Cheapest cell-phone plan?

[Birdie Num Nums]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frost What is the cheapest cell-phone plan you have or know of? Right now, I pay about $42 per month through Sprint. This plan includes unlimited texting. There's no data plan or Internet access.

Here's the link to a similar, lengthy, and informative discussion in the Bogleheads Forum.

[FIRE'd@51]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cattusbabe Nothing has changed. I had over 1700 minutes on my phone. I just added $10.00 worth of minutes to my Gold Rewards plan. All existing minutes rolled over and I'm good to go until 10/2/2011. From the T-Mobile support page: " T-Mobile Prepaid minutes expiration T-Mobile Prepaid minutes begin to expire the day they are added to your account, not when they are purchased. For example, if you purchase a refill card on May 1st and add it to your account May 14th, the term of expiration begins on May 14th. Depending upon the refill amount you purchased and your Gold Rewards status, the expiration time for your T-Mobile Prepaid minutes will vary. For non-Gold Rewards customers: Unused minutes will expire as follows: $10 T-Mobile Prepaid card -- expires in 90 days $25 T-Mobile Prepaid card -- expires in 90 days $50 T-Mobile Prepaid card -- expires in 90 days $100 T-Mobile Prepaid card -- expires in 365 days For Gold Rewards customers: Unused minutes will expire one year from the date you last applied airtime to your account. To help ensure that you never lose your unused minutes, T-Mobile will send you a text message when your account is within five days of expiring. That way, you will have plenty of time to refill your account and carry forward any unused minutes to your new expiration date." I underlined the important information. It does not matter the amount of refill but when you refill. $10 carried all of my unused time forward for another year.

Another nice feature of T-Mobile is that their phones use SIM cards. If you buy a new T-Mobile phone you can simply transfer the SIM card from your old phone to the new phone - no need to even activate the new phone. That way you keep your old number, Gold Rewards status, and unused minutes, all of which are stored digitally on the SIM card. T-Mobile has deals on new phones fairly frequently. A couple of weeks ago, they offered for $30 a nice Samsung flip phone (t139) with free shipping and included a $25 refill card, so basically the new phone cost me $5. My current minutes expire in December, so I will use the refill card then to roll them over for another year (plus get another 150 minutes).

[Cattusbabe]

Nice.

[EO 11110]

I just added two years to my Tracfone. Monthly cost $6.87. I love my Tracfone. It's great for a non gabber.

[Frost]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MasterBlaster To help you, you need to lets us know how much you use the phone for voice (in minutes) and for number of texts. If you don't use the phone much and just need voice and text. A pre-paid plan costs very little.

I use my cell phone for voice about 200 minutes per month. I send about 400 texts per month.

Virgin Mobile has a Beyond Talk plan that offers 300 voice minutes per month and unlimited texts for $25 per month. Does anyone know of a plan cheaper than $25 per month for my amount of usage (200 voice minutes and 400 texts per month)? If not, I'll switch to this plan when my Sprint contract expires in January.

[Sam]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frost Right now, I pay about $42 per month through Sprint. This plan includes unlimited texting. There's no data plan or Internet access.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frost I use my cell phone for voice about 200 minutes per month. I send about 400 texts per month. Virgin Mobile has a Beyond Talk plan that offers 300 voice minutes per month and unlimited texts for $25 per month.

I like the $25 Virgin Beyond Talk plan a lot, especially the inclusion of the unlimited "Text, Email, Data & Web". I will switch to that plan when feasible .

[WhoDaresWins]

I have a Verizon plan....$40.00/month for 400 minutes which I generally don't use in a month but once or twice a year I come pretty close. I keep it because most of my friends have Verizon, and we can have unlimited communication without depleting the minutes. I have a friend who recently moved to AL and sometimes we yak a lot. I also have a land line via Comcast. I have had Verizon and the same cell phone number since the early 90's and it has become a habit. I don't have a fancy phone...just one that is "free" with a two year contract. I don't text at all.

[simple girl]

I'm in the market for a new cell phone, and I'm going to try this "All You Need" plan from Walmart:

Shop - Service Plan

I use my cell phone as my primary phone, averaging about 600 minutes a month and 100-200 texts. So the other kinds of prepaid would not work out well for me.

My friend has used it for about a year and has been pleased with it. Only $32.80 with tax, etc., etc. She said there have been a few remote areas where she lost coverage, so I checked the coverage map. Should be good for the areas I travel. There's no contract, so if it doesn't work well, I'm only really out the phone.

Sharing this in case it helps someone else.

[RockyMtn]

Ever try this site? Just type in your zip code and based on usage it spits out the best plans for your area.

Cell Phone Plans - Compare cell phone plans side-by-side

[simple girl]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RockyMtn Ever try this site? Just type in your zip code and based on usage it spits out the best plans for your area. Cell Phone Plans - Compare cell phone plans side-by-side

Wow, thanks! It looks like the Net10 plan bears further investigation...might be an even better deal, if the coverage works.

[bssc]

We also have the T Mobile. Got the 1000 minutes in 2008. Renewed 100 minutes in 2009 and 2010. Still have 900 or so minutes.

[JDARNELL]

I use Net 10. I will say customer service lacks so I try to do everything online. With Net 10 you can identify what type of service carrier you want based on the zipcode you enter when you purchase. Check out Fatwallet.com and do a search for the latest Net10 thread. I just purchased another Refurb phone with $25 30 day 750 min card for $21.38 after discount code 44777 and since I went thru my fatwallet account I got another 15% off so my cost is $18.38 for 750 min 30 days. Test is 1 min.

Tomcat98

[Da Nag]

For Verizon coverage/call quality, without the Verizon price - PagePlus is awesome.

They use the Verizon network, plans are pre-paid, and dirt cheap. The lone caveat - they're not good for anyone needing data/smartphones.

1200 minutes talk/1200 texts: $30/month.

Unlimited talk/unlimited text: $45/month.

Above are total prices...no taxes, add-on fees, contracts, or any of the other junk you don't want. You can save a few more pennies, by buying your minutes at various online vendors when they go on sale.

I used PagePlus for 2+ years, loved 'em. Got sucked into the smartphone craze, though...I'm still not used to the monthly sticker shock.

[Mulligan]

In case we have any cell phone penny pinchers, my common scents 7 cent minute plan got bought out by Virgin Mobile. They have a plan on their paylo option for $30 a month you get 1500 minutes, 500 texts, and 10 mb (?) of internet which I was told you could check your email approximately 100 times. No contract. This will be enough minute time where I am cutting my landline. Will save $40 a month. It is on the sprint network. Works great where I'm at.

[Patrick]

Prepaid Compare

[JOHNNIE36]

Not to be bragging but we have the best cell plan of anyone. DW has a Droid from Verizon along with unlimited minutes, texting (she does voice texting), data package so she can use the phone as a computer, unlimited minutes, free long distance, GPS, 850K ringtones, 1.5M choices of wallpaper, etc, etc. I have the basic phone (what I wanted) to make calls although the minutes are unlimited as is long distance. Although Verizon had a special running to "buy one, get one free", we ended up getting a better deal of "buy none, get one free".

Honestly, what happened was our wonderful son decided to give his Mother a great Christmas present and bought her that phone and gave us both a great present of putting us on his family plan. Don't know what he is paying on the "family plan" but we were at about $85/mo and now it is zero. He's a great guy!

[W2R]

Wow, he is a great guy! I pay $39.99 for my new nationwide voice plan, and $29.99 for the unlimited data plan on Verizon. So, you would probably be paying a lot each month if you were paying for them yourself.

The iPhone 4 itself was $199 with a two year contract, not too bad.