Who we are
WhistleOut was founded in Australia in 2008 on the assumption that you shouldn't need to be a genius to get a great phone or broadband plan. Despite how confusing this industry can be, we knew that people just needed clear information to make a good decision.
After success in Australia, we’ve brought the site to Singapore and currently help thousands of Singaporeans each month compare mobile phone and broadband plans.
Our search tool is designed to deliver clear, easy-to-understand product comparisons in a way that lets you decide on what is best for you. We are an independent company, and while the major brands feature in our comparisons, we are not owned by any of the companies you see listed on our site.
Up to date data
To deliver accurate, up-to-date plan information, we have a dedicated team of data experts that checks every plan in our database against the current offers on the service provider's websites. It is a big job and currently our team maintains over 300 plan combinations and we estimate that we make hundreds of changes to our database each month. While we don't track pricing for every provider and product in the market, we do our best to cover as many as possible while not compromising on our rigorous process.
As part of our service promise, we commit to including at least the top ten providers of Mobile Phone and broadband Plans and currently we have 16 mobile phone carriers and 7 broadband service providers listed.
Free for consumers
WhistleOut is completely free to use, but as you might expect, we are a business. We are constantly building and maintaining the service and it takes a lot of work. When you click on a "Go to Site" link that transfers you to a third-party website, we may get paid a fee.
We will always show you the single most relevant product result for each supplier based on your search criteria, ranked by sorting options that you control. For suppliers with whom we have commercial relationships, we will then show additional listings beyond their most relevant result.
Suppliers do not need a commercial relationship with us to be included in search results. Our team of product experts check the prices of all suppliers with the same rigour no matter what our commercial relationship.
We don't collect any personal details unless you offer them to us (signing up for a newsletter for example), and we won't contact you unless you ask us to. You can read more about this in our privacy policy.
Sponsored placements
We offer sponsored placements to third party suppliers on WhistleOut - we know that advertising on some websites can be annoying and intrusive so we try to show products that relate to a user's search and that are a compelling offer. It is important to know that sponsored products are not a recommendation that a product is the best match available.
Featured results
The Featured Result "Ad" is a sponsored placement where a product is elevated to the #1 #2 or #3 position in the search results (clearly labelled "Ad") and meets the search criteria of the page. Below the Featured Results the organic results are sorted by, price low to high by default.
Brand Advertising
Brand Advertising ads appear on the mobile phones or broadband homepages as well as within editorial content on the site. These ads click directly to the supplier’s website.
The sticky strip promo
The sticky strip promo is permanent ad placement at the bottom of all pages.
Marketing to WhistleOut users
We do not sell any data to suppliers. We do create our own ads served via ad exchanges, that may show up as you visit other websites on the broadband.
Product ratings and awards
Awards & editor's picks
The WhistleOut Annual Awards and Monthly Editor’s Picks are aimed at finding the best providers for different phone and broadband needs on a national level.
We review the biggest cross section of providers possible, including the top 10 service providers in each category plus many smaller providers.
The WhistleOut Editors Picks are judged by our team of product experts who award 3, 2 and 1 points to the providers of the best plans in each category on a monthly basis. Service providers are not required to have a commercial relationship with WhistleOut in order to be considered and selected for Editor's Picks. The annual award winners are the providers with the highest number of points at the end of the 12 month period (July - June of the following year). In case of a tie, winners are chosen based on the number of 1st positions, then 2nd positions, then 3rd positions they achieved in that category over the course of the year. A provider can receive points for multiple plans in a category if their plans best match the award criteria.
The two exceptions to this judging process are the Best Promotion awards for Mobile and broadband. These awards are given to the single best promotion over the twelve month period as judged by WhistleOut’s in-house panel of experts.
FAQ
Any product listed that includes a phone number, 'Go to Site' link or 'Call me Back' link is a commercial partner. Below are some examples to help identify commercial partners.
A standard organic result from our database result that is not a commercial partner.
An organic result where we have a commercial relationship to refer the customer to the Service Provider.
Users have control over how products in a search result are sorted. The default search results are sorted by Lowest Price. Users have a range of options to view the results in a range of ways.
- Highest Speed (Broadband) - most broadband providers in Australia report Typical Evening Speeds which is the download speeds during peak times (7pm and 11pm).
- Most Data (Broadband & Mobile) - sorts plans by data, it is particularly useful if you have filtered results to a price range and you want to see which plans have the highest data allowance.
- 24 Month Cost (Broadband & Mobile) - we calculate the cost of using the service for 2 years, so that high upfront costs are normalised and contract costs are exposed to help users make an informed decision. This is similar to the process of comparison rate in the financial industry.
- Minimum Total Cost “MTC” (Broadband & Mobile) - Telcos are required by law to show MTC on all products in conjunction with the price. It is the minimum you will pay the Telco and is a way to compare the cost of plans.
- Most Popular (Broadband & Mobile) - this is user generated popularity based on page views and clicks (purchasing intent) of each service provider or product on WhistleOut in the last 7 days. The popularity sort does not reflect real work market share.
- Max Saving (Mobile) - Calculates the $ value of any discounts and offers over the life of the plan.
WhistleOut is a search engine that uses a proprietary algorithm to create a list of results based on the data inputs. This might be entering an address, selecting a phone, data, speed or price requirements and many more. Based on the inputs we generate a set of results from our database containing key information designed to help users compare. The ranking of products in the WhistleOut results table is performed using the following criteria, subject to the limitations on the information we provide as set out below:
- the number of features requested by the consumer that the product contains;
- the quantity of a particular feature offered by the product, e.g. we treat 20 GB of download usage as being better than 10 GB of download usage; and
- the relative price of the product.
The highest ranked product in a WhistleOut results list at any given time will be the product which generally provides the most usage and features for the consumer for the lowest price (with the exception of "Featured Results").
Where two products have the same monthly price, the higher ranking product will be the product with the lowest overall Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) when all fees and incentives over the life of the contract for the product that you specify when using the Service have been accounted for.
Where two products have the same TCO, the product with the most of each feature will be ranked higher.
We can't cover all products in the market as the product maintenance burden is too large, but we always endeavour to include at least the top ten service providers and usually many more. We maintain pricing combinations (deals, promotions, products, fees) for the thousands of products in our database. We're also aware that showing too many products can be a little confronting for some users, and might make browsing the results seem like a daunting task for them. We endeavour to make the results as accurate and comprehensive as we can, while making them easy to follow. To aid this process we include filter options and navigation tabs with each set of query results so users can best hone in on the results most suitable to them.
We collect information about plans as disclosed by the service providers, and maintain the prices and features. We don't test each service and we rely on the fact that if a service provider says that they are offering 2GB for $20, we can take that as factually correct for the purposes of comparison.
WhistleOut has commercial arrangements with a range of third party Service Providers in each category of comparison. Other than the placement of Featured Results "Ads" which are clearly coloured, separated from the results table and clearly marked as an advertisement at the top of some comparisons, the results on the WhistleOut service are not altered or moved due to commercial relationships that WhistleOut may or may not have.
When WhistleOut does have commercial agreements with a third party Service Providers, we receive payment from the provider when you use our service. This can take the form of a cost per click, cost per sale, cost per call or cost per call back.
WhistleOut's Data Experts
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Crystal Feng
AUS -
Mitch Mercado
AUS -
Macel Calibjo
AUS -
Sydney Medina
USA & Canada -
Mark Adrian Dino
USA & Canada -
Joy Sanchez
USA -
Mayonel Condez
USA -
Nikki Shane Tirao
USA -
Noemi Pontanal
Canada -
Ana Jamolin
Canada -
Arpita Srivastava
SG
