Prepay cell phones...advise on how they work

[RolliePollie]

I have an AT&T prepaid phone (from WalMart) and it's working out great for me. I got one of the cheaper phones and as I recall it was like $29. I add $25 every 90 days and any unused minutes carry over. I have never run out of minutes, but I hardly ever use my phone.

For long distance at home, I bought a prepaid long distance card at CostCo. For $20 you get 700 minutes, so about 2.9 cents/minute. You call in using an 800 number, so you don't have to pay the all the access fees and taxes my phone company charges for long distance. And you can set up several numbers for PIN-less dialing so you don't have to dial a million numbers to make a call.

I'm all about saving money wherever possible (hence dial-up internet as well), so I love cheap phone options!

[StressFree]

I would definitely check out Cricket, I believe they have blackberrys and their plans are really cheap and it works well as long as there is coverage in your area.

[eofelis]

I'm all about saving money wherever possible (hence dial-up internet as well), so I love cheap phone options!

I have a very cheap Tracfone that gets minimal use. My phone is a $10 older model, a Motorola V170. It's extremely basic, and not highly regarded in the TF community, but I like it. It is one of the few TFs with free incoming texts. I like it so much that I just got 4 more of them as backups from guy on a TF forum for $10 total. (Some people activate multiple phones and then harvest minutes from them.)

Every three months I get a $20 phone card (3 months/60 minutes) and add it. I look online for bonus codes to get free minutes when I add a card. Last time I got a code for 60 free minutes. So I pay ~$6/mo for this phone. I tell most people to text me instead of call me since my incoming texts are free.

FWIW, I also found out that if someone sends me a text while my phone is turned off or out of a service zone (I live in a mountainous area), when I have service again eventually the text will come on through. If someone simply calls it won't do that, I just miss the call and get no notification. Texts will also go through if there is only a couple bars of service, not enough bars for a phone call.

I'd love love love to have high speed internet, but my dial-up is FREE! I just can't stomach a $40 bill each month right now. My dial-up is free from the college I just graduated from. The college IT dept will probably purge me from their system eventually, but until then I will keep dialing in.

[indigoiis]

I am also a tracfone user, as is my DH. Last year I bought the Year + Double minutes card, so every time I re-up it doubles whatever I purchase. I like that!

[Red Rock]

Hello All:

Just letting you all know that my DH and I went in to the phone company and looked at our situation. My DH let me have his upgrade so I downgraded to the BB Curve I. I am still figuring things out on it. I have a Storm I that I did not like for many reasons as most. One of the lines cannot be cancelled until later this year. So unforunately we are stuck with that. I think when this line is cancelled, I will go with one of these prepay phones for bike rides etc.

We looked at what the older man is paying and he is paying what he should. I got rid of one "service" to. So that will help cut things back.

Thank you for all of your assorted comments and experiences with these phones.

Red Rock