Check your options before making the switch to a prepaid phone plan if you have upcoming travel plans. This fee often makes it impossible to leave before when are expenses credited your contract is up because the cost is simply too high. If you want to try a new cellular service, you’re free to make the switch at any time.
- Once you’ve spent the balance, the card becomes unusable until you add more money to it.
- This not only saves you from digging around in your pocket or holding up the line while you count change, but it’s also a much safer option.
- Prepaid cards can be convenient for people who do not carry cash.
- Take the Galaxy S8, which costs $349 and $449 at Cricket and Boost, respectively, thanks to current promotions.
- Because many prepaid phone plans use existing U.S. cellular networks to provide service, they aren’t always the best for traveling internationally.
And you don’t have to worry about overdraft fees since your spend cannot exceed the balance on your card. Is that you can only spend the money you have already loaded onto the card. T-Mobile To Go — Sidekick (with camera and keyboard) and Motorola Razr phones, plus a wide array of phone features, including free incoming text and picture messaging and competitive pricing.
What can I use a prepaid card for?
Our partners cannot pay us to guarantee favorable reviews of their products or services. While the line between prepaid and postpaid phone service is blurring, some differences remain. Prepaid phones are just like the phones that come with contracts.
Alltel Wireless — Monthly or per-day plans may be a deal for frequent talkers; phones include Motorola Razr and Kyocera Slider Remix. Some plans offer unlimited text messaging and unlimited nights and weekends. Get your paycheck instantly loaded to a payroll card and enjoy a fast, convenient way to make purchases, pay bills and manage your money. You might find ways to spend your money that are cheaper than a prepaid card.
You buy a cell phone with a set service (number of minutes usable over a certain number of months). You can make calls or even text and picture message, depending on the phone’s features, until you run out of minutes. When that happens, you can buy more minutes immediately or within a time limit.
- If you don’t renew before the service expires, you lose the phone number completely (and are often charged additional fees to get a new number).
- Alltel Wireless — Monthly or per-day plans may be a deal for frequent talkers; phones include Motorola Razr and Kyocera Slider Remix.
- The differences between prepaid and contract cellphone plans might seem irrelevant.
Other carriers usually have similar family deals that significantly lower their monthly price. Although contract plans still lack flexibility, they certainly suit larger households from an affordability perspective. With No Annual Contract Plans (also known as prepaid) you pay in advance for your service, You can also choose from our monthly plans with no deposits or credit checks. Plus, enjoy up to $15/mo savings after 9 months of service, with loyalty discounts and Auto Pay. A prepaid card is not linked to a bank or credit union account.
Visa Prepaid Q+A
AT&T prepaid phone plans have unlimited talk & text – just choose the data you need. No annual contract, no credit check, no activation fee when you buy online. Most cellphone plans throttle data speed after a certain usage amount. For example, AT&T sometimes reduces data speed for different unlimited data plans when customers use more than 22GB or 50GB in one billing period. The main advantage of prepaid phone plans over contract plans is lower pricing. With a prepaid service, you have the freedom to buy exactly what you need.
Prepaid vs. Contract Cellphone Plans — What’s The Difference?
You can also find plans that offer unlimited calling and data if that’s what you need. Generally, with prepaid cards and debit cards, you can’t spend more than you have loaded on the card or than you have in your account. However, some bank and credit union accounts allow you to make overdrafts, and so do some prepaid cards. Overdrafts allow you to overspend, and then you must replace the money. Plus, you have to pay an overdraft fee for each transaction that overdraws your account.
Prepaid billing & payments FAQs – Monthly fees & refill cards
Plus, you don’t have to worry about overdraft fees, since your spending cannot exceed the available balance on your card. It’s easy to get a Visa Prepaid card and there’s no credit check required. Phone selection remains a differentiator, too, though not as much as it used to be. Postpaid customers at the major carriers can always expect to see the leading flagship available at their wireless provider. Increasingly, though, those same models are available from prepaid providers, too.
However, there are several advantages of prepaid cellphone plans that also cut costs. If you want to save money on a tight budget, prepaid carriers might be your best option. If you need to build credit or have been denied a bank account, a prepaid debit card might not be the best option. Secured credit cards help build credit, and if you can’t get a regular checking account, try second chance checking. These accounts provide another shot at mainstream banking and its perks. The main advantage of prepaid cell phones is the combination of freedom and control that they offer.
Verizon +play
Only with the right details and authentication can a prepaid card be used both in-store and online. The money loaded on the card is also safe and cannot be hacked into. One of the most significant advantages of using a prepaid card is the idea that you no longer need to carry physical cash or a bank account to purchase and shop for things. Prepaid phone plans are affordable, flexible, and remarkably competitive with contract plans. An easy way to waste money with a contract plan is to go over your limits.
Cardholders must use care in protecting their card and notify their issuing financial institution immediately of any unauthorized use and for additional details. Your service probably won’t give you the code to unlock the phone, but several Web sites offer unlock codes for free or a small fee. SIM cards for various countries are available from Web sites such as Telestial.com, as are unlocked GSM cell phones.
Here are some strengths for each, again based on surveys and reviews. While a prepaid cell phone offers many advantages, it also can present problems for its users. One of the biggest problems is the cost per minute, a serious disadvantage for anyone who talks a lot on a cell phone. Prepaid cards may also come with fewer protections than your typical credit or debit card. The government has taken steps to provide legal rights for prepaid cardholders, like a pathway to reimbursement should you lose your card or have it stolen. But these protections may not measure up to those of traditional credit or debit cards.
Some issuers may set maximum card limits and some banks only allow transfers up to a specific amount each day. Our ZEN Mastercards are linked to multi-currency accounts that are managed through a simple mobile app. You can use the app to transfer funds from a bank account, Mastercard or Visa, or digital wallets like Apple Pay and Google Pay. When you reload the card, funds will instantly show up on your account balance and can be used immediately. If your prepaid card is lost or stolen, you’ll only lose the amount that has been pre-loaded onto the card.
In our latest testing, for example, MetroPCS matched T-Mobile’s speed, while Boost and Virgin generally performed as well as Sprint. So you’re unlikely to take a performance hit from going prepaid. Gallup also points out that prepaid carriers also tend to offer better deals on older phones, which can be appealing if you don’t need the latest and greatest models. Take the Galaxy S8, which costs $349 and $449 at Cricket and Boost, respectively, thanks to current promotions. That same model costs between $600 and $696 for postpaid customers at the Big Four carriers. You’ve probably heard no contract phones called disposable phones or burner phones.
Once the money runs out, you won’t be able to make more purchases until you reload the card. This results in an “on/off” or “all or nothing” proposition for the prepaid service providers and their clients (i.e. the account either has enough credit to use the phone, or it does not). Some operators (e.g., Orange) allow their pre-paid customers to have a small negative balance to allow short calls or texts when the customer’s credit has been completely used. This is then deducted when the customer next adds more credit.