One of my goals for October, was to go over phone plans and my options for saving money on my cellphone bill each month. So, trying to be a good goal-achiever, I grabbed the information from T-mobile the other day for research. What I found is on the verge of driving me bonkers.
I’m currently, and intend on staying, in a family plan with my mom. We don’t live together or anything like that, she just calls me more than anybody else does and it’s cheaper for me. She doesn’t charge me half of the bill like I should be paying, thanks Mom. 
Currently, there are two options for family plans at T-mobile: the Value Plans and the Classic Plans. Did I mention that both of these new plans don’t include the MyFaves anymore. Yep, the lady said they were getting rid of them; that sucks. Anyway, so the main difference between the 2 plans are that the Value Plans don’t allow you to receive discounts on a new phone, that’s why they’re cheaper.
Usually, when I would need (or want) a new phone, I could go into T-Mobile every other year and score a discount on a new phone. I’m thinking somewhere around $200 off and in exchange, you are continuing your contract for an additional 2 years. Which was usually fine with me.
Determining My Phone Usage
First off, the apartments we live in have the worst cellphone reception EVER! Really, it’s ridiculous. I usually have to go outside to use the phone and if I don’t it cuts out like crazy and drops calls all the time. Thankfully, I’m not much of a phone person…mostly I’m a texter.
I don’t have a fancy iPhone or anything like that, just a plain ol’ Samsung Galaxy 2 (because of the little keyboard for texting purposes). Having a data plan would be cool, but it’s really not something I need. So, pretty much lots of texting and 100 to 200 minutes a month is perfect for me.
Determining Mom’s Phone Usage
She is super extroverted and loves talking to people non-stop. This is usually why she doesn’t make me pay half of the cellphone bill and I’m cool with that. 900 minutes a month just isn’t enough for her; since T-mobile is doing away with their MyFaves, she will need closer to 2,000 minutes a month.
An unlimited plan would probably be the best option for her needs. She doesn’t do as much texting as I do, maybe 75 to 100 texts each month. She doesn’t want to pay extra for a data plan and isn’t very interested in them anyway.
The Value Plans:
$24.99 for 1,000 shared minutes and NO texts 
$29.99 for 1,000 shared minutes and Unlimited texts
$34.99 for 2,000 shared minutes and NO texts
$39.99 for Unlimited minutes and Unlimited texts
The Classic Plans:
$29.99 for 1,000 shared minutes and NO texts
$39.99 for 1,000 shared minutes and Unlimited texts
$39.99 for 2,000 shared minutes and NO texts
$49.99 for Unlimited minutes and Unlimited texts
*prices are per line
So, to continue staying in a family plan (which saves me money), we need to consider our usage. I need texts and Mom needs lots of minutes. That brings us to the unlimited plans. The Value Plan is $39.99 and the Classic Plan is 10 bucks more at $49.99. To save money, the Value Plan can give us what we want at the lowest price but doesn’t include phone discounts.
Both of our phones are fine and don’t have any problems, but can they make it another 2 years? It would cost us an additional $10 each per month ($20 total) for the next two years ($480) to receive a discount on new phones. See, you’re not really getting the discount, you’re paying installments on it, like a loan.
If something did happen to our phones and we needed to replace them, we could always go to eBay or something and find an inexpensive one. I just keep going back and forth because it seems like a really lame deal since they used to just give you the discount for extending your contract. Oh, as if all that isn’t dumb enough, you have to sign-up for a 2 year contract with both the plans anyway?
Mom thinks the Value Plan with unlimited minutes and unlimited texts sounds good too but I’d only have to pay $30 a month. Right now I’m paying $50 a month, so I would be saving $20 each month ($240 per year) on this cellphone plan.
What do you think?
Should I do it and just be really careful with my phone?
I’d go with the value plan:D I personally hate talking on the phone for a long period of time so I mostly text or meet in person so my minutes are rarely used up. If you work for a big company, tell them, they might ba able to give you a discount. I work for TD so they AT&T gives me like 20% discount every month.
Nice to hear I’m not the only hater. I’m actually unemployed, so no discounts for me, but it’s cool you’re able to snag 20% off.
I have to agree with Aaron, the value plan with unlimited texts seems like best value to me. A good call is a brief call. ha!
The value plan really does seem like the best option. I’m just kinda pissed how they’re changing everything around and all that, it reminds me of Netflix and a couple of banks. Oh well.
I would definitely go with the value plan. An extra 10 bucks a month for a free phone is not worth it to me. Plus, in 2 years, there will be so much competition that cell phones will be free anyway. If you do want to text, you can text through Google Voice free. But I don’t know if the value plan comes with any data?
I hope you’re right about the free phones, sounds good to me. The plans I threw up there don’t include data since we don’t really ‘need’ it but they do have more expensive plans that include data too.