Prepaid Phone Providers

[MindoverMaster]

I think this in the right place.

I do not use my phone like you may, just for emergency and family contact. A little out of the family sometimes, but that is not often.

ATM, I use Virgin Mobile. We have to buy a $20 minimum "top-up" card. That is paid every 30 days. Also, it costs .15 per text, .25 per call/minute. So, for a emergency phone, it is fine.

The problem I am having is, I am getting all these charges on the **** who knows what. I then learned that these charges were for internet access. Ok, I use it one day to check the weather. AFAIK, that is with their service, nothing extra. For the last ~2 months, I have been charged .10 a day. I had at least $30 on there. I'm down to $2 now. I'll ask them next to refer my money. If this does not happen, they can close my account. I don't care.

So, to move on to another provider...

I've seen excellent prices on ATT's new GoPhone plans. The Simple Rate Plan, 10 cents per minute calls, and you can buy texting deals if needed. $25 starts 90-day cards.

Net10? Tracfone? I heard those were pos.

Anyone have any other knowledge?

 

[MindoverMaster]

Bump

I forgot about this thread. I had my Virgin problem resolved, but they are still giving me crap.

 

[KSoD]

Sorry i missed this topic. Well for basic use you could go with Net10. They have a flat rate of 10 cents a minute for calls and 15 cents for mobile web. Now depending on what your looking to pay Walmart has a service called Straight Talk. Now with this you have a couple of options. The $30 a month card allows for 1000 minutes, texts and 30Mb of Data usage. For $45 you can get unlimited talk, text and web. The only issue is with this service you pay more up front for the phone compared to the service.

Overall Straight Talk is not a bad deal. As you pay a flat rate. You then get the said amount of time for that rate. With services like AT&T GoPhones you have a couple of options. The first one is you can subscribe to a pay per use or pay per day charge. So either you get nailed with a daily charge of up to $3 and then a flat rate of 10 cents a call, 15 cents a text and no mobile web. Or you can go with the pay per use where you will only be charged on the days you use the phone but that is a rate of $3. Then you get nailed for each call you and text you make.

I would honestly advise against service like AT&T and Verizon for no contract phones for this reason. They nail you silly with the service charges. Considering that they go for a month you would be better off going with Straight Talk and pay just a flat rate. While it is a bit more, at least you also get more. With AT&T and Verizon pay per use phones you only get so many minutes for the $ amount you spend depending on which way you want the service to go.

I usually suggest either Straight Talk or Tracfones to people. With Tracfones you get the cards. They can be 60, 120, 200 or more depending on how much you want to spend. With them you have 90 days of service as well as the amount of time. But you lose 2 minutes for every text and mobile web access you do. So 60 minutes can run out really quick and that is the cheapest card at $20.

I can provide more details if you wish. Just let me know which service your considering. I do know about Tracfone, AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, Straight Talk, and Boost as they are sold in my store and i answer questions on them daily. But really the best bang for your buck will be Straight Talk.

 

[MindoverMaster]

Staight Talk has on a $30 plan for 30 days? I could get Cricket for that price.

I was looking at T-Mobile's prepaid. 5¢ to receive, 10¢ to send. A $10 card, I can buy, and see if I need more money before the 90 days is up. I currently pay $20 in 90 days. I barely use up 1/4 of my money. Looks like they have better phones, than Virgin. Free nationwide calling too. I live in Southeast Wisconsin, so I'm covered.

 

[KSoD]

Cricket has junk coverage. You would be lucky if you had coverage where you were when you needed it. at least with Straight Talk it uses T-Mobiles towers so you have much more coverage. T-Mobile does have some decent plans. They also have a new Family Plan thru Walmart as well.

 

[MindoverMaster]

I might go with T-Mobile if Virgin bites me one more time.

Are unclocked phones any cheaper than the ones T-Moble provides for prepaid? Maybe not the latest Android, but something cheaper around the $100 range?

 

[KSoD]

Well you cant get an unlocked phone from a store like Walmart. So you will end up spending more money if you want to go that route. As you would have to purchase one of the phones sold there to get the SIM card that is used with the pre-paid service and then after that purchase an unlocked phone and transfer the SIM to that phone.

 

[MindoverMaster]

Ah, OK, I wasn't aware what was involved.

 

[KSoD]

Well there might be an option if you would go directly to T-Mobile and get a SIM card directly from them. But since those people work on commission in those stores they will advise you against this, tell you it cant be done and so many other things to try and talk you into signing a contract. The honest fact is they can provide you with a Pre-Paid SIM card that you can use with this service. If you get a honest salesman that isnt worried about his commission is another thing.

So there is the option of getting an unlocked phone to work. It just has to many factors.

 

[MindoverMaster]

Hey Mak. What do you think of Boost Mobile? Think Boost is on the Sprint Network, correct? I see they have a Ultimate $2/day used. I think that will better suit me. It would take me 30 days to use the full $50 unlimited plan. I'm sure I won't use even that. But if Im away from home and need to contact somebody or use the net, I can do that all day for $2.

Looks like they have awesome phones for relatively cheap. Nothing like a Blackberry, but fairer than most prepaid phones. Mine takes like 20-30 seconds to load a single page of text.