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Has anyone went with Pay as you go?

N

ncage

Golden Member
Hey guys i've just recently been evaluating my bills and trying to cut them as much as possible. I'm currently with verizons 450min play which ends up being $37ish because of my state discount. Anyways the problem being that i rarely ever use more than 100 minutes. I originally got the cell phone because my job started logging every call you made. Its not like i was doing anything wrong but i didn't think it was anyones business who i was calling.

Anyways, i have been evaluating Pay As you go Service. I decided probably not to go with verizon because they are expensive. My two top pics were

TMobile
Pros: cheapest if you don't use that many minutes
You can buy minutes that don't expire after 30 days

Cons: Service seems to be kind of shotty around my area. I mean its not that bad just not anywhere near as good as verizon
Pricey phones (most phones i looked at were near or over $100)

Virgin Mobile:
Pros: Cheap Phones
Left over minutes rollover to next month as long as you buy more before your card expires
Uses sprint network which while not nearly as good as verizon is descent.

Cons: You must buy minimum of 200 minutes a month and they expire after 30 days unless you want to get on there $6.99 + .10C minute plan.

Has anyone went this route? Did you regret it? I'm not too worried about going over my minutes. I'm look at both the LG Flare & Kyocera Cyclops. I Really dont' care about a lot of the extra features phones come with (Cameara, ect). The only thing i don't like about the Kyocera is that there is no analog roam. I don't think i would hit this very often but it would be nice to have the ability just in case you were in the middle of knowhere.



Anyone who has
 
I have Virgin Mobile's Minute2Minute plan, which might not even be offered anymore. I think they ask for $20 every three months. It's still more than I need, now that I've got Skype.

I should probably change it to something like a Tracfone, but I really don't know. I don't think I even use 60 minutes a month anymore.

A cellphone is mainly nice to have on long roadtrips, in case I'd need to call AAA.

Once I get some income going from this internship I got, I'll probably get SkypeIn so I'll also be able to receive regular calls. That'll knock down even more time from the cellphone.

 
I recently went with a Tracfone setup. I got a double minutes for life phone so whatever amount of airtime I buy gets doubled. The neat thing about Tracfone is the bonus codes they have get you additional minutes when adding airtime. Usually an additional 60, sometimes more. Whenever you purchase airtime, you get 90 more days of service, so you do have to top up every three months if you don't buy a one year card. So far no complaints, in my area my GSM Tracfone uses either T-Mobile's or AT&T's network. If you're heavy into text messaging, Tracfone isn't the best since each send/received of a text costs you .30 minutes. Some of their phones are really basic too. There are a couple with bluetooth and a camera, but for the most part they're pretty basic. However, if all you're after is a cheap phone & service, they'll do.
 
Page plus if you can. Cards last 4 months and minutes roll over I do believe. You can get rates as low as 6c per minute with no daily access fee. The access fee is only 50c per month.

Also, they can activate pretty much any verizon phone, and some CDMA phones from other carriers too. They can also do unlocked phones.

You get 100 free minutes when you activate to boot 😛

Other good choices are cricket and metroPCS. Boost will be having an unlimited everything for 50$ per month pretty soon, but it is on sprint.

http://www.pagepluscellular.com/

also, PP runs on the verizon network. MetroPCS and cricket run on their own network. I don't know if they can roam on anyone else's.
 
Originally posted by: Kaervak
I recently went with a Tracfone setup. I got a double minutes for life phone so whatever amount of airtime I buy gets doubled. The neat thing about Tracfone is the bonus codes they have get you additional minutes when adding airtime. Usually an additional 60, sometimes more. Whenever you purchase airtime, you get 90 more days of service, so you do have to top up every three months if you don't buy a one year card. So far no complaints, in my area my GSM Tracfone uses either T-Mobile's or AT&T's network. If you're heavy into text messaging, Tracfone isn't the best since each send/received of a text costs you .30 minutes. Some of their phones are really basic too. There are a couple with bluetooth and a camera, but for the most part they're pretty basic. However, if all you're after is a cheap phone & service, they'll do.
Click to expand...

So the phones can use either AT&Ts towers or Tmobile towers? If so i might have to check it out. No i actually am one of the text message haters. If i can shut text messaging off i will.

 
Originally posted by: nonameo
Page plus if you can. Cards last 4 months and minutes roll over I do believe. You can get rates as low as 6c per minute with no daily access fee. The access fee is only 50c per month.

Also, they can activate pretty much any verizon phone, and some CDMA phones from other carriers too. They can also do unlocked phones.

You get 100 free minutes when you activate to boot 😛

Other good choices are cricket and metroPCS. Boost will be having an unlimited everything for 50$ per month pretty soon, but it is on sprint.

http://www.pagepluscellular.com/
Click to expand...

What network does it use? It be great if i could just use my vx8300. I just want to make sure i can get service when i need it.
 
Originally posted by: ncage
Originally posted by: Kaervak
I recently went with a Tracfone setup. I got a double minutes for life phone so whatever amount of airtime I buy gets doubled. The neat thing about Tracfone is the bonus codes they have get you additional minutes when adding airtime. Usually an additional 60, sometimes more. Whenever you purchase airtime, you get 90 more days of service, so you do have to top up every three months if you don't buy a one year card. So far no complaints, in my area my GSM Tracfone uses either T-Mobile's or AT&T's network. If you're heavy into text messaging, Tracfone isn't the best since each send/received of a text costs you .30 minutes. Some of their phones are really basic too. There are a couple with bluetooth and a camera, but for the most part they're pretty basic. However, if all you're after is a cheap phone & service, they'll do.
Click to expand...

So the phones can use either AT&Ts towers or Tmobile towers? If so i might have to check it out. No i actually am one of the text message haters. If i can shut text messaging off i will.
Click to expand...

It depends on your area mostly. You may be in a CDMA only zone or you may have all three available. Easiest way to find out is by going to tracfone.com and seeing what code is shown in your address bar.

GSM4 =AT&T, GSM5 =T-Mobile, GSM5AT =T-Mobile & AT&T
CO =CDMA, COGSM4 =CDMA & AT&T, COGSM5 =CDMA & T-Mobile

There are a couple detailed threads over at fatwallet.com that really go in depth on codes, phones and other stuff about tracfone.
 
I use T-Mobile's pay as you go and I get pretty decent service in the Denver metro area. One nice thing about T-Mobile is that after you spend $100 on minutes, you become a gold rewards member (minutes don't expire for one year and you get bonus minutes when you purchase more). You can buy a phone from the T-Mobile website that isn't to expensive if you just need something entry level.
 
I use t-mobile pay as you go. 1000 minutes for $100. they don't expire for 1 year. So 10cents a minute and you get a year to use them all. Texts cost like 10cents to send and 5 to receive. or something like that
 
Originally posted by: Kaervak
I recently went with a Tracfone setup. I got a double minutes for life phone so whatever amount of airtime I buy gets doubled. The neat thing about Tracfone is the bonus codes they have get you additional minutes when adding airtime. Usually an additional 60, sometimes more. Whenever you purchase airtime, you get 90 more days of service, so you do have to top up every three months if you don't buy a one year card. So far no complaints, in my area my GSM Tracfone uses either T-Mobile's or AT&T's network. If you're heavy into text messaging, Tracfone isn't the best since each send/received of a text costs you .30 minutes. Some of their phones are really basic too. There are a couple with bluetooth and a camera, but for the most part they're pretty basic. However, if all you're after is a cheap phone & service, they'll do.
Click to expand...

I've been using a Tracfone for about 18 months now (double minutes and use the bonus codes when I have them). Its all I need, and sometimes I don't even use the minutes up before the 90 days of service ends.

Don't call customer service for Tracfone. Its very bad.
 
thanks for the help. Tracfone intiallly seemed a little bit more expensive until you look at the deals. Those bonus codes you mentioned....do they work when you have lifetime double minutes so you would get double minutes + Bonus Minutes? This could make things very cheap 🙂. I checked there site and it looks like there coverage is great.
 
Originally posted by: ncage
thanks for the help. Tracfone intiallly seemed a little bit more expensive until you look at the deals. Those bonus codes you mentioned....do they work when you have lifetime double minutes so you would get double minutes + Bonus Minutes? This could make things very cheap 🙂. I checked there site and it looks like there coverage is great.
Click to expand...

The double minutes doesn't apply to the bonus minutes unfortunately. With my phone, a 60 minute card would be doubled to 120, then the 60 bonus minutes gets added. still not a bad deal, roughly $7.00 a month for 60 minutes each month. Plus my phone was only $12 after tax and shipping from walmart.com

http://www.walmart.com/catalog...do?product_id=10714717
 
Originally posted by: ncage
Originally posted by: nonameo
Page plus if you can. Cards last 4 months and minutes roll over I do believe. You can get rates as low as 6c per minute with no daily access fee. The access fee is only 50c per month.

Also, they can activate pretty much any verizon phone, and some CDMA phones from other carriers too. They can also do unlocked phones.

You get 100 free minutes when you activate to boot 😛

Other good choices are cricket and metroPCS. Boost will be having an unlimited everything for 50$ per month pretty soon, but it is on sprint.

http://www.pagepluscellular.com/
Click to expand...

What network does it use? It be great if i could just use my vx8300. I just want to make sure i can get service when i need it.
Click to expand...

It uses the verizon network. I had mine activated by vzw_rules on howardforums, but ugly eric is well known and trusted on ebay. Also, cellular_360 had some deals for howardforums pageplus users that got the cost down to around 5c/min
 
Originally posted by: ncage
Hey guys i've just recently been evaluating my bills and trying to cut them as much as possible. I'm currently with verizons 450min play which ends up being $37ish because of my state discount. Anyways the problem being that i rarely ever use more than 100 minutes. I originally got the cell phone because my job started logging every call you made. Its not like i was doing anything wrong but i didn't think it was anyones business who i was calling.

Anyways, i have been evaluating Pay As you go Service. I decided probably not to go with verizon because they are expensive. My two top pics were

TMobile
Pros: cheapest if you don't use that many minutes
You can buy minutes that don't expire after 30 days

Cons: Service seems to be kind of shotty around my area. I mean its not that bad just not anywhere near as good as verizon
Pricey phones (most phones i looked at were near or over $100)

Virgin Mobile:
Pros: Cheap Phones
Left over minutes rollover to next month as long as you buy more before your card expires
Uses sprint network which while not nearly as good as verizon is descent.

Cons: You must buy minimum of 200 minutes a month and they expire after 30 days unless you want to get on there $6.99 + .10C minute plan.

Has anyone went this route? Did you regret it? I'm not too worried about going over my minutes. I'm look at both the LG Flare & Kyocera Cyclops. I Really dont' care about a lot of the extra features phones come with (Cameara, ect). The only thing i don't like about the Kyocera is that there is no analog roam. I don't think i would hit this very often but it would be nice to have the ability just in case you were in the middle of knowhere.



Anyone who has
Click to expand...
I don't know where you're looking.


 
I'm with virgin mobile and have the lg flare.

Love the cheap service -- i'm on the minute2minute deal which is $20 per 3 months pre-paid. I do the annual payment of $90/year pre-paid -- but I stock up on pre-paid cards that are frequently on sale at Target so it's actually less.

I've looked into tracfone and they are very similar in price. Walmart had a phone with a bundled "double minutes for the life of the phone" just before christmas which might still be around.

I basically like the flare -- which i got to replace an old kyocera K9 who's battery was starting to wear out. The flare on sale at target was cheaper than a new battery, so i got it instead.
The only negative to the phone is that reception is relatively weak. In a metal gymnasium, i get no reception -- but other people use their phones with no problem. In normal environments, the reception is fine.

If I were in your situation, I'd be comparing tracfone with a bundled "double minutes" vs. virgin mobile.

Not sure if texting is important to you, but vm is increasing their basic rate for texts from $0.05 to $0.15 send and receive. They sell monthly bundles for much less per text, but it was kind of nice to have a reasonable $.05/txt without bothering with buying a "pack" of text messages. The increase will happen in mid february -- and i haven't calculated if that's a deal breaker for me (versus switching to tracfone) -- but just an fyi.

edit: vm offers other plans than the 200min /month thing. I don't know if i've been grandfathered in to the 3month or yearly deal -- but i sure don't use 200min /month and i don't lose any minutes.
 
I use Simple Freedom, which has been acquired by Alltel, no complaints but I am thinking about switching to Tracfone in the near future they seem to offer the most bang for the buck....I hate using the phone to just gab....emergency's, if someone needs to get ahold of me from work or to call the wife if she needs me to pick anything up from the store. I would like to find one without texting ability.....I hate that feature....hate getting a text, and refuse to send them....you wanna talk to me?..call me.

Doesn't say much about our society when we are getting too damn lazy to pick up a phone and call someone.
 
AT&T had the Go Phone plan. You add dollars to your phone online or with pre-purchased cards to use as minutes. I checked into it once and it works out to about $8 a month.
 
I am simply not in the country, i switched to prepaid with tmo right before I left from my monthly plan. I get to keep my phone number. I am coming back for a visit next week, so time to buy some minutes.
 
I wish I could get a pay-as-you-go cell plan with a reasonable data connection. Right now, I pay ~$80/month with AT&T for 450 minutes a month plus unlimited data. I only use about 50 minutes each month, but I use my data connection all the time. Of course, to even get a data connection with most carriers, one must have a cell plan, too. Total crap.
 
I use the Tmobile 1000 min pay as you go. Works out to a little over $8 a month. Was paying Verizon $42 so it was an easy decision when my contract expired.
 
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