chgoeditor

I've been on an AT&T wireless plan for years. My latest 2-year contract is coming up and I feel as if I could save money with a pre-paid plan, but I'd love some thoughts and advice.

Background...
* Average monthly cell minutes: 157 (includes nights, weekends, M2M minutes)
* Average monthly texts sent & received: 255 (about equal send & receive)
* Average monthly data (KB): 565,000 (try to use wifi whenever possible, but data has been as high as 1.4 GB in months where I was on the road & wifi wasn't readily available)
* Currently playing $67 before fees for 450 daytime minutes with rollover, unlimited nights, weekends & mobile to mobile, 2GB data, 1000 SMS/MMS, $75 with taxes and fees
* Predominately use phone in Chicago, but travel to St. Louis, Northern Michigan (Little Traverse Bay), Dallas and Lakehurst/Manchester, NJ, frequently to see family
* Travel to Europe/Asia/Africa 2-3x per year. Keep my phone on, may send & received limited texts, answer phone in emergencies, turn off data. Also travel to Canada 1-3 times a year, about normal talk/text usage, turn data off. Most recent countries visited: Ireland, Northern Ireland, France, Netherlands, Morocco, Japan, Hong Kong.
* Android smartphone user, currently replace phone ~ every 2 years but would probably replace more often if not locked to a contract/price were right. Total 2 year cost (phone + plan) = $2K

Mobile wishlist...
* Fast data
* While traveling overseas, would prefer to have 2 options. 1. For longer trips, to forward mobile to Google Voice & buy a local SIM to use in phone for local voice + data. 2. For shorter international trips, to continue to use international roaming (even if it's limited use).
* Considering getting a Google Nexus 7 tablet. If I could possibly use Skyroam (or something similar) + my prepaid SIM to get data on that in the absence of wifi connection = terrific
* Lower total cost over 1 or 2 years.

Questions...
* Should I be sticking with GSM or considering CMDA phones/plans, too? (Worse case, I could use my old GSM Android with a local SIM when overseas if I switch to a CMDA phone.)

* Do the prices quoted for pre-paid plans typically include taxes? Or when they advertise $50 unlimited, for example, am I really paying $60 or $65?

* I know that AT&T's prepaid plan is GoPhone. Based on my actual usage over the last 18 months, the average monthly cost of GoPhone would be $17 less than my current plan. From a purely technical perspective, would I be getting the exact same speeds, network access, etc.? Or do pre-paid plan users get second-class treatment compared to the users who are under contract?

* If I stay with GSM, I understand my options are AT&T GoPhone, T-Mobile, Straight Talk and H2O Wireless. I cannot get a T-Mobile signal in my home, so do not want to use a pre-paid service that requires me to use T-Mobile's network. Do GoPhone, Straight Talk and H2O Wireless all use AT&T's network? Other options that are GSM networks?

* Looking strictly at price, Straight Talk is the cheapest at $45 a month unlimited. From a technical perspective, what differences would I notice when using this compared to my current AT&T service? (For example, it seems as if they don't offer nationwide roaming.)

Thanks!

OverThereTooMuch

You can eliminate tmobile prepaid from consideration based on your criteria.

No roaming outside of NA.
You can't forward the number. http://www.howardforums.com/showthre...Mobile-Prepaid

For GoPhone, I thought that they throttled the data speeds on prepaid.

Starting with my current cell, I have had:
- Tmobile prepaid
- Tmobile monthly (even more plus; No annual commitment, but not the same as prepaid)
- AT&T GoPhone
- AT&T annual contract

The GoPhone I had was pre-"4G", and I was really only getting email so I can't recall ever noticing if it was throttled or not. I had no complaints about any of the options, I just kept switching to what seemed like better deals for me (I have less voice use than you).

Prepaid users definitely get different CSR's. Quality of support seems to be lower.

Letitride3c

OP, I would not switch to CDMA (a/k/a Big Red) domestically if your existing GSM connections are mostly fine with reception & call quality, etc. - when you are looking to save some $$ once you are out of contract. Presumed that your existing Android is unlocked & perhaps not yet running a customized ROM, all the buzz lately isn't about ICS but Jelly Bean ...

I had an active Gophone account with data bundle for years, only recently discontinued as I'm finding more WiFi on the go/road with our travel patterns, plus I've a prepaid T-Mo Sim for voice only emergencies (Gold Status, cost only $10 a year to top-off/refill to keep it activated - my glove box/backpack safety "kit") and a China Mobile HK p/p SIM that's good in many places, rates comparable to domestic carrier's roaming charges.

Gophone just doubled their data packages, the bundle renewed every 30 day with unused balanced carrying over with refill/topping off - $15/mo now will give 200 MB instead of 100 MB before - there are a variety of options & choices, including monthly deals - the same Sim card can be moved around from device to device as IMEI checking isn't strictly enforced ("locked Sim to activated phone only ...) I would look into details further as they just rolled it out recently - there's a subforum over at howardforum . com under AT&T Gophone with many useful info/discussions about prepaid.

I'm not in a position to comment about AT&T throttling their prepaid as I'v never noticed it - speed is good enough for my basic email/web browsing & GPS usage in the vehicle, and, besides - I'm paying for the data bundle & the faster I used it up, the more $$ I will add for the next refill - the concerns most likely affect those running VPN or downloading/streaming movies on a paid connection ??? For those, I would use WiFi if and when it's available .

The prices & rates quoted for these prepaid included all the taxes, fees & surcharges, nothing hidden or extra - for AT&T and T-Mo, no administrative fees - and I refill mine via online retailer, getting a 3% to 10% discount on top. You can setup online account manager to check your feature packages, balance & detailed call/data usags, etc. easily for free - customer services & support are fine (the lower costs/bundled plans via H2O or Simple reflect a scaled down support/care as expected - good for saving $$ as long as you can manage things well)

For using compatible devices, AT&T is very good - almost anything will work as is, with minimal APN or data configurations, H2O or Simple are said to be more limited in what devices are permitted (when bring your own over) unless you buy one in their limited selection (and tend not to be as advanced)

For domestic GV apps, I'm about GrooVe IP Lite, it's VOIP over WiFi without using airtime minutes for making free calls in the US and that along with Skype - are great in keeping the cost for the total package very reasonable.

That's about all the time I have to knock off a few thoughts ATM to help you out in thinking about the options ... post more if/when I get a chance & look into this a bit further.

Qasimja

i just recently switched to straight talk they have Sim cards now its byod (bring your own device) its 45.00 a month unlimited talk ,text and data they say the data is unlimited but most people who use it say they might throttle you if you go over 2gigs a month consistently

transpac

T-Mobile pre-paid allows international roaming in ~ 40 + countries:


http://prepaid-phones.t-mobile.com/c...llingRates.pdf



I can also recommend GrooVeIP if you have a Google Voice number/account. I opted for the paid version which allows use on 3G. I make/receive calls to/from the U.S.A. anywhere I have 3G data or WiFi. It is a great app.



I am pretty sure Straight Talk offers nationwide roaming, assuming you mean the U.S.? Further, as I understand it, you can get a Straight Talk SIM specifically for use on AT&T, so perhaps little or no difference from your current AT&T service.

http://www.straighttalk.com/shopsims


BTW, that is a lot of texts per month. Have you looked at alternative messaging platforms/apps like WhatsApp! Line? Tango? Viber?

chgoeditor

Be that as it may, I get no T-Mobile reception in my house unless I hang out one window. And since I work from home, that's somewhat essential.
No, but don't those require both sender & receiver to use the same platform?

transpac

Understood, but others are reading this thread and I wanted to correct the lack of international roaming misinformation on T-Mo PAYG.


Yes, all of the alternative messaging apps. I mentioned require the same platform. That said you may be surprised how many of your contacts use one or more of these apps. currently? IMO/E WhatsApp! is brilliant, not so much as it is essentially free, but because it is easy so easy to use, specifically sending pictures and videos. For some businesses this makes it super easy to transmit product/service/retail/RE information and close a sale in seconds.

Qasimja

I agree Grooveip is a lifesaver saved me alot of money when i went to europe just using wifi or 3g data to keep in touch with the kids

Dubai Stu

I like WhatsApp as well. I thought Tmobile had international roaming, but couldn't find the link last night. The rates (as I recall) weren't very good.

If you go with a TMobile issued Android phone, you get their UMA service (when the TMobile) SIM is in which gives you service over wifi.

OverThereTooMuch

Thanks for the link. I just spent about a half hour reading through a bunch of different info on the Tmobile support site, and there's still a lot of conflicting info here.

Many of their international support articles clearly mention that specific things don't apply to Monthly 4G or Prepaid - Pay As You Go. Data roaming with prepaid is just as confusing.

Doc Savage

Pagepluscellular.com offers Verizon coverage, great service for very cheap prices.

transpac

I only found out about the relatively recent T-Mo/PAYG international roaming capabilities when I turned my phone on in the UA RCC at NRT and started getting service, on 2100 MHz 3G via Softbank. Obviously the rates are bit exorbitant and I probably wouldn't use it except to monitor in-bound SMSes and calls, and in emergency situations. It might also be valuable for OTPs (One Time Passwords)? I wish roaming worked here in Thailand.

chgoeditor

Just had a long conversation with an AT&T rep today who confirmed it's silly for me not to switch to a GoPhone plan. She claimed they don't throttle data speed.

Just looked again and see that I'm paying about $74 a month for my minutes + texts + data. Based on the same usage, the prepaid plan will be $50 a month. That ~$300 a year savings essentially allows me to upgrade to a new no-contract phone each year (rather than every 2 years with AT&T). Just ordered the Galaxy Nexus today.

My only unresolved issue is porting my number. The phone rep & AT&T website claim my number can't be ported to GoPhone, which defies logic. The rep did say that sometimes the store reps can accomplish things they can't do over the phone.

Worst case, I port my phone to Google Voice and either keep it there or temporarily rest it before porting it to GoPhone.

The only reason *not* to keep the number ported to GV is that they apparently still don't fully support MMS.

Anyone have another workaround when a company claims a number can't be ported to a specific provider?

mrcamp

Even though expensive, as expected, tmobile payg does work outside the USA. My tmobile registered and made test call when I was in Nigeria in April. However, thanks to my tmobile payg when I was in Jamaica for a week last month. I needed to be reachable and both my Telna and truphone sims were unreliable. I was being charged for calls that never reached me. Quickly changed my forwarding to my tmobile sim. It worked flawlessly and the few calls I received were crisp clear! One caller even asked if I was actually in Jamaica because of the clarity of the call.

Palal

One caveat on GV: can't send/receive int'l SMS (don't know why). Can't use non-latin characters, some lag is possible if you use it through GrooVe IP.