this post was submitted on 17 Jul 2024
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Not really a "hack" but I don't know why most people get into phone contracts.
Since college, I have always just bought unlocked phones with cash and then used the carrier's prepaid plans and set it to auto pay.
I pay so much less than most people I know, I get all the same service, and my phone isn't tied to a contract or carrier, so I can cancel my plan whenever I want and switch to another carrier by just buying their SIM card for ~$20.
My current phone is an unlocked Pixel 6a that I got on sale new for $300. I have unlimited talk, text, and data for $45 a month. And if I get sick of my current carrier or they bump my cost, I can just switch to anybody else for just the cost of a $20 SIM card.
I have so many friends and family members that complain about their phone bills being super high and their service sucking, but they can't cancel their contracts without paying off their huge balances plus the interest and usually cancelation fees. Plus, because their phone is tied to the contract/carrier, they can't even keep transfer the phone to the new carrier and have to get sucked into a "phone trade-in" deal and the cycle continues.
And for the folks saying that most people can't afford to save up and buy a phone outright, there are a lot of places that offer payment plans for the phone, or you can buy it on credit and pay it off that way, which would likely be less interest over time. Or you could buy unlocked used/refurbished phones for 25-50% off their normal price.
Maybe it makes sense if you get a stipend from your company, or you bundle it with a bunch of other packages like cable TV or internet, but for just a cell phone, I just don't get locking yourself into a crazy contract.
This seems like an American problem. This used to be the case in the Netherlands as well but over the years people have learned that SIM-only subscriptions are so much easier and cheaper that the majority of people now use SIM-only. In fact I know of no one around me that does it differently.
Also $45 per month is still expensive lol. I pay β¬12 a month. Sure, not unlimited but I never call or SMS so the 100 a month I get for that is way more than enough and I never finish the 10GB of data a month either. I can make either unlimited for really not that much more.
I believe a major factor in this was a ruling by the Hoge Raad that a "free" phone with a contract is unlawful and is actually a loan. Carriers now have to list the price for the phone and for the service separately, so it's a lot more clear what the costs of the phone are.
Also, a "free" phone is now registered as a loan with monthly recurring costs, which impacts for example the maximum mortgage you can get on a home.
Also in the Netherlands and I have recently extended this concept to my home internet. Since 25 Mbps download / 10 Mbps upload is enough for my use, I no longer have an internet subscription and I make use of $25 LycaMobile unlimited data sim cards for home internet using a sim router. The IMEI of the router can be easily modified, which is also a plus.
Do you have a static or dynamic IP though? For some applications one would want a static one iirc
The IP is dynamic, but for my self-hosted services that require a static IP I make use of a WireGuard tunnel between my raspberry pi and a virtual private server. The VPS has a static IP, so my domains point at the VPS and then the VPS re-routes the packets via the wireguard tunnel. In a wire guard tunnel only the server needs a static IP, so the VPS can route packets to the client even if the client's ip is dynamic.
If your're at the point where you need a static IP, then 25mb down is probably not going to cut it for you anyway.
France is a bit similar, but a new phone company decided to cut down the costs by not providing a phone. 20 β¬ a month formore data than you'll ever need or 50 β¬ a month with the latest iPhone included everyone chooses the first option
Nice, over here $45 a month is pretty cheap, at least in my circles. Most people I know are paying close to double that.
Have you checked price comparison sites recently? In germany you can get 10GB for 5β¬ now
I was recently comparing some phone plans and found that nowadays, you mostly just pay the actual price of the device, plus the normal subscription costs, no interest or anything.
Got a Pixel 8 Pro from Odido (awful service btw, would not go with them again). The device costs me 30 euros per month, for 2 years, which comes out to 720 euros at the end. That's actually cheaper than the normal resale price of ~870 (average according to Tweakers).
Actually thinking about it now, I wonder what the catch is. That kinda seems too good to be true.
Bonus points in that android phones won't have their bootloader encrypted by a cellular service provider.
Absolutely right!
It feels like the nineties/2000 just called :-D
I pay 10β¬/m for "unlimited" 5G (186GB/month IIRC).
Nice! Maybe Europe has it better, (wouldn't be the first time lol.)
Hey, don't be shy ;-)
Part of the problem is that weβre advertised at constantly, so when the latest, greatest iPhone or Galaxy or Pixel comes along we feel like we need it. Because if we get the Β£1200 phone the resell value in two years will still be high, right? It actually makes sense.
But the only way to afford that is to borrow the money to pay for it.
I picked up an iPhone 13 mini last year, on a two year contract, for Β£29 a month. And thatβs ok by me. By the end of my contract Iβll go SIM-only and my bill will drop to around Β£10 a month, which Iβll rock until Apple finally release another mini phone.
So this 13 mini will be the last phone I ever useβ¦
I agree except who is charging you $20 for a sim?
Verizon, might have been a little less, but reasonable to me, I keep my phones for a long time, and I got a really good deal on it.
Interesting, seems like Europe has some really cheap options, much cheaper than the US.
Hell go to swappa.com and buy an unlocked used phone.160 and you can have a S20 which works perfectly.
Because people want the latest iPhone or Samsung and paying $ per month works better for them than $$$ upfront. The alternate finance method you speak of isnβt very well known, so itβs most simple to contract with a carrier.
I don't know if I'm grandfathered in or what but I have Google Fi (I know I know I suck) and have 3 lines unlimited everything for $80/month
Solid.
Google Fi is a god-tier service for traveling abroad. When I went to South America I paid nothing extra vs my friends who had to deal with Verizonβs ridiculous travel plan fees.
Maybe I'm misunderstanding something but here in Australia there's no benefit to not having a contract.
With our largest telco the contract is really just repayments on the phone. 24x monthly repayments is always the same price the phone is retailing for outright. You could cancel the sim and just keep up the phone repayments if you wanted.
Interesting. Seems like my situation is pretty specific to the US. Lots of folks from other countries that seem to have much cheaper options by default.
But who actually does this otherwise? I have seen those kind of contracts advertised, but I never see people actually having them, apart from some 16yo who want the new iPhone by all means and this is the only way they can finance it.
Almost everybody I know has something like this, growing up as a teenager it was the same too.
Wtf where your from? Is this some murica dumbness I'm to European to understand? Is it common in Europe and I just know smart people?
But yes, hyped teenager is the only group I've actually seen falling for that when I was at school
If you go prepaid for a year you can get service for even cheaper. I don't need unlimited data so I buy a year of Mint Mobile's cheapest plan for about 200 dollars which gives unlimited talk and text and 5gb data for only around 15 dollars a month.
Right on. I do need unlimited, as my job requires me to be on the road a fair bit and accessing lots of data.
But that's a good idea, I'll see if my carrier offers that option.
I should clarify that mint mobile also has "unlimited" and "unnecessary" plans for 30 and 40 dollars a month respectfully. (When prepaying for a year)
Quote: Unlimited plan incl. 40GB high-speed data w/10GB hotspot. Unnecessary plan incl. 60GB high-speed data w/20GB hotspot. Video @ 480p. Data speeds reduced after monthly allotment. Taxes & fees extra.