Is there a good cell phone choice for this unusual need?

[kranky]

I'm looking for a cell phone plan for an unusual situation. Infrequent travel to a few different big cities for 1-3 weeks at a time. When this happens, I might use about 100-200 minutes per day, and almost all the calls will be local to where I am. Travel might be 2-6 times/year. When not traveling, the phone won't be used at all.

I first thought of AT&T prepaid (gophone), but the minutes expire after 30 days. It has the huge advantage of no long distance and no roaming charges. Cost/minute can be high if not buying a ton of minutes at a time. But if I buy a lot of minutes, they might expire before the next trip.

I doubt it's possible, but the ideal situation would be to pick up a prepaid phone the first time I get to a certain destination city, making the roaming issue irrelevant. Hopefully the minutes would be cheap and wouldn't expire as fast as AT&T.

Any thoughts?

 

[conjur]

Minimum Cingular Nationwide with rollover?

http://www.cingular.com (guess you'll have to key in your zip but you should have a Nationwide GSM 450 plan available):

Monthly cost *$39.99
Anytime minutes 450
Night & weekend minutes 5,000
Long distance Included
Roaming charges Included
Additional minutes $0.45 per minute
One-time activation fee $36.00
Contract length 2 years

 

[vi edit]

How do calling cards (at .04 or less a minute) work with cell phones on roam?

If you call an 800 number on roam do you get dinged a charge?

 

[kranky]

Thanks for the good pointers. I'll be checking them out today.

 

[dabuddha]

Originally posted by: vi_edit
How do calling cards (at .04 or less a minute) work with cell phones on roam?

If you call an 800 number on roam do you get dinged a charge?

AFAIK, If you're roaming with your cell phone, you still get charged per minute. With AT&T, they charge me $.69/minute AND it uses up my minutes if I'm roaming. If I'm on the AT&T network and I call an 800 number, it still uses up my minutes.

 

[Christoph]

So you're saying that your usage might be zero one month, then 2000 (3 weeks x 100 minutes per day) minutes the next? Is this all peak business-hour stuff, or will some usage be nights/weekends? Do you need voice usage only, or data as well?

Are most of your calls incoming or outgoing?

Are the phone numbers you're calling/taking calls from mostly land-lines, or cellular? If cellular, which carrier? If the bulk of your calls are to numbers on one cellular carrier you may be better off getting a phone from that carrier with an unlimited mobile-to-mobile feature.

Is there no land-line at all available where you're going? Could you have people call you on the cell, then call them back from a land-line with a calling card?

How far in advance do you know you're going to be traveling? If you have a few weeks' notice, you could change your plan every time you know, but this could bite you if you don't have enough notice or forget to switch the plan.

If you're looking at prepaid, check out Virgin Mobile as well. I believe they use the Sprint network. 100 minutes in a day would run you $11.50 (.25 for the first 10, .10 per minute after that). Minutes don't expire as long as you add $20 to your account every 90 days.

Have you posed this question on howardforums?

 

[Drakkon]

I use a tracfone and its been a great solkution for me since i dont talk on it that much. There cheap to pickup and get talking too though...i think at walmart you get a phone and 80 minutes for like $40. They take about 5 minutes to activate online. They also let you change your "local" number up to 4 times a year or something like that and the process is pretty smooth, but that takes a phone call to one of those india call centers. You can buy a phone card that keeps the mintues from expiring for a year too.

 

[kranky]

So you're saying that your usage might be zero one month, then 2000 (3 weeks x 100 minutes per day) minutes the next? Is this all peak business-hour stuff, or will some usage be nights/weekends? Do you need voice usage only, or data as well?

Mostly peak.

Are most of your calls incoming or outgoing?

About 50-50

Are the phone numbers you're calling/taking calls from mostly land-lines, or cellular? If cellular, which carrier? If the bulk of your calls are to numbers on one cellular carrier you may be better off getting a phone from that carrier with an unlimited mobile-to-mobile feature.

Most calls will be to and from cell phones. But chances are they will be long-distance calls, so it's good if long distance is included.

Is there no land-line at all available where you're going? Could you have people call you on the cell, then call them back from a land-line with a calling card?

No, I'm outside at construction sites with no landline available.

How far in advance do you know you're going to be traveling? If you have a few weeks' notice, you could change your plan every time you know, but this could bite you if you don't have enough notice or forget to switch the plan.

I can't count on having a lot of notice, unfortunately.

If you're looking at prepaid, check out Virgin Mobile as well. I believe they use the Sprint network. 100 minutes in a day would run you $11.50 (.25 for the first 10, .10 per minute after that). Minutes don't expire as long as you add $20 to your account every 90 days.

I checked Virgin Mobile, but as far as I can tell they do not offer roaming. Only service in your home area.

Have you posed this question on howardforums?

Thanks for the tip, I'll check it out.