NET10 Cell Phone Costs?

[W. eWatson]

Several years ago we started using NET10 cell phones. They offer a plan
for 10 cents a minute. However, your total minutes are lost if you don't
buy more in some period. Two (600 min) and six (1000 min) months plans
are available. I use it sporadically and only when I'm away from our
small town. I might use 400 minutes in an entire year. However, to keep
the service, I always purchasing more than I need. As a consequence, I
currently have 1600 min. In one month I will have to buy more. This in
my view is a losing proposition.

Is there a plan with another company that's more comfortable for my
situation? Comments?

 

[W. eWatson]

Don't buy "minute cards"; buy extended activation.

It might be cheaper to change to a Tracfone plan. Tracfone sells by
the minute (i.e. a 60 minute card) but also offers 400 minutes valid
for a year for $100 (unused minutes carry over with the next year's
purchase). That translates to $8/month.

If you have cable TV, you pay a flat fee each month regrdless of
actual usage. I just look at the $8/month cost as my "flat fee" for
cell phone usage and let the minutes accumulate (currently somewhere
above 800 minutes). My cell usage is usually between 20-30
minutes/month - but the extra minutes are a cushion for travelling or
an emergency.

You can get one of Tracfone's Motorola flip phones with camera for
about $20 at Kmart or Walmart.

John

Yes, I think you have it right. My wife and I looked if over. We are
really paying $180/year, and accumulating minutes far beyond what we
might use. It's sort of like who cares. I am heading for a tracphone
when I cancel the current phone.

Another thought on this is why not take advantage of the web connection?
At the moment, there is no useful description for how to use it. I
called NET10, and they offered to lead me through the basic steps. I'd
be better off with a booklet that explained it. Then too my wife thinks
web connections might be slow. At 25 cents a minute, one can afford to
do some experimenting.

 

[SMS]

Several years ago we started using NET10 cell phones. They offer a plan
for 10 cents a minute. However, your total minutes are lost if you don't
buy more in some period. Two (600 min) and six (1000 min) months plans
are available. I use it sporadically and only when I'm away from our
small town. I might use 400 minutes in an entire year. However, to keep
the service, I always purchasing more than I need. As a consequence, I
currently have 1600 min. In one month I will have to buy more. This in
my view is a losing proposition.

Is there a plan with another company that's more comfortable for my
situation? Comments?

Pageplus, a Verizon MVNO, requires $10 every 120 days (10 cents per
minute), which is their most expensive refill per minute. That's around
$2.50 per month compared to Net10's $15 minimum per month.

$80 buys you 2000 minutes that are good for a year (4 cents per minute),
available from dealers (including online dealers, but not direct from
PagePlus). The longest you can get from Net10 is 1500 minutes for 180
days for $100 (6.67 cents per minute).

PagePlus also offers 400 minutes for $25 (6.25 cents per minute) and
1000 minutes for $50 (5 cents per minute), all of which have a 120 day
expiration. There is also a 50 cent per month service charge subtracted
from your account. So $30 a year would buy you [$30-(12*0.50)]/0.10=240
minutes/year.

Texts are 8 cents each. Data is 60 cents/MB.

Don't ever forget to add money at least every 120 days, unless you're on
the one year plan.

PagePlus also offers some packages. One is 1200 minutes, 2000
text/multimedia messages, and 100MB of data, for $30 per month. 100MB of
data isn't a tremendous amount, but in reality if you use Wi-Fi whenever
available, and aren't doing dumb things like downloading/uploading video
or huge JPG files, 100MB of 3G data is sufficient for a lot of users.

http://www.pagepluscellular.com

You can use any Verizon phone except an iPhone, and except Verizon
InPulse prepaid phones (they used to activate the latter but got upset
about people doing that).

Just be sure that you usually use the phone in areas with Verizon native
coverage because roaming outside of Verizon territory is 29 cents per
minute. In reality it's pretty rare for roaming to occur, but there are
some rural areas where the CDMA carrier is some other carrier. I.e. if
you go to parts of California's gold country, or Yosemite, the carrier
is not Verizon, but Golden State Cellular. In some rural places in
Oregon the carrier is U.S. Cellular.

 

[SMS]

Yes, I think you have it right. My wife and I looked if over. We are
really paying $180/year, and accumulating minutes far beyond what we
might use. It's sort of like who cares. I am heading for a tracphone
when I cancel the current phone.

Another thought on this is why not take advantage of the web connection?
At the moment, there is no useful description for how to use it. I
called NET10, and they offered to lead me through the basic steps. I'd
be better off with a booklet that explained it. Then too my wife thinks
web connections might be slow. At 25 cents a minute, one can afford to
do some experimenting.

Tracfone is not as good a deal as Pageplus.