Pay As You Go Phones

[DVC2004]

So, I am looking for ways to cut costs a little. One big expense is our cell phones. We have 2 just my husband and I and a tradtional contract from AT&T. He gets a discount through his work but our plan is not that great- 500 anytime minutes shared between us which we never use all of. They roll over and we never use any of those either. We really call eachother for a few minutes or make very short calls. No one calling internationally or talking for long periods. Very little texting and occasional email access. We are charged sep. for these things. Our bill is $100 per month with all this.

I looked at a few (Boost, Criket) but it looked like it still would be the same. Any suggestions?
We do need the phones so cancelling altogether is out of the questions.

[Dznygrl79]

I would avoid Cricket they may be going under, the company has shut down a lot of its retail locations in the past few months. Virgin Mobile and Straight Talk have very reasonable pre pay plans. The only other thing to think of is if you want a smart phone most pre pays do not have a plan for that. Good Luck!

[Ms. Mode]

We also have the AT&T basic plan, 550 minutes per month that we share between three telephones. (one is our 20 year old daughter)

I used to have a Go phone, but the minutes would expire before I could use them and at that time they didn't roll over. It actually saved us when we started the 550 plan....still....it's a lot of money for telephones. :)

[DizneyRox]

Many folks are cancelling their land line phones and switching over to cell exclusively.

We are on AT&T with a 750 minute family plan, two iPhones at $30 each for data, I think we're at about $139 a month. If my math is right, it's like $69 for the 750 minute plan, $10 for the extra line, then $30 each for data. We may be able to drop our land line and go cell only if we needed. We would probably need to bump up the minutes however.

Texting and data when not covered under a "plan" can get very expensive. I think texts are like .10 each under AT&T which will add up quickly. Costs .10 to send it, and then $.10 to receive it (or .20 if you're texting each other).

The lowest iPhone data plan is now $15 which could save us considerably, if the data would cover what I need (it doesn't). We're staying grandfathered under the unlimited plan as long as possible, then I'll jump ship to another carrier if necessary.

You may want to look at Google Voice if you're dropping your land line. If you need to change your number, might as well change it to something that is useful. Google Voice is fantastic if you use it to the best of it's abilities. Beside s rining multiple phones at once and transferring between them, you can drop people directly to voice mail, different greetings for different contacts, have callers announce themselves, etc.

[DVC2004]

Many folks are cancelling their land line phones and switching over to cell exclusively.

That's an idea. We almost never use our home phone and almost no one calls us on it. I think we pay $45 per month for it ,though since it's bundled with our internet and sat. it's hard to separate the charges for all these package things. I will look into that. I heard though, and maybe this has changed, that there used to be some issues if calling 911. What is the deal with that? Not that we call but you never know...

[DizneyRox]

The 911 calls are worth checking out, however I'm not sure it's a HUGE issue. In an emergency, yes, every second counts, but in reality, I'm not sure that I would put much weight behind it.

Maybe it's a gamble, and potentially it's a gamble with a life, however I have enough confidence in my local law enforcement that they will straighten it out and get the right people moving quickly.

Bundles are a pain, the savings may quickly be eroded by lack of discount, and this is by design.

In all honesty, my first experiement with getting rid of my land line failed miserably. This was over 10 years ago and cell phones have come a long way. The problem was we didn't accurately gauge our minute needs and ended up going over a lot. It worked great overall, but the savings wasn't there. At the time I think 750 minutes on a cell phone was unheard of! Now it's one of the low plans.

Finally, I think AT&T has started allowing wireless into the bundle discounts, so if you have AT&T for Internet and wireless, you may still be entitled to the bundling discount.

[buzznwoodysmom]

We ditched our landline years ago and never looked back. Actually it must be something many, many people around my area do because I know very few people who still have their landlines. While I don't think it really saved us all that much money, it was just something we rarely used so we got rid of it.

[DizneyRox]

I'm going to seriously look into going data only at home, no cable TV, phone, etc.

I thik it's in it's infancy (well, not really, but adoption isn't as good as save cable or even satellite), however products like Hulu and the like are becoming quite attractive.

I'e got a HTPC right now, so adding Hulu or streaming netflix is trivial. Between that ad OTA broadcats, is there a need for that huge cable bill anymore?

So, Hulu is what $10 a month now, plus Netflix at $10, surely less than the $40-50 maybe even more if you're not on a promotional rate for TV.

Hardware is the tough part, and I don't know if it's there yet, although many consoles (Wii, XBox, PS3) are capable of streaming these services already, and many Ts are doing it natively as well.

If you're serious about it and have the know how, it's worth a looksee. All you really need is a nice fat pipe coming into the house from the Interwebs.

[TikiGoddess]

We have T-Mobile "to-go" cell phones -- prepaid. My husband and I rarely use our cell phones, so this works great for us. We buy minutes that last a year, and if you haven't used them in a year you just have to add minutes to the phone so the old ones don't disappear.

We spend about $150 per YEAR on our phones.

Kathy

[momef3grls]

I am a supervisor at a 911 center so I am pretty informed on the subject. The biggest thing to worry about is if your local center is phase 2 or nextgen compliant. What that means is they can find your location from the GPS chip in your phone. Phase 1 only takes you to the cell tower site which is ok but only gives us a general area. Phase 2 will drop it within 60yds. That is a much better statistic to find your location. Most of the time it actually drops on the house. Nextgen is up and coming and will be even more accurate. Right now it is beta testing in a few places around the country. Nothing beats a landline phone in an emergency. We get all the information right on our screen before you say a word. We still confirm everything to be sure it is correct but it saves valuable time. Even if you don't have service to your house you can still dial 911 from the landline but we don't always get the info. And just a side note....Please do not give old phones to children to play with. Even if there is no service to them they can still dial 911. Most communities have a recycling program that give them to senior citizens or abused women to use in emergencies. If you have to give it to a child, take the battery off the back then it can't dial. Just my :twocents: