New cell phones
October 18, 2008 by kellys
Filed under financial matters
Karen recently has logged her new cell phone service experience. I really feel her pain! My cell phone has been on the fritz and would die in the middle of a call or text. After a few times, it was enough to make a christian curse! So after DH wasn’t able to reach me for a few days when he needed to tell me something and the school wasn’t able to contact me if Turkey Butt needed anything, we decided to get a new phone.
My suggestion is to really watch your wallet as Karen said. Here a a few things that allowed us to save a lot of money.
- My phone was eligible for an upgrade so we got a $250 phone for $49.
- We simply renewed our contract for 2 years. We are happy with the service so why not.
- We took our kids at bedtime and the poor guy wanted to get us out quickly so he recommended a great insurance plan for the phone (which I need) but said we didn’t have to get it just then. That was perfect as we could wait until the next paycheck to pay for the insurance that we were going to have to get but really couldn’t afford at the time.
- We went to Radio Shack so we didn’t have to do the mail in rebate and took advantage of the instant rebate.
The moral of the story is, if at all possible, wait until you are eligible for an upgrade and go to your local store. We went to Radio Shack and got great service with a real discount. Hope this helps. We were very pleased as a new cell phone was not in our monthly budget.
The new phone by google is coming out in a few days, and I would love to get it, but my one phone still works, so there is no reason to get it, but it sure would be nice.
So i’m trying to talk my self into staying within my means, but it’s really hard at this moment.
Nice job of approaching your new cell phone with a level head…
I really enjoyed your tactics to get the most out of your cell phone purchase. I constantly counsel clients about budgeting and I think that I use your common sense example of how to think through and approach this necessary purchase.
Thanks again!
When I needed a new phone, and was eligible for an upgrade I went into the store for it. I was told they don’t do “free” phones anymore (with the discount I was eligible for, the cheapest phone would have been $70) . I said absolutely not, forget it, and walked out. I decided to check online instead, and on the cell company’s website I found not one but FOUR different phones for free with my discount. And they shipped for free. I got it the very next day. And it’s pretty and red, which totally doesn’t matter, but it was a total bonus.
It amazes me how many people just pay the regular cost of phones and don’t shop around. Good find, Becky.
Becky highlights a point I was going to make. These days it is almost guaranteed that the best bargains, and the least chance to get upsold on a bad insurance plan is to buy from your carrier’s website. You will get the upgrade discount. They often also have online only discounts (since they don’t have to pay a commission on those sales), and you get the full set of phone options to choose from (whereas Radio Shack and even some of the carrier stores will only have a limited subset of the phones).
Plus many times they have sales on “factory refurbished phones” (which come with warranty), which could save you even more money.
Point being, if you speak to a salesman, he has to get paid, and you are going to be paying for it in the price of your phone.
Also be wary of the contracts that other providers (like Radio Shack) gives you as opposed to the one that the carrier will give you. Make sure you are not paying up for that, or getting less for your insurance than you otherwise would.
Great points, JayMonster. So glad to see you back.