HELP! Need to buy 2 Prepaid Phones.

[Taylors6]

It looks like we will be looking for 2 prepaid phones for Christmas this year- I've been trying to read up on different ones (not so easy when there is always kids with me!!) but I just can not find anything that I am sure would be right for the need....

One is for my mom- she will not do a monthly plan. Has had a trac phone years ago but gave it up because she never used it enough and had to keep getting minutes every few months, etc.. I'm thinking a flip phone because one problem last time was her forgetting to push the buttom and turn the call off (countless times!). Surely she would remember to simply close it!!

The other is for our son...as a trial phone to see if next summer he might be responsible enough to be added to our family plan. I was hoping to find something with a cheap texting option. Mainly he would just use it every once in awhile since hes always with us anyways.

Any ideas or suggestions??

Thanks in advance for the help!!

Missy

 

[PelletierBears]

We've had Virgin Mobile for over 3 years and love it. You do have to top up every 90 day but that's only an issue with my son since rarely uses his. Still no big deal though since you can top up as low as $10 so eventually all the minutes are used... we've never lost out.
It's perfect for my mom too, in fact we gave her one last year and I top her up when I do the rest of us since she never remembers!
And I have to say, we've traveled from New England to Florida, NE to Ohio, Mass to Maine and have never had a coverage problem.

Good luck finding what works best for you!
Lisa

 

[Taylors6]

Did you buy yours instore or online?

Thanks!

 

[Kies99]

We've used Virgin Mobile for quite some time now.

I believe if you put a total of $90 on your account within 3 days, you then don't have to top up for 365 days.

Currently my plan is $0.18 a minute any time day or night. I can call anywhere in the country. I can also make calls from anywhere in the country that Sprint is (Virgin Mobile uses the Sprint network).

Phones can be had in many stores including Target and Walmart.

 

[CherylA]

I just bought T-Mobile. Other than an issue getting set up with a transferred # I've been happy with them. I paid $30 shipped for my flip phone and it came with a $25 card for minutes that is good for 90 days. After that is up you can buy $100 of minutes that don't expire for a year. That might be a good option for your mom. If she doesn't use a lot of minutes then the $100 would last her all year and she'd only have to worry about buying minutes once a year.

 

[Karalea]

I bought my Mom an AT&T Go phone in October for her birthday. The service coverage was best for her area in Florida and it was the easiest to use phone I could find - she has vision problems. I bought it off the website for $50 and it came with a free $50 minute card.

It is $1/day if you use the phone and .10/minute. The $50 card expired after 90 days. Her plan doesn't include text messaging.

If Jitterbug wasn't so expensive, I would have gone with that for her.

 

[solfan68]

Nowadays Trac has a "one year" card. Its what DW and I use. You could make the airtime a holiday gift every year and mom would never have to worry about it. Seems like our WalMart had had TF phones lately for ten bucks. I know you can also order from the website. Sometimes its "Buy a year card and get a designated phone for free".

Best of luck in your search, prepaid has been a really good move for our family, and when DS gets to that point, I'd feel very comfortable getting him one as well.

ETA: The TF Motorola V170(a small flip) gives free INCOMING text messages.

 

[LindaDe]

I loved my trac phone. I had to give it up when my kids went to college hours away and land lines rates were way too high to pay to talk to them, like they want to talk to me anyway. I got great service too...rarely ran into dead zones where I couldn't call anyone.

I would load the phone up once a year with their one year plan and always waited for the extra minutes deal and never was able to use all the minutes that I had for a year. You can even pay a little more and get double minutes when you have to load and loading is easy over the internet and you never loose your minutes if you don't use them they roll over with the next time you load your year in.

My in-laws have trac phones and they too have no problem...you can even choose a special plan that if you forget to load in the years time they will not disconnect you..and they only charge you the fee if you need to use it. In fact my in laws get a reminder call from trac phone when the year is coming up.

I will in a minute go back to my trac phone when my kids get out of college. I am paying way toooo much for cell phone service I do not use. I pay verizon for 700 minutes a month for 4 phones and hardly use any of them...of course they are mostly "in" calling. My kids use the text thing most. But when they get out of college they get to pay their own plans.

The only thing is my in-laws do not understand how to load the minutes in and I have to do it for them...so for the elderly (they were in their 70's when they got their phones) the tract phone may be a little overwhelming trying to understand the codes and all. I have no idea how loading the other pay as you go phones are, they may be just as hard for the elderly to understand. But again no problem I just do it for them.

 

[LindaDe]

Oh and I forgot...One time on my Trac phone I did the double minutes plan for a year and it built up lots of minutes for a slight extra fee that year...then I had plenty of extra minutes from that year and went back to the regular year plan the next year and had plenty of minutes to play with in case I needed them for two years.

 

[StephMK]

DD14 has a go-phone because it offered a pink Razr as one of their pay as you go compatible phones. We just signed her up for the 9.99 for 1000 text messages. You have to buy a text plan each month but unused texts will carry over as long as you do. They also offer 200 texts for $5 or unlimited for $20. I figure if she has some left from the 1000, we'll do the $5 plan next month. I put some $ on her for calls but she really only uses that to call me & it's $.25 a minute. Since she mostly texts anyway, this works ok for us.

 

[HeidiPA]

We have 2 trac phones and have been very pleased with them.
We bought the first, a flip phone, last fall.
Then around Christmastime last year, Walmart had a special on a smaller one - it was like $14 and came with a double minute for life card. Awesome deal and it is THE BEST little phone.
We've since purchased the double minutes for life card for the other phone as well - great deal in the long run. The great thing is that, right on the screen, it shows you the expiration date of your minutes. And they call you (on your home phone) to remind you AND send emails when they are running specials.
Those phones have definitely been worth their weight in gold for us!

 

[mum4jenn]

First of all check to see what cell towers serve your area. You might end up with a great phone but no coverage. All we can get is Alltel. I used to have a Tracphone but the coverage was from a different carrier and I cold only get coverage after 10 PM IF I was standing in the middle of the street. Most of the time I would even then only get one bar and as soon as I put it to my ear I would lose coverage.

I felt like that commercial a year or so ago where the guy was folded in half on top of the filing cabinet trying to get coverage.

We get good coverage now.

 

[Promomx2]

My ds and I have At&t, that way when we call each other its free and we have coverage alot when others don't. Also check for deals on black friday. check the websites that have the sale ads already posted. I know I saw some deals at walmart and target.