-Fi, it’s hardly a bargain.
TPOL’s TIP: If presented with “free Wi-Fi”, just say no.
IMO, people really need to learn to disconnect from wifi for a while.
Anecdata collected by me reveals that business types arent too bothered about Wifi, its more the blogging, and experential travel crowd which are big on it.
Not me, I’m hooked on my legal cases.