cell phone company review.

[JustinH]

So, I burn through prepaid cell phone companies left and right.

This time I wanted to save some money and didn't care about data. I have a work phone I can use data on if I need to, and I rarely need that.

This year I signed up for Republic Wireless. They have an interesting take on what they do.

They use the WIFI in your home or work to make calls and text, and they use the Sprint Network when you are away from WIFI.

I have very fast wifi at home and very fast wifi at work, and it works perfect.

$12 per month, unlimited text/voice and no data. I get my data over wifi if I need it.

They have another plan for $17 per month which includes 500 meg of data on the sprint network.

5 years ago I had Sprint, they were terrible. The coverage in Central Texas is now very good, almost the same as Verizon (my work phone).

For all you guys cutting cable and stuff, maybe look at the cell phone bill. I know tons of people who pay $75 per month for that Iphone plan, or Android plan.

For republic I use their cheapest Moto E phone. It was 99 bucks on sale last year. Now I see they have a new version for $129.

My old plan was $45 per month for an unlimited plan with some data on Verizon. So I'm saving $396 per year just moving to this plan.

That figure doubles when I move my wife's plan to Republic wireless also.

Now I'm sold on the Sprint network, I drove to West Texas last week and had very similar coverage to my Verizon $$$ phone.

The problem I used to have with Sprint was coverage inside my home. Now I use the WIFI at home so I get full coverage, no drops nothing.

Tmobile used to do WIFI calling, and it was terrible a few years ago. I think that Republic figured out how to do it.

They run the WIFI calling on an Android app, which gets updated once a month with bug fixes and little feature updates. It means they are actually improving the product.

I would have Verizon phones that would NEVER get any updates to them, for years of owning.

Just off the top of my head, I can tell people how to save several hundred bucks a month out of their budget, that they can put into savings or paying down debt.

 

[901Memphis]

Yes I almost got Republic wireless recently but I wasn't happy with the initial out of pocket cost of the top phone. I would save money in the long run though.

 

[racer12306]

I'm strongly looking at Google Fi after it gets a little more developed. At a minimum, I can join and maybe in the next couple years they will allow iPhones for my wife.

 

[Merkava_4]

Originally Posted By: JustinH
They use the WIFI in your home or work to make calls and text, and they use the Sprint Network when you are away from WIFI.


So how does that work ? Phone calls go over the internet ?

 

[michaelluscher]

Google Fi is also a good alternative


T-Mobile urban data performance, with slightly better Sprint 800 voice in the burbs and rural areas.

That and it's PAYG, and you get credited for data you don't use, and they let you finance a superb smartphone to do it on, a Nexus 6.

 

[Rand]

I've been happy with cricket, 35$ a month includes all fees and taxes gets you

AT&T towers, unlimited talk/text 2.5GB of data @8mbit speed
then unlimited at 128kbit

also have large discounts for 3+ phones

ie 5 phones =100$ all get separate data of 2.5GB


Around here tmobile is decent except for some building penetration issues. Sprint is actually quite good except congested in some areas.. but slowly going full 4g lte which is fixing that.

Of course out in the boonies for example a cow field outside carrollton ohio only Verizon(2bar) and AT&T(3-4bar LTE)
have coverage.

Kinda nice to have full coverage while I'm mowing for hours etc.

Previously I was paying about 48$ a month for 2 phones on ting(sprint), but I was having data anxiety. The phone flipped out and updated 300MB on the last day of my plan and booted me to the next tier (extra 12$)

Also sprint at the time was much worse than now.

I then tried ting(tmobile) service.. but while my home and work area is rated "very good service coverage"
the whole back half of my work building had 0 bars.

That got frustrating not even knowing I missed calls.

Cricket has been well worth the 35$. I might throw the parents on the plan next year when their verizon is up that would bring it down to 25$/phone

 

[LC]

We have 4 accounts using Republic wireless.
Have been a customer for 2 years. All with no problems.
My son in college loves it. And I enjoy only paying $47.00 a month for 4 phones.

 

[JustinH]

Originally Posted By: Merkava_4
Originally Posted By: JustinH
They use the WIFI in your home or work to make calls and text, and they use the Sprint Network when you are away from WIFI.


So how does that work ? Phone calls go over the internet ?


Correct, they use an Android app to make the calls, and it is seamless. You just dial the number and it uses whatever service you have.

I have only had one problem where I was at home on WIFI, then walked down the street out of range, and it dropped. They have since fixed this, they transfer the call to the cell tower with like a 2 second pause. Pretty cool. Its getting to the point where it is almost seamless.