Cheap, low-usage cell phone plan needed for HPPNW

[JerryCarr]

Thanks to everyone for their suggestions. I knew I could count on Punawebbers for some good ideas, and some of the deals y'all came up with did not show up in my web searches. I have made a little spreadsheet comparing the plans, and will present that to the committee.

Cheers,
Jerry

[ef9]

Have you looked at the ATT Wireless Go Phone plans?

I believe there is no expiration at all. Easy to load up. Phone is very cheap from WalMart.

And you can use the $$ on the plan in anyway you choose, such as texting and/or minutes used. There are 2 different plans that you can sign up with.

First plan is cheaper minutes usage but each day the phone is used, you get charged a daily fee.

Second plan has a bit more expensive minutes usage, but there is no day usage fee.

Stan

[StillHope]

Any prepaid phone is going to turn out more expensive than having a regular plan.

Verizon offers a long term customers $ 20 a month -100 min + 250 (?) after hours and weekends.

But you have to ask for this plan .

[G. Leis]

Well, yes and no. For heavy talkers a post-paid contract plan is usually the best option. OTOH, if you use in the neighborhood of 150-175 minutes per month or less, prepaid might be a better choice.

Here are a couple of websites that might be helpful in your research: For general info regarding any and all things wireless Howardforums is regarded as the definitive source. Many of the posters there are CSRs or engineers with AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, Sprint and various overseas providers as well as most of the major handset manufacturers.

Additionally, Dave Markson (AKA "Cellguru") has created an excellent comparison chart of most major prepaid companies.

It seems to be a little known fact that the big telcos wholesale some of their bandwidth to third-party providers. These so-called MVNOs (mobile virtual network operators) can often come up with prepaid rates and plans superior to those offered by the companies that own the physical net. PagePlus for example, uses Verizon's network and provides voice service for as little as $0.06/minute. You don't have to buy a phone from them either; any old Verizon CDMA phone you might have laying around they will activate.

In the past, prepaid was targeted toward younger customers or people with suspect credit. No longer. Mella and I have FICO scores in the area of 800 and are firm believers in these plans - and we're not alone. Prepaid is the fastest growing segment of the wireless market, and that growth is coming from people dumping their contract plans when they expire. Personally, we have no use for 2 year commitments just to get a free handset.

Net10 and Tracfone (both owned by América Mvil and essentially providing the same service) will probably give you the best overall coverage because in Hawaii, they have agreements with both AT&T and T-Mobile and wherever you go you stand a pretty good chance of being within range of a tower belonging to one or the other. The only drawback - if you want to call it that - to these two outfits is that you must use their phones. With other GSM providers you can simply use any unlocked phone and swap SIM cards, i.e. use a T-Mobile card in a Cingular phone.

aloha,
Gene



_________________________

Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati

[csgray]

Net-10 is the cheapest system available for low use users. I won't go into the details but basically $15 a month gets you 300 minutes, of which any unused minutes accumulate so if there is a really big crisis in HPP and all your people start burning minutes you have them available. The phones and cards are available at Walmart, OfficeMax or online. My husband is frugal beyond belief, researches the hell out of stuff, and he picked this plan for our rarely used cell. Net10.com is the site. We are in escrow for a house in HPP so our interest isn't purely academic.

Carol

[StillHope]

quote:

---

Originally posted by G. Leis


Well, yes and no. For heavy talkers a post-paid contract plan is usually the best option. OTOH, if you use in the neighborhood of 150-175 minutes per month or less, prepaid might be a better choice.

---

150 min. means 5 min.a day only.
I use the cell phone minutes only if it is really necessary.
5 min. is definitely not enough ... unless it's : "Thames,sir!":

There is an old joke about the butler trying to explain to the impatient
earl that the flood from Thames is getting close to the mansion.

Every time he started,he was rudely interrupted by "Could you make it shorter,please?!"

The butler tried,but meanwhile the water was getting closer.

Finally,the butler oped the door and announced
the shortest version possible :

"Thames,sir!"

[Kelena]

Jerry,

Thank you for working on this on behalf of HPP. We appreciate it.
Not too far off topic, I hope, I have been watching crime in New Orleans lately. They have a disorganized, poorly paid police force and a lot of violent crime. Recently, there was a horrible, broad daylight murder of a popular French Quarter bartender. People are starting to organize. One idea they came up with are "cell phone alerts" of criminal activity. They use a technology called "Tatango". Citizens can sign up to be notified by text message of criminal activity. Here is the link: http://www.nolacrimealerts.com/

[JerryCarr]

Glen, thank YOU for the support and for sending your guests to attend HPPNW meetings. We already have two neighborhood crime alert "phone trees" and email notification networks. HPP is so big that it didn't make sense to do a subdivision-wide system. (In other words, it didn't make sense to alarm someone at Shower and 29th about a burglary situation at Makuu and Beach.) One of the pilot neighborhood systems is my own area, and we have tested it once and used it once to alert regarding theft from a construction site. The other is down near Paradise and 3rd.

There IS an HPP-wide system for Civil Defense type emergency alert notification called ENET. We in Neighborhood Watch are in the process of joining with Civil Defense and ENET as a traffic control auxiliary in the event of an evacuation. We will have a communications test on January 27, and I believe some units of ENET will actually mobilize.

We are trying to re-energize the HPPNW and will begin more regular and comprehensive car patrols soon, as well as some other initiatives. I may start a thread on the subject to keep things updated here on Punaweb.

Back on topic, we are probably going to go with TracFone as our option for cell usage. We got several recommendations, and since they use more than one carrier, coverage would seem to be good. (For HPP, anyway.)

Many thanks and cheers to all who have helped,
Jerry

[kani-lehua]

<<bump>>

jerry,

sorry for bringing up this old thread.

did you, "go with TracFone as our option for cell usage. We got several recommendations, and since they use more than one carrier, coverage would seem to be good. (For HPP, anyway.)"? if so, how is/was it? if not, what other carrier/phone did you opt for?



"a great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices."

w. james

[JerryCarr]

No worries, Kani! TracFone has proven to be adequate, and they have a number of plans for buying minutes, so it's easy to avoid expiration. Not having used TracFone in every corner of HPP, I can't honestly say that it works everywhere here, but it has worked where I've tried it. YMMV. I use is as my personal service now, having dumped Verizon.

Edited to add: FWIW, I have used my personal TracFone on the mainland in rural areas of Texas and Oklahoma, and it gets better coverage than I used to get with Verizon there.