Cell phone for 11 y/o question

[allie&mattsmom]

Okay, I know I'll get flamed for this so flame away and get it over with. I also know I'm coming off like a stuck-in-the-past old geezer latley, and I guess that's true at least some of the time, but here goes my take on the cell phone for an 11 year old girl:

On the surface, there seems to be some logic in wanting a young daighter to be able to stay in touch, you know, for "emergencies." Then I couldn't help thinking why such a young girl would be anyplace unsupervised by a responsible adult.

Just an honest opinion...

That's okay, I'm not going to flame you. I'll give you a couple of examples of why it would give me a sense of security when it comes to my 11 y/o. We have a neighborhood pool and I used to have her use the pay phone when she'd get up there safe. Well, they removed the pay phone which stinks. At this particular pool, you are able to get a pass to go alone at age 9. Both my kids are competitive swimmers plus the lifeguards there are amazing. Another example would be their daily swimming/diving practices. This is at a pool across town. I drop them off and if she needs to get ahold of me for whatever reason, she can use her cell phone w/o bugging the office people to use their phone. Sometimes if there is lightening in the area, they cancel practice and she can catch me on my cell to come pick her up. Last month she took the Red Cross babysitting class. She was there for hours. It made me feel uncomfortable so I gave her my cell phone to call me if she needed me to pick her up early. What if the class got out early or she felt sick? So these are just a few of my justifications for it. She'll be in 6th grade next year and she'll be staying after school for volleyball practice and basketball practice a lot, so I'd feel good about her having it then too.

 

[allie&mattsmom]

Well, I talked to my hubby and he sent me to Target to get the Tracfone. He wanted me to get the one year with 250 units, so that's what I did. Just got it activated and it's being charged up. DD's been given the lecture about not using it just to call a friend to chat, etc. So we'll see how it goes! Thanks everyone!

 

[Anne34]

We got our 12 year old the Trac Phone with the one year of minutes for Christmas. So far, so good. She still has 98 minutes left. I told her if she runs out before her year is up, then she has to pay the minutes. It has really worked well and has taught her not to call people on her cell just because she wants to chat.

Good Luck

 

[paigevz]

I'm sorry, did you say you are afraid an 11 year old girl might not use all her minutes?

Seriously, I can't add to what's already been said..............they've covered it.

 

[MrsPete]

I looked at TracFones not long ago. It works like this:

Say you buy 50 minutes on August 1st.
Because it's an emergency-only phone, she uses only 20 minutes.
Your minutes are due to expire on October 1st; however, if you buy another 50 minute card, you get to keep those "leftover" minutes. So you now have 50 new minutes + the "leftover" 30 minutes.

Most of my friends who've given their children this type of phone give the child a new card every month (as if it were an extension of the allowance). That is a good way to keep up with a big-talker's minutes.

Here's the nasty detail that they don't advertise, and the reason I went with a traditional plan for my 12-year old: You "spend" minutes every time you use the phone -- that is, you "spend" minutes for both incoming AND outgoing calls.

I decided it wasn't a good deal for my family, but you'll have to judge for yourself. The big reason, in my mind, to get this type of phone for a child is that there's little financial loss if she loses it; on the other hand, if she loses a traditional phone and someone finds it, you could have a big bill run up in a hurry.

 

[allie&mattsmom]

I
I decided it wasn't a good deal for my family, but you'll have to judge for yourself. The big reason, in my mind, to get this type of phone for a child is that there's little financial loss if she loses it; on the other hand, if she loses a traditional phone and someone finds it, you could have a big bill run up in a hurry.

This was a big factor for us too. She's gotten the lecture about being careful with it, don't get it wet if she takes it to the pool, etc., but we realize accidents happen (heck, I've ruined two phones in the last few years myself ) so the price tag of $29 was a plus!

 

[Imzadi]

You "spend" minutes every time you use the phone -- that is, you "spend" minutes for both incoming AND outgoing calls.

I'm curious, what cell phone did you get that doesn't use up minutes on INCOMING calls?