For those of you who have cell phones (obviously), when you got yours (your first cell phone, and/or the one you have now), how did you decide
…what kind of phone to get?
…what company to get cell phone service from?
…what “plan” to sign up for?
I still don’t have a cell phone yet, partly because every time I look into getting one, I am overwhelmed with the number of choices I would have to make, without knowing what basis on which to make those choices.
I got mine in about 1994. I didn’t want a bag phone, so I got a big, gray, heavy flip phone. It was huge compared to the phones now. I live in a small town and there was only one carrier at the time. I’m sure this isn’t what you’re really looking for, though!!
Look at the coverage maps of the carriers for your home, office, and other areas you are likely to spend time. Talk to coworkers about their experience with coverage at the office.
For the phone itself…do you want a simple device that just makes calls, or do you want a smartphone that lets you do all the latest cool stuff? Do you want to read and send e-mails? Is a physical keyboard important to you? If you want to browse the web, you’ll want to look at screen sizes. If you want to watch youtube or other videos, you’ll want to look at screen resolution.
And there’s more…of course… 
-D/a
When I got my first cell phone I went with Cricket because it was unlimited talk for a set price (I think it was about $30). I regretted it almost immediately; their footprint was very small - I basically had no coverage out of town. I now use T-Mobile with a plan that lets me talk to other T-Moblie customers free, nights and weekends are free, my five “faves” are free and I get 300 minutes a month, plus unlimited text. Since I really don’t talk on the phone that often, other than to those 5 people, it suits me.
My phone has a QWERTY keypad because I hate trying to text on a dialer.
For my current phone: our carrier is the one with the best coverage in the largely rural county where my husband works, so we went with the family plan - I can talk to him, the kids, and my niece without burning minutes. Because of his initial plan, I was able to be grandfathered in on unlimited data, so I chose a Droid phone. After years of proclaiming that “I only need a phone to make and receive phone calls,” I am now unabashedly in love with my smart phone. In one tiny little package, I can phone, text, surf the net, take photos or record video (and post them straight to Facebook or Picasa,) play games, read a book, etc. I have friends who operate small businesses who are able to accept credit cards now, with just a phone and an inexpensive attachment. It’s all pretty amazing!
Previously, I had just a basic phone through Cricket, and I was satisfied at the time, but that was before I drank the smart phone Koolaid!
I seem to remember my first cell was a trac phone, because it was the only way i could get one without a contract. It was a pay as you go, stick phone [not as big as a brick] a nokia if memory serves. This was back in 1992. I mainly got it because my husband was in the navy and would go out to sea for random amounts of time, and I did not want to be stuck out in the ass end of nowhere and have the phone go out, and have something happen where I would desperately need to call police or rescue. I also had an old international harvester Scout that was normally dependable, but you can never tell if a tire is going to blow out on you in the middle of nowhere[ or whatever car problem that ensued], and we had AAA so I could call for assistance.
I had the phone for about 12 years, then we got verizon mainly because mrAru got a job with them and we got a deal on it. Got nokia clamshells at that time, and kept upgrading the clamshells with newer ones until about 7 years ago when I got my first PDA phone, a Palm Treo [that didn’t need internet] that 2 years later got upgraded to a motorola that had internet, and last upgrade was to my droid 3 years ago.
Through the years I tried several companies. Verizon had the best coverage. Things may have improved with other companies but I find no reason to change. I just bought the iPhone 4s when my Droid started to go bad. Chose it because my girlfriend bought me an ipad for Christmas and I wanted to take advantage of the icloud. When I got my first phone there weren’t many choices so it doesn’t really matter as part of this discussion.
I wanted a pay-as-you-go phone rather than being tied down to a contract. Issues like “minutes” or “text charges” weren’t an issue for me because I have no friends and nobody calls me ever. I wanted it mostly for emergencies (needing to call AAA, etc) or calling from a hotel room or something where the rates would be atrocious. This was about 10 years ago and I went with Virgin Mobile because they had the best coverage a) where I live, 2) where my relatives live, iii) places I frequently traveled. The price was right too - $20 every 3 months, calls costing (I think) 10 cents a minute, 4 cents after 20 minutes of use a day (something strange like that.) The unused cash rolled over to the next period. The phone itself cost around $25 IIRC.
I finally switched over to a smart phone just this year, and decided to stick with Virgin since I’d never had a problem and they seemed very reliable. That in addition to them advertising a flat-rate, pay-as-you-go monthly fee of unlimited EVERYTHING for $25/month. Calling, texting, web surfing, EVERYTHING. And guess what? One of the reasons I was reluctant to switch to a new phone is because of the rolling-over of the money on the old phone, I had accumulated like $150 worth of credit I was not wanting to give up. They ROLLED OVER that credit to the new phone! I essentially got to use it free for 6 months!
The downside: when you usually buy phones (aside from Apple) you can get them relatively cheaply when signing up for a plan. This one (an Android) set me back $200. If it lasts as long as my last cell though, I see that as an ok investment purchase.
I went with Tmobile first, because my mom had Tmobile. I was on her family plan for my first cell phone, which I got when I was 18. After she kicked me off her plan, my dad put me on *his *family plan, with Cingular. I didn’t choose the carrier in either case.
Then I got my own phone. I shopped around between all the major carriers, and found that Tmobile had the cheapest plans. I was on a very tight budget, and my mom was still with them and liked their service. So I went with Tmobile, and I’ve been with them ever since. My current contract expires in May, though, and the whole AT&T fiasco has given me a distaste for Tmobile. So now I’ve decided to go with a pay-as-you-go company once this contract expires (possibly Virgin or Cricket, I’m leaning toward Virgin though). My uncle and his daughter both have Virgin phones, and their plans seem very reasonable. The only negative is, I’ll have to save up for a couple months to pay for the phone upfront. But that beats being roped into a contract. 2 years is a VERY long time to be tethered to the same technology.
I’m thinking I’d like a Blackberry
As far as which plan to sign up for, get a midrange plan until you can gauge how many minutes and texts you will be using (I am eyeing the unlimited data/300 talk-minutes with Virgin for $35 a month). Unless you rarely use your current phone, you don’t want to go with the lowest plan and find out that you run out of minutes/texts on the 15th. Once you figure out how much time you need, you can upgrade or downgrade your plan.
Oh, I just did some surfing on Virgin’s website. Now I’m thinking I’d like not a Blackberry.
the first one I got was a basic phone in like 2000, I don’t remember what it was. I just cared about it being a phone. then work issued me one, so from about 2003-2010 I didn’t have my own.
most recently, I got an HTC Trophy from Verizon.
I’m like voguevixen, I infrequently use my cell phone. I bought a used unlocked Razr on eBay for $20 some years back (you can get them now for $8). I pay less than $30 per year on a pay-as-you-go plan that rolls over with a company called Page Plus. Never had a problem with coverage or low signals.
Recently, I configured my cell phone to act as a pager for work. I also use my cell phone as a watch (to check time), as an alarm clock and as a white noise sound generator for sleeping. I’ve used it to take perfectly adequate photos. The battery charge lasts for days. (can probably stretch to a week between recharges)
I find it incomprehensible how much money people spend for their cell phones… a lot of people don’t know there are cheap alternatives and end up lining the pockets of big corporations that offer bad service.
I got a Samsung Galaxy S2 as that was the most advanced android phone that was on the market when it was time for a new one (my work lets us pick a new phone once a year). An alternative could have been iPhone, but I refuse to use Apple products as I know how they do business.
Picking the service provider was rather easy as I work for one.
This, plus talk to your neighbors. There are random spots even within a city and dense suburbs where Verizon ain’t so great or ATT isn’t.
Then also ask your extended family and your friends what they have. We had Verizon as a family back in the mid 90’s. Then one uncle had ATT because Verizon coverage in LA was shit (is it still – this info is 5 years old now), so we all rolled over onto ATT because calling the same carrier is free.
Also, you should think about rolling your landline over into a cell phone. Only $10 a month and you can take it wherever you go or just leave it at home. Free long distance (just uses minutes) and much cheaper than any landline.
First you figure out how and where you’re likely to use your phone. For us, we both had to consistently be reachable within town on call weekends, I was going to he doing a decent bit of solo long distance driving so I needed to be able to call for help if indicated, and I wanted a cheaper way to call my parents.
I think most companies offer statewide local calling standard now, but they didn’t always, so that and free nights/weekends was definitely a shopping criteria for us. (My parents live in the same state but different area code, which is ridiculously expensive to call on a landline but wouldn’t be much cheaper on a cell if you have to burn minutes and pay long distance charges.) Reception in our neighborhood was a huge deal because so much of our phone use would happen at home.
Our plan has changed over the years, starting out as a high minute, low frills option and morphing into texting, data, etc as what we want from our phones has changed. As for the phones, I generally look at what they have on special for re-upping and pick whatever is cheap, basic, and has good battery life. I don’t text to speak of, I don’t want or need constant access to the intertubes or games, and I really don’t get the whole “ooh, shiny button” thing, so this month’s outdated “one penny with activation” phone suits me fine. It would NOT suit my husband fine, because he uses his phone differently than I use mine.
When my kid got a new cell phone I bought his old one from him. It’s a Samsung “egg” and I buy time from t-mobile by the chunk rather than sign up for a plan. This works for me.
When it comes to WHO to use as a provider, I’m going to agree with the above statements.
Think of all the places you go regularly, that you want to be able to make calls from. Talk to people in those locations, and find out who their provider is and how it works. for them.
Next, see if your employer has any cellphone provider deals. Lots of mid-sized to large companies do. I get 11% off of the standard monthly rate, through my employer.
The last thing to remember is, your choice of provider and phone are not life long commitments.
Phone numbers are often portable, especially in larger markets. If you go with a typical contract, it’s usually for 2 years, and after that you go to month-to-month. At any point after that, you can switch. Most cellphone companies will offer you a discount on a new phone every 2 years. If you find you picked a plan with to many or to few minutes, you can usually change plans with the same provider.
Since everything except the provider is changeable, I usually start with which provider will give me good coverage, and go from there.
For us, with three kids, it made sense to go with one of the big provider family plans. The three kids’ phones were $10 each per month extra, plus we initially got five phones for free (although I went with a Chocolate for $20 or $30 extra). It then came down to Verizon and ATT based on coverage, and Verizon edged out out ATT for where we typically go on vacation.
Getting a phone for just one or two, OP? Then this info is useless for you!
I didn’t decide, I got an iPhone.
My parents got a Verizon family plan because it had the best coverage in our area (DC) and until a couple of years ago, was the only carrier that worked inside the Metro. They got me a phone as part of that when I was 14. It’s been ten years and we’re still on Verizon. They just upgraded me to an iPhone as a Christmas present.
I will probably be kicked off their family plan when I finish grad school in May and get a real paying job. I’m likely to stay with Verizon just because of the coverage issue and the fact that the rest of the family uses them as well. You have to pay through the nose for service, but what good is a phone that drops calls? It’s worth it.