Cell Phone Plan

[zukeypur]

I'm curious to know which cell plans you all recommend. We have been with Verizon since before it was Verizon, but we have just had enough of their high prices and billing issues. We also travel from the Austin area to West TX several times per year, and there is a 2 hour window on the trip where we have no service. When we got an email from our ISP (Altice) for a new mobile plan for $20 per line for unlimited everything for life, we jumped on it. It has been an absolute NIGHTMARE. Customer service is only available through chat, is unhelpful, service is spotty at best, and we had absolutely no service this past weekend when we went back to West TX for 4 days for a funeral. Family and friend were trying to reach us with no luck the whole time. It supposedly uses Sprint and AT&T towers for coverage, but it does a poor job of switching providers and AT&T is throttling Altice customers. I need to find an alternative ASAP. I am fine with either prepaid or postpaid, but I need something reliable on either Verizon or AT&T towers. We were spending $89 for two lines and 4GB of shared data on Verizon, so I would like something in that price range or cheaper, more data would be nice. We usually stay under 4GB when we are going about our daily lives, but we usually go over when we travel (which is where the billing issues come in with Verizon). DD2 has been on Mint Mobile for the past 6 months or so, and we were pretty happy with that, although she had little service in West Texas as well. As much as I hate to say it, it sounds like we really need Verizon towers. So far I have found that Straight Talk uses Verizon towers, but they don't have many plan options. We need 2-3 lines (I might put DD back on Mint Mobile if I can't find anything else, as she uses less than 1 GB per month) Any recommendations are appreciated!

[jerseygirl07067]

I think a lot of your carriers effectiveness will be based on the area that you are in and how many towers they have.

I live in Central Florida and I have Verizon for work and the coverage is very good, even in a lot of the remote areas. I've had AT&T which is also really good but a few dead spots here and there. I currently have T-Mobile and really like it. The price is awesome, $40 per line it you do auto bill pay, unlimited everything! I'm probably a data hog even more so than my kids lol . We get free Netflix with our plan and there is T-Mobile Tuesdays where they give away a bunch of stuff for free and have coupons. They also have really good deals on phones. I just traded in my daughter's iPhone SE and got a free iPhone 8. I believe they are even doing it now with the 11. Sometimes the quality is not perfect but I will take that because of the price and I usually use data and text more anyway.

I guess that does not ever answer your original question as you needed something to stay on certain carriers towers, but it's all else fails see how T-Mobile's coverage is in your area. You can go on their website put in your ZIP code or the ZIP codes of where you need coverage and you can see. I just had to get a signal booster for my home which was $25 but it has worked out perfectly as there are a few dead spots right around my house.

Their customer service is awesome, when I call I generally get someone within a minute or two. Highly recommend T-Mobile if they have good coverage in your area!

[calebsmama03]

We were always happy with Tmobile and their coverage is increasing. We switched to Xfinity Mobile about 15mos ago when we decided to get our kids cell phones in high school. Xfinity uses Verizon towers and we've been really happy with it so far. If you have iPhones that work on Vz you can BYOD (some other iphones work, you'd need to check their site) but so far BYOD is only for iPhones, otherwise you have to buy the device through them. A few caveats - you have to have another Comcast Xfinity service to get it and they recently changed their plan terms and structure. We are on the old grandfathered plans though, so I'm not sure how it is now. The old plan is pay by the gig $12 per gig shared, or $45 per line unlimited. Voice and text are unlimited and free (pay taxes/fees) so I have unlimited and turn on my hotspot when on car trips as needed. DH, DD, and DS have cellular data turned off for most things so their plans cost $12 total for all 3 lines (plus taxes, of course). The newer plans price structure is nice because you can get up to 10gigs of shared data for $60, which would be PERFECT for us, BUT the "gen 2" plans are subject to throttling and once you leave a gen 1 plan you can't go back, so I'm hesitant to try it because I don't know how bad the throttling will be and don't want to risk it. Might be worth looking at if you are a comcast customer.

[NCGrandma]

Definitely consider which carriers have good coverage in your home area AND in any areas where you travel frequently. I previously had T-Mobile which was pretty good here but really terrible near my NE family's house. After I switched to Verizon, I had good coverage in both places. When Verizon dropped my very favorable prepaid plan, I switched to Cricket which also uses the Verizon network, and it's been fine.


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[zukeypur]

I think a lot of your carriers effectiveness will be based on the area that you are in and how many towers they have.

I live in Central Florida and I have Verizon for work and the coverage is very good, even in a lot of the remote areas. I've had AT&T which is also really good but a few dead spots here and there. I currently have T-Mobile and really like it. The price is awesome, $40 per line it you do auto bill pay, unlimited everything! I'm probably a data hog even more so than my kids lol . We get free Netflix with our plan and there is T-Mobile Tuesdays where they give away a bunch of stuff for free and have coupons. They also have really good deals on phones. I just traded in my daughter's iPhone SE and got a free iPhone 8. I believe they are even doing it now with the 11. Sometimes the quality is not perfect but I will take that because of the price and I usually use data and text more anyway.

I guess that does not ever answer your original question as you needed something to stay on certain carriers towers, but it's all else fails see how T-Mobile's coverage is in your area. You can go on their website put in your ZIP code or the ZIP codes of where you need coverage and you can see. I just had to get a signal booster for my home which was $25 but it has worked out perfectly as there are a few dead spots right around my house.

Their customer service is awesome, when I call I generally get someone within a minute or two. Highly recommend T-Mobile if they have good coverage in your area!

Thank you! I will check out T-Mobile. Supposedly, Altice will get better in the future when Sprint merges with T-mobile. In the meantime, it is horrible.

We were always happy with Tmobile and their coverage is increasing. We switched to Xfinity Mobile about 15mos ago when we decided to get our kids cell phones in high school. Xfinity uses Verizon towers and we've been really happy with it so far. If you have iPhones that work on Vz you can BYOD (some other iphones work, you'd need to check their site) but so far BYOD is only for iPhones, otherwise you have to buy the device through them. A few caveats - you have to have another Comcast Xfinity service to get it and they recently changed their plan terms and structure. We are on the old grandfathered plans though, so I'm not sure how it is now. The old plan is pay by the gig $12 per gig shared, or $45 per line unlimited. Voice and text are unlimited and free (pay taxes/fees) so I have unlimited and turn on my hotspot when on car trips as needed. DH, DD, and DS have cellular data turned off for most things so their plans cost $12 total for all 3 lines (plus taxes, of course). The newer plans price structure is nice because you can get up to 10gigs of shared data for $60, which would be PERFECT for us, BUT the "gen 2" plans are subject to throttling and once you leave a gen 1 plan you can't go back, so I'm hesitant to try it because I don't know how bad the throttling will be and don't want to risk it. Might be worth looking at if you are a comcast customer.

The primary reason we tried Altice was because of the many positive reviews for Xfinity. Unfortunately, comcast is not an option for us. We have Suddenlink, which is also awful. I guess I should have known.

Definitely consider which carriers have good coverage in your home area AND in any areas where you travel frequently. I previously had T-Mobile which was pretty good here but really terrible near my NE family's house. After I switched to Verizon, I had good coverage in both places. When Verizon dropped my very favorable prepaid plan, I switched to Cricket which also uses the Verizon network, and it's been fine.


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I'll check out Cricket also since it uses Verizon towers. Do you have the same coverage and strength that you had with Verizon? I wonder if they prioritize Verizon customers over Cricket.

[AnnieW625]

I have had Verizon for 17 years and I have had very few problems with billing and no problems with cell service. We have three iPhones, one payment plan, and the basic unlimited talk, text, and data and we pay $185 or so a month. I have thought about switching multiple times but never have. I am just happy with the service. I live in an area with tons of coverage from all networks but I never have dropped calls. I would go with the network that serves your new area the best. Verizon is the only network that works in the middle of nowhere Wyoming where my in-laws live, and in the mountains of SoCal where my grandma lives.


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[zukeypur]

I have had Verizon for 17 years and I have had very few problems with billing and no problems with cell service. We have three iPhones, one payment plan, and the basic unlimited talk, text, and data and we pay $185 or so a month. I have thought about switching multiple times but never have. I am just happy with the service. I live in an area with tons of coverage from all networks but I never have dropped calls. I would go with the network that serves your new area the best. Verizon is the only network that works in the middle of nowhere Wyoming where my in-laws live, and in the mountains of SoCal where my grandma lives.


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Verizon works great where we live, and also in West Texas. The only big issue (besides billing) is the big hole in the middle of Texas for a two hour stretch.

We increase our plan during summer vacation because we know we will be traveling and using more data. I did it mid-cycle through the app so that I wouldn't have to talk to anyone. Two weeks later I got a notification with 12 hours left in the billing cycle that I was out of data, so I did the Verizon UP to get a gig of data to last the day. It never showed up. When I called, they said I used it, which is impossible because I never got it. It takes 1 week to use a GB, and they said I used it in 30 minutes (we were home on wifi this whole time). They gave us a free GB, but then billed us for it. Then they told me that I could only increase my data plan, not decrease (even though the app let me), and that I would have to prove that I really only used 4GB per month before they would approve the decrease from 8GB back down to 4GB. This is after they could clearly look over the last 10-15 years of bills and see that we rarely go over 4GB. I had to pay for 8GB and then call back 1 month later to ask for a refund for the difference.

[MSWR0319]

Did Straight Talk not have an unlimited plan? Straight talk has an unlimited plan for two lines for $90, which is the same as what you're paying but with more data. It may be possible to add a third line cheaper but I'm not sure.

[wendibird22]

We were long time customers of ATT but switched to Verizon a few years ago because service in our town was spotty with ATT. I have an apple watch with data and could go on a 3 mile run and never once get cellular service. The whole point of having a watch with cellular was so that I could leave my phone home. And DH would find he'd have to go on our front porch sometimes to make a phone call. Verizon has been great so far. That said, we are pay $300 a month for 4 phones and a watch for 16G of shared data (8G rolls over) but that cost also includes monthly payments on 2 iphones and $30 insurance on all 5 devices. So it's probably closer to $200 for talk/text/data for the 5 devices.

[dogmom]

I switched to T-Mobile recently. I get 5 lines of unlimited data/call/text. It includes unlimited data and text in many other countries. (Used it in Aruba) AND it pays for my Netflix for $180 you can get a $10 a month kickback a line if you use less data, so my MIL phone always gets a discount and often my DH since he uses WiFi a lot.

I found this site helpful to compare carriers

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.whi...s/Coverage/amp

I needed to check that they had coverage in a couple of places. There are still dead spots in the middle on nowhere, but OK for us. It’s so individual to where you live and travel.