My brother, who is clueless, needs a cell phone. He doesn’t want a committment, so he’s considering a Pre-paid Cell Phone. He is so clueless, he comes to me for advice. I don’t own a cell phone. He would probably like to buy it at Wal-Mart and he does not own a credit card. He wants a no-frills phone. (This is the brother who asked me if I could turn the CD’s I made for him into Casette Tapes because the new used car he just bought still has a casette player.)
I am going to have to research this for him and tell him what he wants. I don’t particularly want to do the research on-line either and will probably walk into a Wal-Mart and talk to the sales staff. I can imagine my brother will want a phone that will last for at least 6 months until he gets the hang of this cell phone thing and so he doesn’t have to deal with this again in the near future. No frills. Doesn’t need them. Wouldn’t figure out how to use them.
Until it was crucial that we (read: Mr Izz) have an iPhone, we used TracFone without any problems whatsoever. You “charge” your card every 3 months or so…or more, if you want to pay a bit more…and it’s about as no frills as you can get. You can do all of it at Wally World, and for a fraction of the cost of mobile plans from AT&T and Verizon. I liked my TracFone, honestly.
I only ever had one cell phone for work, and I never needed it, so I never figured it out. The buttons were really small, and most of them seemed to have no discernable function.
I got my cell phone from Walmart. It’s Alltel and the phone is an LG- I think it cost maybe 30 bucks…(I got it last summer and don’t really remember)- He can buy minutes on a “card” and add them as needed. I like it because I don’t have to buy a minimum of minutes(online anyway) I just add $10 when they are about to expire- to keep the ones I have. I think it’s up to almost an hour now. I rarely use the thing mostly because we have few spots we can pick up any signal. I got it when we went on vacation and it is handy when traveling. I’d think that would do fine for him.
My wife and I had Virgin Mobile phones for a couple of years (until our usage increased to where a plan was better). You can buy a card in stores to top up. We like Virgin mobile - simply phone, reliable network (they use sprint), and they send you a text message if you need to top up. I believe it’s $20 required every 3 months…the airtime carries over, so if you don’t use it much it will build up (that may be a flaw, but it was handy for us).
TracFone. Been using them for about two years now and it’s been pretty problem free.
We opted for the double minutes account, and it has certainly saved us in the long run. No frills, but no bills, either. You pay for the minutes you want, and little hassle. Not at all what I can say for Cellular One, whom we did have a contract with. Much hassle, much cost, no give, all take. I would not go with them again unless there were no way to avoid it. I would not want to be without a cel phone any more, and certainly don’t want my kids to be without one. TracFone does the job, and for relatively cheap.
As little as $10 for a phone, and the same for a low volume minute card. Can’t get started, or stay connected, that cheaply anywhere else.
My blind friend decided he needed a cell phone and had heard Paul Harvey advertise the Trac Phone, so he choose that one. The first phone had decently sized keys so he could use it. Then the company decided he needed a new phone (I think there’s some government rule that if you dial 911 from a cell phone it has to be able to know where you are). This replacement phone has smaller keys and is harder for him to operate. They do show the amount of air time left and your expiration date on the screen, but this is useless for him when he doesn’t have a sighted person with him.
I have Verizon with just a regular monthly contract, and now that I found that I could record a portion of a song and set THAT as my ring tone I’m happier - I don’t like the ringtones that were provided with the phone and I’m too cheap to buy ringtones. We got a Verizon pay as you go phone for my daughter, and she likes it, except when she runs low on minutes and we say it’s up to her to pay for a new card.
Check the coverage to see if it will work where you need it to work. Last year we were camping along the Washington coast near Westport, and I wanted to make a couple of calls. There was no signal at the campsite so I had to walk a couple of blocks and get up on the dunes, which was fine until it started raining. My plan has no roaming charges in the US, but if I step one inch into Canada it gets really expensive to call. It’s great for around town though.
I use Virgin, but I’m in the UK, so I wasn’t sure if they operated in the US. They call it “Pay-as-you-Go” here.
Definitely. And you need to get a bunch of friends with different phone networks to check this out, because the maps of coverage that the networks supply are just advertising and wishful thinking.
My technique is to just not leave the thing turned on.
Every couple of months I’ll be in the car and decide to visit my mother so I’ll turn it on to see if I’m welcome and there might be a couple messages waiting but they’re easy to delete.
If my mother doesn’t answer the phone before I hang up and can’t phone back because I’ve also turned the phone off again, oh well.
She knows I tried.
I don’t wear a watch so if I’m out someplace and there’s no one to ask its pretty easy to turn the thing on just to see what time it is too.
I think it’s up to almost an hour now. I rarely use the thing mostly because we have few spots we can pick up any signal. I got it when we went on vacation and it is handy when traveling. I’d think that would do fine for him.