Refresh airtime

[J-Bax]

O2 advertise O2 refresh plans as 0% interest on phones which sounds good but, why do they charge triple (or more) for the airtime? Example, I have a Pixel 5 and the airtime is £24 for 15gb of data. On a sim only plan it's £8 for 10gb or £18 for 50gb. Is there a reason for this extortionate pricing?

[jonsie]

Contract customers are more or less tied into the phone rather than the tariffbeing an incentive

Competition with other networks and make other tariffs an inducement to attract new customers