Looking to switch phone plans...confused

[AlDente67 563]

What would you suggest in this situation?  Without bogging you down with too me detail, here is what I have:

 

A family bundle with T-Mob for 4 lines.  Unlimited talk and text, and 3 gb of date (I think each line, not shared).  3 of the phones are owned (all bought over time from the T-Mob store.  Mine is just about a year old, so I still owe about $130 on the payment plan.

 

I looked at our data usage last month and all in was about 150mb, so not much going on there.

 

Phone 1 is mine - Galaxy Avant, a few years old technology, but it does what I need.

Phone 2 is wife - She has a crappy old phone and is dead set on a Galaxy 6 for her job needs (she hates iPhones).

Phone 3 is out of state student who has a decent Galaxy and does what she wants (uses the most data, but looks like mostly on Wifi, so actual data usage only came in at around 80mb for the month)

Phone 4 is a decent Galaxy that boy uses only for rare emergencies.

 

All in, my typical bill from T-Mob is around $180

 

Now Sprint and Metro PCS both offer half price deals if you switch, but the kicker is that they won't allow equipment switching unless the incoming units are Galaxy 6 or iPhone 6 level, so just the ported numbers and phone books.

 

I don't know if that is true.  It's been years and years since I had someone unlock a phone and I don't even recall who did it.  Except for #2, all of them are perfectly fine.

 

Sprint offers a 4-line bundle with 2gb for only $50.  So even with taxes/fees/etc, it is still a much better deal than T-Mob.

 

Metro seems a little dodgy to me for some reason, and I haven't spoke to them yet about the equipment issue.

 

What would you do?  I see a bunch of both Sprint phones and generally unlocked phones on Ebay and the like, but I hate the idea of used sight unseen, and even the deals on the S6 are nothing to write home about (close to $500 cash).

Sprint will lease you one for $18/mo for 24 months, or sell it outright for $24 over time (same 24 months), and then you own it.  I would mind that for Wife, but it seems like a waste to have to upgrade the other 3 units just because.

[Howard 538]

You might want to take a look at Ringplus.net.  It is a Sprint NVMO, basically a reseller of capacity.  They offer BYOD (Bring your own device), and you can port in your number as well.  They offer fairly cheap paid service, but also service that is totally free.  Yea, you read that right Free.  The catch is you have to catch the free plans as you can, typically one a week and others at holiday times.  I picked up a Samsung Galaxy S4 on Amazon for $85 and put it on a plan for my wife that has 1750 minutes of voice, 1750 text messages and 1.75 gigs of data each and every month for the price of $0.00 per month.  I have a family plan on Verizon with my two kids and that runs me about $180/month.  I just could not stomach paying the full price for an iPhone now that they are no longer subsidizing them with 2 year plans.  A week or two ago I picked up a mint iPhone 5c for only $50 and added that on Ring+ as a second phone for myself.  The best plan I could find at the time was 1000 minutes voice, 2000 text, but only 1.0 gig of data, also for the total sum of $0.00/month.

 

There are two downsides, one it is Sprint so you mileage may vary depending on where you are.  Also when you call someone you don't hear the phone ringing, rather you hear music or an advertisement while the phone is ringing, but once a person answers all is normal.  It was funny, last night I was at the Springsteen concert at the Prudential Center and my iPhone 6+ on Verizon not only did not get LTE but only briefly had 3G - most of the time it was on 1X while the 5c on the free Sprint service had good 3G signal.

[Krdshrk 3,877]

MetroPCS generally doesn't care what phone you're on if it works with their SIMs.  They have their BYO Device plans - I'm on one right now with my Nexus 5 - and that phone wasn't even on their approved devices list.

 

They use T-Mobile's network which has good coverage in the area.  

[JeremyP 0]

How low are you trying to get your bill? Have you tried calling T-Mobile's Retentions dept and seeing if they can offer you a better deal/plan? Looking at their site you can get 6gb per line for $140 plus taxes/fees. If you go 2gb per line it looks to be about $100 plus taxes/fees. This route you can keep your current equipment, or upgrade whatever lines you want to. The thing with Sprint and possibly Metro is that they use a different network system CDMA vs T-Mobile's GSM making their devices incompatible. (This could have changed by now with everyone moving toward LTE.) But that's why you may need to purchase new devices.

 

I'm currently on 4 lines 10gb each paying $140 a month after taxes/fees. It was a promo they offered some time last year. I'd start with retentions if I were you.

[Howard 538]

Phone like iPhones work on both GSM and CDMA, you just change the SIM card and you are good to go.

[Rob0115 1,105]

They need to be unlocked to work. So they have to be paid off first.  Also not every phone will work on every network.  Thus they say iPhone 6 or newer.  However, a carrier unlocked ATT 5s will work on verizon (just did it) but iPhones pre-6 can't talk and receive data at the same time on Verizon, Androids and Blackberry's can, because of no VOLTE support.  However, that may not be a big deal.  Sprint will have the same limitation on CDMA.

[captblue1 9]

I would also look at Google Project Fi.  You have to use one of the new Nexus phones which wasn't' an issue with me because that is all I use.  It is $20 a month for unlimited minutes and text.  Then you pay $10 per gig of data.  It is prepaid but they reimburse you for unused data.  So if you only use 100mb of data, they refund $9.  They also finance the phone.

 

It uses both tmobile and sprint towers as well as wifi calling.  It automatically switches to the towers with the better signal.

 

I have used it for the past couple of months.  I don't use data that much so I have bills of $25 plus the financing of the phone.

[Rob0115 1,105]

I looked at Cricket today.  They are on the ATT network so any GSM phone will work.  It's technically a prepay provider who was acquired by ATT.  You can get 2.5GB, unlimited talk and text for 40 bucks per month.  You get 5 dollars if you do autopay with them, so 35 bucks.  Each phone you add is 10 bucks less than the previous.  So you have three phones and opt for the same plan for each you would pay 35, 25, 15 for a total of 75 bucks and tax is included in that.  

 

The catch is they throttle your download speeds to 8 mbps down and 2 mobs upload, which is really fast enough for mobile browsing and video streaming.  Which given your usage pattern doesn't seem like something you actually do.  The other knock is customer service is so-so, ok, which cell provider is awesome on that?

 

check them out, I am thinking about it because my bill is enormous.  

 

https://www.cricketwireless.com

[Howard 538]

....  The other knock is customer service is so-so, ok, which cell provider is awesome on that?

 

check them out, I am thinking about it because my bill is enormous.  

 

https://www.cricketwireless.com

I would say the customer service at Verizon IS actually awesome.  I always speak to people that are cheerful, polite and understanding and speak perfect English as they are all here in the States.  They probably have the best customer service of any company I have had to deal with on the phone.

[Newtonian 453]

We've been very pleased with Google Fi service and phones. $30/month for 1Gb and they refund you one cent per unused gigabyte. No contract, no B.S. The phones are awesome too if you're looking to upgrade. 

[AlDente67 563]

Verizon has a new branch in town offering some small deals.  They keep pushing the idea of buying all new phones even after I explain that only one of four needs replacing.

 

The sales guy did mention unlocking the old ones (A Galaxy S1, Galaxy Azure, an iPhone 5) at some extra cost, but he wouldn't elaborate.

[Rob0115 1,105]

We've been very pleased with Google Fi service and phones. $30/month for 1Gb and they refund you one cent per unused gigabyte. No contract, no B.S. The phones are awesome too if you're looking to upgrade.

Doesn't that only work on the nexus phones?

[Newtonian 453]

Doesn't that only work on the nexus phones?

Yes. The smaller one I have is amazing. 

 

I was addressing the situation where you might want to switch carriers entirely or upgrade from an old clunky phone or flip phone to a state of the art smart phone.

 

Since we switched one of our daughters has also switched to Google, and my other daughter regrets getting an iPhone.

[Rob0115 1,105]

I have a couple guys that work for me that do that and like it. I still can't ditch my iPhone.