What is the best cellular phone plan?

It's like asking what the best car is for you...all different types of plans, so you've got to do your homework.

And your immediate family calling you doesn't count as "hordes of femfolk who just want me for my body."

The last ratings I looked at (some 9 or 10 months back..) still had AT&T as the best service quailty and coverage with Sprint in 2nd. Pricing changes daily so you have to check each company's sites constantly.

The only piece of advice I'd give is to stay away from Cingular. Their plans look cheaper than AT&T's but they bill you for everything while AT&T provided the functiosn for free. Cingular's customer service also SUCKS! (not that any of them are good... )

NOTE: I don't have any financial interest in any of these companies other than a dispute that has been running for 9 months now with Cingular over their raising the cost of my plan mid-way through my contract without any notification to me and then billing me retroactively for the changes. When I refused to pay the retroactive portion of the bill they terminated my service for "failure to pay" my bill and then tacked on another $450.00 early termination fee because my contract hadn't expired yet.

CINGULAR SUCKS!

Oh I'll do the homework. I just want to know who the big hitters are any about things like service and coverage.



I know, I know. But if it were your immediate family calling me I bet it would.

Thanks fishin'

Hmm, does anyone other than singular have rollover? I like the sound of that.

"roll over, roll over. and they all rolled over and one fell out."

At present,Cingular has the only Rollover plan of which I am aware. A consideration in the selection of a cellphone provider is the coverage area of that provider as compared to your anticipated useage area. A "Gotchya" that often bites folks is that their provider may not have sufficient signal strength in some portion of the area encompassing your normal travels ... something which could either render you out of touch or present you with a startlingly dismaying list of surcharges and roaming fees on your bill. If time allows, talk to folks in your area, and ask about dropouts, service "Black Hioles", and overall satisfaction with their providers, plans, and billing experiences. Bear in mind that a cellular contract generally is for a minimum of a year ... once you've signed up, you're pretty much stuck, whether it works for you or not. The more you can learn, the less will be your eventual and inevitable disappointment ... and I guarantee some aspect of whatever you choose will prove disappointing.

It's so much easier in other nations... cell phones here are a pain. Oh well, it's a dirty job but somebody has got to do it.

"I know, I know. But if it were your immediate family calling me I bet it would."


That's FUNNY!!!!!!!

"Yo mamma" being the fine tradition it is here I was just doing as Romans do.

Romans be weird.

I have been using Cingular since 1999, and have had no problem with it. Before you choose a company, there are a number of things that you have to consider:

How many minutes will you use a month?

How many minutes will you use outside your local calling area?

If you make a lot of calls out of town, does the provider have a strong presence in that area?

Will you use the phone mostly for prime time, or nights and weekends?

Which bells and whistles do you ABSOLUTELY need? There is a lot of stuff out there that is very nice, but really unnecessary. Decide beforehand which features are a must, and which you can do without. It's those extras that really pile on the charges. Do you really need a phone that takes pictures?

Once you figure thaose things out, then you can compare the different plans.

Craven, how do cell phones work in other countries? What are we missing -- what do we yell for?

I hear that we'll have number portability soon. That will really open up the competition for me, as I love my number. I have AT&T and it's not bad, but as soon as I can I want more minutes, and it will be nice to say, But Verizon (or whoever) can do it cheaper... without changing my phone number.

The US is lagging behind Korea and Japan in terms of technology.

In Brazil this whole thing is much simpler. You buy the phone so few plans ever require a contract. You only pay for outgoing calls and the incoming calls are billed to the caller (this means that through pre-paid plans you have have a cell phone you use for receiving calls only and pay a few cents a month to nothing).

anywho I have a bucnh of different plans all in diddferent shopping carts and I now need to decide which to click on.

I've had Cingular, and its prior CellularOne since 1996 and had no problems but, it works for me as a single plan with a certain amount of minutes included, etc etc. I dont have rollover but, could upgrade to that, lots of gotchas there. I have black holes as well, but it seems most of this citys coverage does so, I dont think Id be getting anything better to change it.
You've really gotta do your homework with cellular plans. You have to go over all the available in the area, what you get, what you dont get, what the carges will be if such and such, etc etc.
This is one of those you better take a while figuring it out or itll burn ya in the end.
To consider--the phone you get is this going to be garbage within a year? How much does an upgraded phone cost/how much can you get a better phone for now when you sign up?
Can you get a one year contract with no hidden items like early termination, termination due to late payment, termination due to other reasons, does this type of thing lead to hidden costs of early termination?
Billing-Prepaid or not? Deposit or not? Itemized billing?
Local calling area, Long Distance calling area....get this spelled out in detail. If there is an area you frequesnt, ask if that is local or local roaming? Is local roaming added fee? Is long distance roaming additional?
Anyone who sells these plans gets about 50-80 bucks a sale so, yeah...make mr minimum wage at the Kiosk give you full details...its worth it for him--dont let him/her fool ya.
Look for extras but, dont let that be a deciding factor. Rollover, nights/weekends, long distance, phone included.
Good Luck

Grrr. I just found out that since I have no credit history I have to pay a deposit and that you can't do that online. I'm gonna have to get a plan with no contract or go to a store to pay the deposit.

Fustratin' I tell ya. I wanted to do this online, now I have to get dressed.


GRRRR

Hi fellas/ladies/farm animals,
I'm no cell phone expert, but here's my 2 bits:
1) Consumer Reports had a fairly recent issue on cell phone plans. Craven, I subsribe to the magazine and to on-line, so if you're interested, pm me and i'll give you the subscriber info (costs me nothing to have you poke around)
2) I use verizon - here in new jersey, it has the best coverage. their data services kinda stink, but i think you don't use a pda anyway (shame on you)
3) i would check for coverage in your area - basically, you don't want dead spots:
a) in your home
b) around your home
c) in and between the areas you frequent
4) you may want to check with a local cell phone store if they have a few different plans - if they only carry t-mobile or at&t, you're looking at a biased answer
I know there wasn't much factual information in here - sorry, but then again, when have you known me to have any facts?

The best cell phone plan ended up being AT&T for me.

They were close to my office and they promised to have me cell-enabled in 15 minutes.

They delivered so I went with them. Thanks all.

I don't think you'll be too upset with AT&T. When on a large, yearly multi-family gathering in Yosemite valley, the only folks with working cellphones are AT&T customers.

We have Sprint, and it works fine as long as we stay near major cities and highways. Get a bit off the beaten path, though...

My experience with Cingular. The store was about 1 mile from our my house. Signal was great there. Got home - no signal inside the house. Had to walk down the block a ways to find a live zone. Called to complain - sorry, bud, you're stuck for a year. So, I agree, Cingular sucks.

I have Verizon and am quite satisfied but if the AT&T give you good service, stick with it, Crave.

Because of this thread I checked on my own cell phone plan and realized that I could finally escape from my contract with ATT. ATT had good customer service, but I didn't get any reception where I needed it which sort of defeats the purpose of a cell phone.

This week I bought a phone & ordered a plan with Sprint (through Costco). Almost immediately I found that I was in roaming mode where I needed to use it and that didn't come as a free service. Sprint was also charging me $45 PLUS $15 for the digital photo service. Because I only had the contract a couple of days, I was able to cancel it and have just now switched to Verizon. It's the same plan, 500 anytime minutes plus free evenings & weekends. Instead of $45, the base charge is $39.99 and instead of $15, it was $5 for the digital photo service plus they provide a personal website for the photos and free text messaging. I also get free roaming and long distance in my three-state area. I am returning the Sprint phone but getting a similar one from Verizon -- it's quite new and has some cool features, especially the camera. I hope I'll be able to live with this for two years, since that's how long the contract runs.