Annual Cell Phone Plan Recap

[Qs Laptop]

Here is the annual recap of my family's cell phone plan with US Mobile. Along with DW and me we have two boys in their mid-20's.




With 9,501 talk time minutes we are in the top 17% of all their users.
17,419 texts is top 2%.
136.97 GB of data used is top 11%

They say we saved $1,568 over the year compared to "the major carriers cost for a comparable plan."

 

[bloom2708]

Since most plans are unlimited calls/texts, the "savings" is probably overstated.

But, anyone still on the big 3 with 4-5 people probably still has a $200/month bill.

We have 3 girls (2 low 20s, 1 teen), so our use would probably be moar, but we are on Mint Mobile and I don't get a summary of usage.

I use FaceTime to chat with my parents, so my minutes are likely very low. Nobody calls anyone anymore or something.

US Mobile is a compelling plan.

If I were to switch away from Mint in 2024, I'd probably go with Boost Infinite (not Boost Mobile). They have a compelling 3 network switching plan that would seem to help with dead spots for carriers. All seem to have them at times.

Mint cost:

2 lines x $20/month + tax
3 lines x $30/month + tax

Paid in one lump in September each year. I might drop to the $15/month plan as I user under 5GB most months.

Happy 2024.

 

[ERD50]

What did you pay, all in, for the year? IOW, what's the baseline for that savings $?

-ERD50

 

[Slater]

I switched from Verizon to Mint....
Solo plan, I was paying over $1k a year with V, now its $240 a year with Mint with 15gb plan.
Could be $180 a year if I chose the 5bg plan...
Im happy with the service!

 

[foxcreek9]

Here is the annual recap of my family's cell phone plan with US Mobile. Along with DW and me we have two boys in their mid-20's.

View attachment 48061


With 9,501 talk time minutes we are in the top 17% of all their users.
17,419 texts is top 2%.
136.97 GB of data used is top 11%

They say we saved $1,568 over the year compared to "the major carriers cost for a comparable plan."

Reminds me of a Kohl's receipt

 

[Sunset]

Last year I paid $2.22 for our two phones, they each had over $100 of credit on them so it keeps it going another year.

We will be switching to tracfone service as it has far better reception at home as it uses a different carrier than T-mobile.
Our cost will jump to ~$250 per year.

Of course I could be swayed to go with some other carrier if they are lower in cost.

We are light phone users.

 

[erkevin]

I switched from Verizon to Mint....
Solo plan, I was paying over $1k a year with V, now its $240 a year with Mint with 15gb plan.
Could be $180 a year if I chose the 5bg plan...
Im happy with the service!

Love Mint also. Wife and I each have the 5gb plan. The only time we really burn data is while traveling; wifi is almost everywhere....almost.

 

[Qs Laptop]

What did you pay, all in, for the year? IOW, what's the baseline for that savings $?

-ERD50

All of us are on an unlimited data plan (which is actually 100GB per month and 50GB hotspot data), unlimited text and unlimited call.

We each pay $34.36 per month, which includes tax. So it's $34.36 X 4 X 12 = $1,649.28 per year.

Yes, we are buying too much data, DW and I rarely use more than 2 GB per month; the boys use a lot more. They will be off the plan and on their own soon, so I will adjust the amount of data purchased downward.

 

[foxcreek9]

Last year I paid $2.22 for our two phones, they each had over $100 of credit on them so it keeps it going another year.

We will be switching to tracfone service as it has far better reception at home as it uses a different carrier than T-mobile.
Our cost will jump to ~$250 per year.

Of course I could be swayed to go with some other carrier if they are lower in cost.

We are light phone users.

Look at RedPocket, you can choose which network you want to use (V, ATT, or T-M), I have a refer code that will give you $25 if interested. We just switched from TF after a bad customer service experience, wasn't planning on it - but they made me look. They are way behind everyone else in terms of value.


I went with Tello (t-mobile), costs me $6 month and my wife has RedPocket (ATT) that costs about $9 month. This way when we are traveling, one of us should have coverage. Our experience with Tello and RedPocket CS has been been very good, the complete opposite of TF (more than one bad experience over the years).

 

[RetiredAndLovingIt]

I paid $99 this year with Tello using T-Mobile towers. My normal monthly bill is $6 but I did need to add extra data when using my phone as a hotspot the 2 times that Frontier was out for days.
My plan is unlimited texts, 100 minutes and 1 GB of data. I'm in WIFI most of the time and rarely make or receive phone calls but I do send and receive a ton of texts daily. What I love about Tello is that I can change my plan up or down each month depending on my needs and also if I manually renew my plan the day before auto renew I get to rollover all my unused data and minutes. Right now I'm sitting with 5.31 GB and 632 minutes.
I also buy a Tracfone bundle deal every year or so from QVC or HSN when they have a super duper deal always less than $100 including a brand new phone (currently a Moto G Stylus 5G) and a limited amount of data/mins/ texts good for a year. I move the new phone over to my Tello number after it's unlocked and keep the Tracfone number active on an old phone as a backup. It has come in very handy when I've left my main phone at my kids house or somewhere else. I think these bundles will be going away soon since Verizon is now in charge of Tracfone and seems to be doing a good job of destroying it. They are trying to force long time users onto Verizon service even if their service is better using T-mobile or AT&T which will no longer be an option sometime next year.

 

[MC Rider]

We also switched to Mint from T Mobile. Much lower cost.

 

[ERD50]

All of us are on an unlimited data plan (which is actually 100GB per month and 50GB hotspot data), unlimited text and unlimited call.

We each pay $34.36 per month, which includes tax. So it's $34.36 X 4 X 12 = $1,649.28 per year.

Yes, we are buying too much data, DW and I rarely use more than 2 GB per month; the boys use a lot more. They will be off the plan and on their own soon, so I will adjust the amount of data purchased downward.

When the kids get off the plan, consider Ting Mobile. It's $10/month per line, unlimited talk & text, $5 per each GB (shared). Those $5 increments start at anything > 0, so unless your phone is OFF, you'll be charged at least the $5 per month. DW and I have only gone over the 1 GB once since we switched to this plan in OCT 2022. But even @ up to 2GB, that's ~ $30 plus ~ $6 in tax/fees (911 etc), or ~ $18 per person/month.

-ERD50

 

[bloom2708]

When the kids get off the plan, consider Ting Mobile. It's $10/month per line, unlimited talk & text, $5 per each GB (shared). Those $5 increments start at anything > 0, so unless your phone is OFF, you'll be charged at least the $5 per month. DW and I have only gone over the 1 GB once since we switched to this plan in OCT 2022. But even @ up to 2GB, that's ~ $30 plus ~ $6 in tax/fees (911 etc), or ~ $18 per person/month.

-ERD50

Why not just 2 x $15 Mint plan? Then you don't have to not use your phone and the cost is fixed.

Ting is great if you just put your phone in the drawer. I partially get the draw of Ting, but in practice it would be better just use tracphone and not use the phone.

 

[ERD50]

Why not just 2 x $15 Mint plan? Then you don't have to not use your phone and the cost is fixed.

Ting is great if you just put your phone in the drawer. I partially get the draw of Ting, but in practice it would be better just use tracphone and not use the phone.

Mint might be better, I just mentioned Ting because it was what I'm using and familiar with.

I didn't mean to imply you should take steps to use 0 data to avoid the $5, it was my way of saying that under normal use, just accept that $5 as part of the basic cost.

-ERD50

 

[Cobra9777]

We have 1 phone on Visible (Verizon) and 1 on Tello (T-Mobile). Both plans are $25/mo all-in. We travel in a Class B van 2-3 months per year. So it's helpful to have both networks. When traveling, we burn thru data at an alarming rate, typically 2-5GB/day.

Visible is the only plan I'm aware of with truly unlimited hotspot. It's throttled to 5Mbps, which is more than enough for most uses. But it limits video to 480p most of the time. The Tello plan has 35GB of data with no limitations on how it's used (hotspot, streaming, etc). But when traveling, we can burn thru 35GB very fast. So we try to always use Visible unless it's not working.

When not traveling, we don't need all that data, but both plans are affordable enough to keep all the time. At some point, we will get Starlink for the van, and only activate the service when traveling. Then, I can downsize the 2 cell plans to a more typical 5GB for ~$14/mo each. The cell savings would pay for ~2 months of Starlink.

 

[RetiredAndLovingIt]

Cobra, just FYI Tello now has 5GB limit on hotspot. It happened to me a few months back when my Frontier was out.

 

[Cobra9777]

Cobra, just FYI Tello now has 5GB limit on hotspot. It happened to me a few months back when my Frontier was out.

Well, that stinks. I always favored Tello over Mint for that reason. Plus I don't want to prepay 12 months to get a fair price.

Now it looks like the Mint 20GB plan ($25) might be the better deal, since I can use all 20GB as hotspot. Or just pull the trigger on Starlink for travel and downsize the 2 cell plans.