Which approach should I take with this phone plan?
Asked by
RZ71 (
61
)
August 11th, 2016
I own a Samsung Galaxy S6 that is currently undergoing repairs. During this time, I have given much more thought to smart phone plans and noticed a few things.
For one, they are expensive if you allow them to brainwash you. No joke, bills may come out to well over $100+ if you allow yourself to be easily influenced by the glamour of cellular “plans” and their “All of these awesome benefits or features for a low cost of 142.65 a month! No other company competes and we have the most nation-wide coverage ever known since the invention of the light bulb”.
Another thing is… are you ready? Two letters separated by a hyphen and another two letters, a space, and two words : Wi-Fi Hot Spots. They’re everywhere, right? So what’s the point of even having to use data unless we find ourselves in a very critical or crucial situation that absolutely requires the use of data.
I’m not even sure at this point what route to go. Keep my smart phone and modify my plan to fit my liking or buy a cheap little flip phone and call it a day. Maybe buy a phone to use for calls and keep the smart phone as a Wi-Fi toy (games, any sort of social media, etc).
What’s your opinion?
Thank you all for your responses, criticism is more than welcome and sugar coating is banned.
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9 Answers
I should think the right answer varies considerably depending on where in the world you live or travel. As for the verdict that the mobile industry is a rip, there’s no argument from me:
I might suggest you get a brochure of the plans from cell company A, and take it to cell company B and have one of their reps dissect it for you. And vise-versa.
As far as Wi-fi, no, it’s not really everywhere. On the road for example. It’s in different business, often for free, but you have to be pretty much inside of that business to use it. If you access the internet without wifi, you’ll be pulling off the towers and you’ll munch through your limited data plan like mad.
I actually have a wifi hotspot. I take it with me when we travel, and go to the lake and stuff. Unless I forget it.
But the good news is, Pokeymon Go uses almost no data!! Just GPS so I don’t have to worry about it .
I use RepublicWireless. It routes calls and texts over wifi if available. If there isn’t wifi it switches to the cellular network. It runs me 11 bucks a month.
I can turn data on and off as needed and it runs about 50 cents a day for data. But I rarely ever do that since wifi is nearly everywhere around here.
It’s all a matter of perceived usage. I pay $60/month for unlimited text, data, phone calls, etc. If I go over 3 gb, my speed gets knocked down a little, but I don’t pay overages.
If someone wants to charge $142/month they are completely ripping you off.
WiFi hotspots are great if you’re more or less stationary at the time you need all of your data, or if you spend time in places that offer the free service, AND if you trust the privacy afforded in places with free WiFi. (Those are the places that I have seen the most significant hacks on my secure data, so I don’t trust them at all any more for anything other than wholly anonymous browsing.)
When I need my data most is when I’m not able to use hotspots, such as while driving and relying upon GPS or weather data, or when I absolutely have to use a secure connection for banking, PayPal, stock trading or other financial transactions that I will never trust to “free WiFi” any more.
So, like the answers to most questions, “it depends.”
What do you mean “More or less stationary,”? When we go on road trips my phone is connected to the hotspot which is in the car. We are not stationary. ... Wait. You’re talking about businesses and hotels. I was thinking of my hotspot, which I can carry around with me.
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