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Solve : Cheap Prepaid Phones with Internet by the month.?

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Cheap Prepaid Phones with Internet by the month.

Found on Lifehacker. You can afford a low-cost smartphone with  internet and no contract. If service goes bad, just stop and switch.  Pay for only what you want.
http://lifehacker.com/how-to-find-the-best-prepaid-plan-and-ditch-your-contra-485042945

Even tho the article favors the USA, some reader comments from the UK are interesting.
I was tempted to move this to SPAM...

I'll leave it up for now.Product/Activation may be cheap. Minutes and data come at a premium... QUOTE from: patio on September 30, 2013, 03:39:44 PM

I was tempted to move this to SPAM...

I'll leave it up for now.
Thank you Patio. No, I am not selling my iPhone. The article is from Life hacker and, IMHO, has appeal to CH readers. Many of use carry phones that we also use to check e-mail and look at what is new on CH. Some of the plans of the big four USA companies are outrageous. Some of the alternatives actually are spin-offs of the MAIN company.  It pays to look around.
From the article:
Quote
The freedom of not signing a contract is great, but it has its own drawbacks, and may not be ideal for every situation. You might be interested if:
    You have an unlocked phone (and enjoy upgrading it frequently).
    You're looking to save some money and don't mind managing your usage.
    You need a burner for work/travel outside of your current network.
If you are currently in the middle of a two-year contract and considering jumping ship, take a look at our guide to avoiding termination fees for some tips.
And I did post it in Off Topic. I wanted to post it in the CH Android section... All i'm saying is it ain't as good as it sounds...far from it. Quote from: evilfantasy on September 30, 2013, 04:00:49 PM
Product/Activation may be cheap. Minutes and data come at a premium...

If you have a smart phone that's Wi-Fi capable, even data is cheap/free, on your home AP.  I have a Net10 prepaid smartphone.  The minutes are normally 10 cents a minute, and a number of plans have rates a fraction of that.  The phone itself only cost $50.  For my usage it's only $15/month.  They lease the lines from one or more of the "big four".  I save a ton over any of those contract plans.  Even if I did a lot greater usage, the plans don't necessarily cost much more ($5-10/mo. more).

The only real drawback is their tech. service isn't great.  If anything much goes wrong, they want you to go through the huge hassle of replacing your phone, instead of just trying to fix it for you.  I'm talking just software/OS/firmware problems here.  Most apps, phonebook, and any other user data that can't be sent to the memory card is not transferable.
Quote
You have an unlocked phone (and enjoy upgrading it frequently).

BTW, how do you DETERMINE if you have an unlocked phone?
Here in Europe, we can get lots of cheap phone deals. I am with Virgin Mobile and I bought outright a "pay as you go" phone from them in May. (I think Americans call them "prepaid"?). It cost me 69.99 UK pounds (around 113 USD) and I had to "top up" (prepay) 10 UKP (around 16 USD) as part of the deal. I already had an Alacatel featurephone from Virgin, and I just had to SWAP the SIMs. The phone is a ZTE Blade III (Android 4.0 ICS, 4 inch 480 x 800 screen, 3G, 5 MP camera, GPS, etc etc). As a first smartphone it has got plenty of good reviews. At the time they had a deal where if you topped up with 10 UKP in any calendar month, you got unlimited data all the next month, leaving your top up credit for voice calls. As I don't make many outgoing calls (incoming calls are free here) I built up around 25 UKP credit so I have switched to a rolling 30 day "SIM only" contract. It costs 7 UKP (11.37 USD today) per month, and for that I get 150 minutes and 500 MB data. I can quit with 30 days notice or switch in store to a higher tier instantly e.g. 10 UKP for 1 GB data and 300 minutes or 15 UKP for unlimited data. I have used 120 MB in the last 30 days. I can get an unlock code for 15 UKP or take it into one of many phone shops for less.


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