Saving Money on your Cell Phone Plan

If you don’t have a Smartphone , feel free to navigate away from this page; if you do, keep reading! Lately, since I have been back to the states, the wireless providers have been taking advantage of consumers being unaware of features their phone can do and now charging ridiculous fees for you to do this. Also with the introduction of “tiered” data, yes I am calling you out AT&T; life hasn’t exactly been easy for those aware of these features.

Is Tethering , most smart phones from way back in the day have been able to share its internet connection to allow you to browse the internet on your laptop! Yes, this is a fact, and now service providers are charging up to $30 a month! That’s $360 a year! Well I bring good news, if you have an Android Device or an iPhone, you can still do this for free or for a 1 time fee ($2.99) With the iPhone, just jailbreak it, and you can once again tether it to your computer for free, wirelessly to bat! With Android, just root it, and you will be good. If you are unaware of how to root it, and don’t feel like doing the work, just download PDANet on the marketplace; it is $2.99, and it allows you to tether, it also shows how much data has been used in the process for those of you that only have 200MB a month.

When speaking to a service provider, you can most likely get some services for free or at a lower cost. The salesmen NEED your sale, they get commission, so most don’t mind throwing you a little percentage off your bill, and for those of you whom are eligible for a discount (military, gov’t workers, and some other jobs as well) better ASK! I found out just recently, if you work for Bank of America , you can get a 23% discount on your plan! That’s crazy! Military only gets a max of 15% from any provider, but enough of me whining. My point here is to tell you to ASK for what discounts you’re eligible for, if you already have a contract, I am sorry, you may be stuck. Verizon is more than happy to apply any discounts at any time , so for those of you that have em, GO ASK!

Sites like Amazon allow you to buy a phone for 99% less than what it would cost at a store with a two-year contract! Look around, and you will see a phone that costs $200.00 at the store with contract will cost 0.01 with a new contract , because once again, all service providers care about is getting you to be their customer. Shopping around just got a little easier!

You are the customer, and the service provider is there to support YOU and keep you happy, in the SLA you sign when you sign up (if you read it) there are a million ways to get out of your contract at no cost to you. Be sure to read it, and don’t be afraid to stand up, an unhappy customer can lose them a lot of money, they know this and they do NOT want it. If you know of other ways to save money on cell phone plans, please share them! I love to hear more ideas, and be sure to read my other hubs, I got some good ones!