the Price of Pay by the Minute Prepaid Cell Phone Plans

I have a prepaid cell phone. It costs $20 for three months of service and 60 minutes of talk time. You have to pay another $20 when either the minutes or the service time runs out.

The service is excellent. It has very few dropped calls and the are very few places I go where my phone doesn't get a signal. I love not having a contract. I am in control of how much I'm paying, so there's no surprises on my bill -- namely because there is no bill. Everything is paid for upfront. It's a great value, as long as you don't use the cell phone too much. If you use a lot of minutes, the prepaid plan can get expensive. Then, it's time to move to a phone plan with a contact, something, I don't really want to have to do because it's much more expensive.

One tip is that it you plan to use a lot of minutes, you can buy a card that is worth more minutes. The card is obviously more expensive than a 60 minute card, but per-minute, the rate is cheaper. Also, as with most prepaid plans, if you search on the internet, there are bonus codes you can use to get extra minutes.