There is one more option to winning the cellphone game that does not get discussed in length and that is to go to a prepaid phone. There are many many people out there that have cell phone plans that almost never use their phone or use it very little during a month. These people are stuck paying $30 per month for a phone that only brings them the security and a little convenience when they are out and about. Prepaid phones are perfect for this person. The other type of user would be teenagers and younger. A teenager can do some real damage to your cell phone bill. This is a great way to rein them in with only a preset number of minutes and text messages.
As far as providers go the one prepaid company that gets higher reviews than any other is Net 10 Wireless. In fact if you go to different message boards people love Net 10. The plan is simple. Each minute costs 10 cents per minute and each text message is 5 cents. As far as pricing goes that is it. The only catch is you have to refresh your minutes every so often. This time period depends on how large of a group of minute you purchase. The amount of time breaks down like this:
300 Minute Card is $30 and lasts for 60 Days or $15 per month
600 Minute Card is $60 and Lasts 90 Days or $20 per month
1000 Minute Card is $100 and lasts 180 Days or $16.67 per month
1500 Minute Card is $150 and lasts 365 Days or $12.50 per month
As you can see the best deals are the 300 and 1500 minute additions. By purchasing additional minutes before the expiration date you keep your phone “fresh” and keep the minutes you have left over. In other words you don’t loose minutes unless you let your phone expire. How do you know when it is going to expire? The phone tells you on the screen. The phone will also tell you how many minutes you have left so that you can add more minutes if you are close to running out. The other question people ask is how hard is it to get minutes. Well, you can purchase minutes directly online, you can purchase them in different retail locations, the most notable being Wal-Mart, or you can enroll in the “Buy Now” service with a credit card and you can purchase minutes directly from your phone.
I have reviewed the other prepaid offers and in my opinion none are as affordable or easy to understand as Net10. So if you are a person that falls into the categories I stated above I would definitely check out Net10’s latest phone specials and just stay away from The Cell Phone Game.
An even better deal is Virgin Mobile prepaid. You set up automatic recharge from a credit card of $15 every 90 days. This works out to $5 per month. Minutes cost $0.18. This is the best deal for someone that uses only a few minutes per month. Unused balance carries forward and does not expire.
Virgin can be a good deal but now we are getting down to how many minutes you use. As long as you do not use 70 minutes or more you can do better with Virgin. However, Virgin is moving farther and farther away from the value shopper. Their goal is to pursue younger people who want all the features and their parents want all the control. I base all my calculations on 100 minutes per month. In my experience this is the number that low end users, who do more than leave the phone in the glove compartment, will gravitate toward over time.