<p>I have a smart phone which i got a little bit over a year ago. It’s my first one. I’ve decided that I can’t justify the cost of it and it’s a waste of my money. My plan is with verizon and I am eligible for my next upgrade in may.</p>
<p>My first question is - does anyone know if I can go back to an old dumb phone now and just drop the data plan off my existing verizon plan? That would lower my bill 30 a month but I am not sure if this can be done since they have new plans out now. If i had to switch to a new plan with a dumb phone it would be 70 a month.</p>
<p>my second question is - does anyone know how the service for carriers like Simple Mobile, Virgin Mobile, etc is ? I tend to travel along the eastern coast and need to make sure my phone works everywhere. I’ve been with Verizon for like 8 years and they are the best I’ve found yet. I do see they have a prepaid unlimited dumb phone for 50 a month. Prior to that I had dealt with At&t, voice stream, cingular, at&t, and t-mobile. Maybe these guys have gotten better in the past decade? Virgin mobile has unlimited prepaid plans each month for 35 and that even includes a smart phone.</p>
<p>Is there anyone in your family who would be willing to include you on their family plan? We did that for DD and it was a rousing $9.99 a month. SHE is paying $24.99 for unlimited texting…and it’s for the whole family!</p>
<p>We are considering a Verizon plan that is only $30 a month per phone…and that is for a smart phone with small data plan.</p>
<p>I used to be on my parents family plan but I left it for several reasons and won’t be returning regardless of the cost. It would be cheaper though.</p>
<p>Where did you find a verzion plan for only 30 dollars? I found a plan for 30 for a basic phone but it required that i add some sort of data package to it for another 40 dollars minimum if I wanted unlimited texting or 10 dollars for their smallest option with pay as you go texting.</p>
<p>I think Verizon would permit going back to a dumb phone, and all it will do is start a new 2 year contract. I’ve been with them a very long time and have always been satisfied. I do have a friend who has virgin mobile with a smart phone and seems pleased. But she doesn’t travel a whole lot…</p>
<p>My daughter and I use VirginMobile. The company is owned by Sprint and uses the Sprint network, so you can expect the same service that Sprint gets in your area. We have (fairly) smart phones, cost around $100 (were $150 when we bought them but the price has gone down). 300 minutes, unlimited texting, unlimited data but it slows down if you use too much (hasn’t happened to us) for $35/month. And that’s all it costs–that plus our state’s sales tax. No other fees. They also have non-smart phones and cheaper ways to connect if you really want to avoid anything “smart.”</p>
<p>I work from home now and I got a tablet for christmas which I plan on taking with when I travel which eliminates the need for using the internet on my phone and will be fine as long as I have wireless access. I also have a smartphone from work that has the internet which I could look things up on in case of emergency. I mainly just use my phone for sending text messages and MAYBE 20 minutes a month.</p>
<p>It just seems silly to be paying so much for something that I don’t need.</p>
<p>There is a company called Pageplus. They are a prepaid carrier and a reseller of verizon network. You most likely can use your current smartphone and transfer your number to Pageplus. You will be on verizon network for voice and 3G data, but no access to their 4G LTE, so basically, you will have very good verizon coverage for voice. You will not get good customer service or any detailed billings and usage, all account information is done through the Internet on their website.</p>
<p>I don’t know what is your usage pattern but their talk 'n text 1200 plan has 1200 voice minutes, 3000 texts and 250MB of data for $29.95 a month. You can get 3-5% discount if you buy refill from callingmart.com and no tax or fees! Howards forum below has a lot more info and faq:</p>
<p>Edit: if you are using only 20 minutes a month, there is a The 12 plan that cost $12 a month, and it has 250 minutes, 250 texts, and 10 MB per month. Or you can go with the Standard Plan in which you pay by the minute for 4 cents per minute and 5 cents per text and 99 cents per MB. You can easily switch between plans if you change your mind but the procedure can be a bit tricky if you want to do it correctly without losing money.</p>
<p>fendergirl - Let us know how it works out. </p>
<p>When I shopped Verizon for non-smart phones summer 2011 there were only a few choices. I picked and Octane and used it mostly for text, but I paid $10/month for a mini data plan (with Vzavigator) that they offered. You may want to beg old phones off friends or family because Verizon will likely offer fewer simple options. </p>
<p>Recently I switched to Droid Cranberry, a freebie with son’s new Droid. I did so with trepidation because it is not clear if I could ever go back to my Octane. In my case, the cost was easier to swallow since my oldest will graduate in May and start kicking in for her share of the Verizon bill.</p>
<p>Thanks for your suggestions. I also found the at*t go prepaid plan that has 250 min and unlimited texting on basic phones for 25 a month. That seems very resonable. I can’t change away from my contract till it expires but it seems like that might be the best deal so far.</p>
<p>I may switch to one of my older phones and just drop my data in the mean time, if they allow me. I really am fed up with this phone too. They upgraded its operating system and now it’s slow as heck and a pain to use. I wonder if I can downgrade it’s OS.</p>
<p>Not too many people are going to be satisfied with only 250-300 talk minutes per month. That amount of minutes only allows for a very few brief phone conversations and also emergency calls. Remember too, prepaid plans with only a couple of hundred minutes/month don’t include free nighttime, free weekend, or free intra family minutes…the meter is always running and 300 minutes get used up fast!</p>
<p>But OP said, she uses maybe 20 minutes a month. She should not be paying for all those free minutes if she is not going to use them. Prepaid plan is good for this, you can have more if you need it at usually a lot less than you have to pay monthly for the maximum you might ever use.</p>
<p>My nephew is a big fan of Virgin Mobil with or without a smartphone. I think that the right plan really depends on your use. We switched to Verizon, because we really, really, really wanted a phone that would work in southern NH and at least near if not in our cabin Vermont. T-Mobile used to be okay and then the coverage actually got so bad it was useless. We have smart android phones. My sil loves her i-phone and is willing to put up with the fact that it doesn’t work when her family visits my Mom and brother in NH. We weren’t. I use the phone for work and I never come near to any typical number of minute limits, though we don’t have any.</p>
<p>Anyone just talking 20 minutes/month on a cell phone should consider just going to a Dollar General store and buying a $10 Tracphone and buying $10 worth of minutes.</p>
<p>I don’t usually use minutes. I’ve had months where I’ve used 4 minutes of my phone. I use text’s. 1500+ of them… A $10 tracphone would be fine if not for this. I honestly wish I could just buy a phone for texting only and then just pay by the minute when I actually make a phone call. It would be so much cheaper for me. Even my mother and my grandmother text instead of calling. I do occasionally get a work call on my cell phone if someone is trying to get ahold of me and I’m not answering my work phone (at home) or my work cell phone. I also did use my phone quite a bit more often the past few weeks because my car was in the shop and that was a slight disaster so lots of phone calls had to be made. My total minutes used this cycle is 52 regular minutes, 15 night time minutes and 2 mobile to mobile minutes. </p>
<p>T-Mobile has a prepaid plan offered only through Wal-Mart for $30/mo. with 100 minutes talk, unlimited texting, ‘unlimited’ data, 4G service. T-Mobile has pretty good coverage most areas.</p>
<p>"When switching to a prepaid plan (such as the ATT $25/month plan above) … is it possible to port an existing phone number from Verizon? "</p>
<p>Yes, by law, they have to allow you keep and port wireless number between different carriers and plans. Just don’t cancel your plan before doing the porting, the porting process usually is the trigger that cancels the previous plan on previous carrier.</p>