Starting March, LG Uplus will expand its 5G plan lineup and increase real benefits related to OTT subscription fees and life cycle benefits.
To enhance customers’ choice of plans and help families save on communications costs, LG Uplus will launch a new monthly plan priced in the 30,000 KRW range. Additionally, the age limit for young adult benefits will be extended from 29 to 34 years, broadening the eligibility for youth benefits, while also significantly increasing the data allotment for two types of 5G mid-tier plans.
The newly launched ‘5G Mini’ plan offers a basic monthly fee of 37,000 KRW with 5GB data. Once this data is used up, ongoing use can continue at a maximum speed of 400kbps. The 5G Mini plan is LG Uplus’s first standard plan priced in the 30,000 KRW range and provides 1GB more data compared to similar plans from other carriers at the same price. It is currently the cheapest option among the existing 30,000 KRW plans, with ample data provision.
To extend practical benefits to customers using existing low-cost 5G plans, including the 40,000 KRW ‘5G Slim+’ plan, which will see an increase in its base data allotment to 9GB, effective April 1. This is a 50% increase from the previous 6GB. Additionally, the base data for the existing 50,000 KRW ‘5G Light+’ plan will also be increased to 14GB.
Furthermore, to increase customer choice in the 50,000 KRW tier, LG Uplus will introduce the ‘5G Basic+’ plan. The ‘5G Basic+’ plan offers 24GB of data for a monthly fee of 59,000 KRW, with continued access available at a maximum speed of 1Mbps after data is depleted. This expands LG Uplus’s 5G plan options to a total of 15 plans, ranging from 37,000 KRW to 130,000 KRW, enabling customers to select a plan based on their data usage needs.
To allow customers to enjoy 5G at even lower rates, ‘5G Direct 42’ offers 24GB of data for 42,000 KRW (with continued usage at up to 1Mbps after data is depleted), and ‘5G Direct 30’ provides 5GB for 30,000 KRW (with continued access at maximum 400kbps after data use). The ‘5G Direct 30’ plan is available for subscription via Uplus.com until August 31.
Since last year, LG Uplus has been providing a 5GB data coupon for households with children under 24 months to address issues related to low birthrates and childcare. Starting April 1, the data provision will be doubled from 5GB to 10GB, and eligibility will extend to children up to 36 months and those entering elementary school in their first year, providing support for a total of four years.
This expansion of the data coupon offerings reflects the social trend that parents of children entering elementary school need to pay more attention to their children’s needs, often resulting in dual-income families taking more parental leave. The childcare data coupons can be applied for by visiting the LG Uplus website, local LG Uplus stores, or by contacting customer service until the end of this year.
To ease the burden on customers regarding rising OTT subscription fees, also known as ‘streamflation’, LG Uplus is offering discount benefits for Disney+ (9,900 KRW per month) across all tiers of its 5G plans through its own subscription platform, ‘U-Dok’.
Previously, OTT discount offers were limited to specific 5G plans, but now this has been expanded to provide discounts of up to 80% across the entire 5G range.
Customers using plans above 75,000 KRW will receive a basic 40% discount along with an additional VIP membership discount, totaling around 80% off. Customers on plans above 61,000 KRW will get 40% off, those on plans above 55,000 KRW will receive 30% off, while all other plans will enjoy a 10% discount. However, this discount does not apply to customers under the age of 19, including teens and children.
This Disney+ discount benefit for LG Uplus 5G plan customers will be available from April to December.
In a bid to reduce the burden on customers traveling abroad, LG Uplus has launched four new roaming products under the ‘Roaming Pass’ label. The most affordable option, ‘Roaming Pass 3GB’, provides 3GB of data for 29,000 KRW over 30 days (with continued access at maximum 400kbps after data is exhausted) and allows voice calls to be received at no additional charge, with outgoing calls charged at domestic rates. Customers who sign up for a roaming pass via LG Uplus’s customer service app or Uplus.com will receive an additional 1GB of data.
Additionally, from April, LG Uplus mobile customers who do not subscribe to separate roaming products can also enjoy data at a maximum speed of 400kbps for only 5,500 KRW per day without additional charges. This is twice as fast compared to other carriers.
Moreover, roaming benefits will also be established for customers using 5G plans. Those on a monthly plan of 75,000 KRW or more will enjoy discounts of 5,500 KRW per day without having to subscribe to a roaming product, enabling them to roam at maximum 400Kbps speeds without issues—suitable for using messaging apps like KakaoTalk.
For customers using plans over 95,000 KRW, starting April 1 through September 30, the data limit of the ‘Roaming Pass’ will be doubled. This initiative allows customers to use telecommunications services just like they would in Korea, providing up to 50GB of data anywhere in the world.
LG Uplus has also expanded benefits for young customers in terms of data allotment. Last year, LG Uplus launched eight types of the ‘Youth 5G Plan’, which offered 50% more data than regular plans launched alongside mid-range 5G plans. Now, with the introduction of the new standard 5G plans, the eligible age for the Youth 5G plans has been adjusted from 19-29 years to 19-34 years.
Moreover, the existing ‘Youth 5G Light+’ (55,000 KRW) and ‘Youth 5G Slim+’ (47,000 KRW) plans will see their data amounts increased by up to 53%, now providing 26GB and 15GB, respectively. A new ‘Youth Direct Plan’ offering 36GB for 42,000 KRW and 10GB for 30,000 KRW has also launched. The ‘Youth 5G Direct 30’ plan is available for subscription on Uplus.com until August 31.
In the meantime, LG Uplus continues to strengthen customer choice and reduce communications costs through various measures such as introducing life-cycle plans (April 2023), introducing nugget plans (October 2023), and easing sign-up conditions between 5G and LTE (January 2024). This month, LG Uplus has also launched mid-range phones like the Samsung Galaxy A15 (priced at 319,000 KRW) to continue its efforts to reduce overall telecommunications costs, including fees and device purchasing costs.
Lee Jae-won, head of the MX/Digital Innovation Group at LG Uplus (Managing Director), stated, “LG Uplus has led the service competition by being the first to launch unlimited data plans for LTE and 5G, along with establishing the world’s first nationwide LTE network and 5G commercialization. We will continue to take the lead in realizing differentiated customer value in the increasingly competitive future telecommunications market.”
By Lee Sang-jin daedusj@autodiary.kr