It seems practically everyone carries a cell phone and can be reached almost anywhere and time. But not everyone feels the need to carry a full-service cell phone, especially if they just use a cell phone when away from home. Pay-as-you-go cell phones serve a purpose in keeping people connected. While pay-as-you-go or pre-paid cell phones have advantages, they have disadvantages as well.
Pay-As-You-Go
Pay-as-you-go cell phones are phones that don't come with a two-year plan for which you are charged for a number of regular minutes each month. With pay-as-you-go or pre-paid cell phones, you purchase a phone that works with a particular company. Tracfone is one of the main pay-as-you-go cell phone service providers. Cell phone providers T-Mobile and Verizon also offer pre-paid or pay-as-you-go cell phone options. With the pre-paid cell phone you purchase a certain number of minutes that you can use anytime and place you wish to use them. You purchase only the minutes you plan to use. A disadvantage is that there are no free evenings and weekends. Every time you use the phone, you pay for the time used. You also pay for incoming calls, because you spend time on the phone.
Some pre-paid phones are programed for your local area. If you travel outside this area and make calls, the cost for the call is greater than when calling in your local area.
Time Limit
Pay-as-you-go cell phone minutes need to be used in a certain amount of time. After that time limit, you lose whatever minutes remain. Tracfone allows you to purchase a year plan at a time, which means they will not shut down your cell phone should you run out of minutes within that year. However, you still need to purchase minutes in order to make calls. If you run out of minutes and go beyond the time limit allowed for the use of those minutes, you not only may not be able to make calls, you may lose your phone number as well. In an emergency situation, running out of minutes can spell disaster, which is a major disadvantage of a pay-as-you-go cell phone.
Phones
Many who buy a regular cell phone plan find that they have the option of a free phone. This may not be the top of the line company phone, but it has all the basic cell phone functions and without extra cost. A disadvantage of the pay-as-you-go cell phones, on whatever plan you choose, is there is an additional cost for the phone. Also, regular cell phone plans offer any number of cell phone styles. While you may pay extra for some of these cell phones, they are available. Pay-as-you-go cell phones services offer fewer cell phone options.
Cost
Pay-as-you-go or pre-paid cell phones, unless a large number of minutes is purchased at a time, tend to cost more per minute than a regular cell phone plan. With pay-as-you-go cell phones, you pay for the phone, you pay for the minutes and you pay for everything up front. With every minute segment---ten, twenty, 200 minutes, etc., you are given a time period in which you must use those minutes purchased.
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