[1] Originally launched as IKEA Family Mobile on 8 August 2008, it offered pay as you go SIM cards to the public, with members of its loyalty programme and all 9,500 IKEA staff in Britain presented with a handset and £5 worth of free calls.
[2][3] Family Mobile offered UK calls for 8p per minute and UK text messages for 4p each, with a minimum initial top up of £10, making the network the cheapest pay as you go operator in the UK at time of launch – "at least 25 per cent cheaper than any other comparable prepay offer"; and as of May 2012, Family Mobile was still the cheapest pay as you go UK network.
[4] The service targeted individual users families, with extra features for the latter, allowing customers a number of SIM cards per account with shared credit shared among family members and the ability to cap each user.
A free standalone SIM card or handset with their SIM card could be ordered at the Family Mobile website.
Other notable features included automatic top-ups, online itemised bills and the ability to manually switch to the Orange Network if no T-Mobile signal is available by chaining relevant phone settings.