A network name change on people’s phones plus some prizes for folks shows Telstra is helping push the important message of vaccination.
There are plenty of reasons to get vaccinated from COVID, the biggest being that it could save your life and prevent serious illness from the current strains of what’s keeping us in lockdown, constantly coming up with ways to survive staying at home, but if you need added incentive and are a Telstra subscriber, you only need turn to your phone.
Specifically the top of it, where the telco broadcasted network name is, with Telstra shifting it to “#LetsVaxx” to get more people in the spirit of vaccination, one of the goals that will lift two states from lockdown, and could bring the country closer to what the new definition of normality is.
Telstra is going beyond that, mind you, offering Telstra Plus members an extra 2500 points for fully vaccinated members, and a further competition afterwards that will see 20 fully vaccinated Telstra Plus members go in the draw to win 5,000,000 points to do with what they want, as well as $3500 credit to cover the cost of services for a year.
For Telstra customers, Telstra Plus exists as a sort of points program not unlike a frequent flyer program, allowing you to rack points up depending on the services you pay for, and then spending it on other things later on, such as phone accessories, tablets, and more. This initiative sees an extra dose of points added to customers simply for getting vaccinated and protecting themselves, also boosting the vaccination rate of their state and country, while going in the draw for even more.
It’s one of the many incentives for vaccination happening around Australia, including Qantas’ addition of 1000 Qantas points and 150 status credits, a competition from Virgin Australia to win from a prize pool of over $150,000, and others, though Telstra’s push to bring incentives for vaccinations is the first time we’ve seen a telco try this. Indeed, at the time of writing, nothing like this was available from any other mobile or internet provider.
“As a company, we can play a bigger role to encourage others to get the vaccine, and make that jab in the arm even more worthwhile,” said Andrew Penn, CEO of Telstra.
“To help out, we will be rewarding those who roll up their sleeves, and encouraging everyone to get vaccinated for the good of the nation.”
Telstra’s vaccination rewards also come with the help of Australian comedian Mark Humphries, who explores whether the COVID-19 vaccine could give you 5G (spoiler: it can’t).
