Pay as you go cell phones

[Garet Jax]

Do all providers have them or just a select few?
Any special tricks or pitfalls I need to protect against?
Anything you think I should know?

 

[PottedMeat]

How many minutes are you looking for?

My mom has a Virgin Mobile phone (uses Sprint network ), cost her $20 and came with $20 credit. She doesnt use it very much. To keep the account alive you have to add $20 every 3 months. Its not a bad deal - $80 a year.

 

[kami333]

I would consider getting the T-Mobile To Go deal that Target has right now. Nokia phone + 1000min for $88 ($100card = 1000min), minutes are good for a year.

 

[Garet Jax]

Originally posted by: PottedMeat
How many minutes are you looking for?

My mom has a Virgin Mobile phone (uses Sprint network ), cost her $20 and came with $20 credit. She doesnt use it very much. To keep the account alive you have to add $20 every 3 months. Its not a bad deal - $80 a year.

Hard to say. We are selling our house and the RE agent wants to be able to get access to her very quickly for arrangements for showing the house.

 

[Garet Jax]

Originally posted by: kami333
I would consider getting the T-Mobile To Go deal that Target has right now. Nokia phone + 1000min for $88 ($100card = 1000min), minutes are good for a year.

This is an interesting deal. No other strings?

 

[Electric Amish]

I too would be interested in this information.

 

[kami333]

Originally posted by: Garet Jax

Originally posted by: kami333
I would consider getting the T-Mobile To Go deal that Target has right now. Nokia phone + 1000min for $88 ($100card = 1000min), minutes are good for a year.

This is an interesting deal. No other strings?

Nope. I think T-Mobile has the best deal if you get the $100 card, and plus you can extend your minutes for another year after that by buying another card (can be a $10 card). STi and some of the others charge a per-day fee or require a call every so many days to keep the line active.

 

[abaez]

I've used the t-mobile to go for about two years now and what people have said is correct. Everytime you buy some time it gets extended for another year. I've always bought in chunks of $100 (~1100 minutes). Bonus if you have a gsm phone is that you can use it overseas in a pinch (although its like 3x the cost).

 

[LookingGlass]

Originally posted by: abaez
I've used the t-mobile to go for about two years now and what people have said is correct. Everytime you buy some time it gets extended for another year. I've always bought in chunks of $100 (~1100 minutes). Bonus if you have a gsm phone is that you can use it overseas in a pinch (although its like 3x the cost).

Pretty much the same for me, I used TMobile to go for a year and a half. I didn't use it much, when I did need it, it sure was nice to have. It is more expensive, but, if you don't use the phone much, the cost out weighs a monthly plan in the long run. For a while I was hardly putting any money towards it.

Add minutes when you need to, very easy with TMobile. Dial (star)*233 from the phone, and go. If you don't need it much, it's the way to go. The minutes do last a year, from the date of purchase.

I have just switched plans recently to TMobiles my fav's. I'll see how that goes. Good luck.

 

[eplebnista]

Another vote for T-Mobile.

 

[Yreka]

Good question, we were thinking about getting one as well.

One other question I had, can you do SMS with these ? If so, how does the billing work ? I find we communicate by text more than actually use the phone part.

 

[ttown]

Originally posted by: PottedMeat
How many minutes are you looking for?

My mom has a Virgin Mobile phone (uses Sprint network ), cost her $20 and came with $20 credit. She doesnt use it very much. To keep the account alive you have to add $20 every 3 months. Its not a bad deal - $80 a year.

I've been using Virgin Mobile for several years and am very happy with it. To save a little more, Target often sells the $20 cards for 2-for-$30 -- making it $60/year for a light-use phone.

Things to watch out for: 'minutes' or $$ that expire.
Virgin Mobile rolls them over from one month to the next, and I'm pretty sure most others do, too, nowadays.
But I remember when I was first shopping around, some didn't.

 

[thirtythree]

Originally posted by: Yreka
Good question, we were thinking about getting one as well.

One other question I had, can you do SMS with these ? If so, how does the billing work ? I find we communicate by text more than actually use the phone part.

My friend uses tracfone, which I guess is on the tmobile network, and we text each other all the time (actually, I use my e-mail). Text messages cost a fraction of the cost of a minute -- it may be as low as a quarter of a minute, but I'm not sure.

 

[luckysnafu]

I have the Alltel prepaid plan that is 15 cents a minute. The only string attached is that you have to make at least one phone call (one minute) each month or they charge you like a $4 maintenance fee or something like that. You can pretty much buy any phone you like and add minutes over the phone or online. Works for me since I don't use my phone much and I don't think the minutes run out. Just make sure you make one call and month and you are good to go.

 

[SuperNaruto]

I use both tmobile and virgin..

Tmobile - great if you hit gold... i bought my parents 2 tmobile line.. each year they use like 10 bucks out of 100.. and I just add another 10 dollar refill at end of year to extend it..

Virgin - Only use to port number in and out.. they're fast.. ie i want to keep my number on verizon, dont want to "renew" since new contract prices are sometimes better than renewal.. so end of 2 year, i port out, sign up for new line and port the number back in...