Cell phones & Prepaid Plans?

June 27, 2006

Hi Everyone,

In today's paper there was an article written by Marshall Loeb.

He was the former editor of Fortune, Money and the Columbia

Journalism Review. He now writes about personal finance for

MarketWatch. These short articles appear daily in the paper I get.

Today he focused on Cell Phones. I Hope this article will be of

help.

The article is intitled, Are Prepaid Plans Right Call?

" Prepaid or pay-as-you-go calling plans allow you to buy a

month's worth of airtime or purchase voucher cards worth a certain

number of minutes that you can activate when you want to use them.

But don't expect major bargains from these plans. You'll

likely pay more for each minute and face more restrictions than if

you sign up for a typical cell-phone cantract that lasts one or two

years. You're paying for the freedom of not being locked into a

contract. Still, for those who want a phone solely for emergencies,

or who plan to make very few calls per month, a pay-as-you-go plan

may make sense.

Take these examples: Cingular and Verizon offer 10 cents a minute

on there pay-as-you-go plans but charge $1.00 for each day you talk

on the phone. If you pay 25 cents a minute, Cingular will waive the

$1.00 per day fee. When you buy minutes though, they expire in 30 to

90 days depending on how many you purchase at once.

T-Mobile's prepaid cards go from $10.00 for 30 minutes- or 33

cents a minute - to $100 for 1,000 minutes - 10 cents a minute.

Minutes don't expire for a year only if you buy the $100 card.

Tracfone, another company sells $20 cards worth 60 minutes or

$80 cards worth 400 with no expiration date. You'll also be charged

a monthly fee, which is $8 if you pay for a full year in advance.

Most plans come with basic features such as call waiting, voice

mail and national long distance, but read the fine print.

Consider how you will use the phone and when, and compare a

prepaid plan to a contract with a similar number of minutes. You

may end up choosing to commit after all. "

Hugs

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