Snap offers UFB fibre to schools, with unlimited data, from $99

Snap Internet has become the latest retail ISP to release pricing for schools under the $1.35 billion Ultrafast Broadband (UFB) and $300 million Rural Broadband Initiative (RBI) rollouts.

Starting from today, Snap is offering two plans.

One is a half-speed 50Mbit/s up/50Mbit/s down plan priced from $99 a month ex GST ($113.85 incl GST).

The other is a full-speed 100/100 plan priced from $199 a month ex GST ($228.85).

Both plans cover the first 100 students only. Extras are charged at $0.50 ($0.58 incl GST) per head.

There is a fixed installation cost of $99, and Snap is throwing in free membership and access to REANNZ (Research and Education Advanced Network New Zealand), usually charged at $2.65 per student per year.

All the kids can eat
NBR ONLINE has sparred with Snap over what this website considers stingy residential data caps on its cheapest fibre plan (for if you don't use more than 25GB a month, why move from copper/DSL)?

This isn't an issue for Snap's two schools plans. Both offer unlimited data, "with no caveats or fair use policies on usage". Nice. Presumably the ISP figures teachers will keep BitTorrent crazy students in line.

The opposition
With the UFB roll-out in its formative stages, most ISPs have yet to reveal their hand in either business, home or school pricing. 

But CallPlus recently announced three plans schools – one offering 30Mbit/s up and 30Mbit/s down ($130 ex GST/$149 incl GST), one 50/50 ($150 ex GST/$172.50 incl GST) and one at the full fibre speed of 100/100 ($280 ex GST/$322 incl GST).

How are those UFB home sales going?
Snap commercial manager James Koers told NBR his company has had "thousands" of queries.

"But with limited UFB coverage the conversion rate for UFB services is low," he says, echoing recent comments by Orcon.

In areas yet to be reached by Crown fibre (that is, most places, there is "very good coversion to DSL and VDSL" copper. Hmm.

The UFB rollout currently passes around 45,000 homes, with 140,000 estimated by the end of the year.