Picking a new cell phone company

I have been with Verizon forever. I was with them when they formed and with their predecessors since 1993 when I got my first bag phone. First it was Bell Atlantic, then Eastern Bell, then Bell Nynex, then just Nynex, then Verizon. For the first 10 years I stayed with Verizon because they had the best coverage and my wife and I were traveling fools. It was nice to have cell phone service in the middle of the desert.

For the last five or so years I've not been feeling the love. The corporate turnover means that I'm no longer a loyal 20-year customer, I'm just a number. I used to be able to play the loyalty card and at least get some deals but they don't care anymore. Now I'm paying insane money for two phones.

I need some thoughts on your experiences with wireless providers. With whom should I contract? We prefer unlimited plans - data, phone, text, everything. We would rather pay a flat rate and not get surprised because we use our phones at TON. Because we use our phones pretty intensely, hardware upgrades are important too. Verizon does the 2-year thing and we pretty reliably bust phones faster than that.

thoughts?

all depends on what coverage looks like for different companies in your area... I'm in the Houston area and moved here with ATT... coverage sucked so I had my phone unlocked and tried out tmobile prepaid with good success... had them for over a year now and very happy, but I also know that if I travel I loose my LTE and coverage isn't nearly as good as most other options... but I'm willing to take that as the coverage at home is good and the price is decent.

ATT here because there is excellent coverage in Tulsa, and there is actually coverage on most interstates so if you need the phone it is worthwhile, unlike my previous Sprint coverage.

$150 for two iPhone 5's with 6GB shared data, also thanks to the 22% corporate discount I get through work.

AT&T or Verizion have the best coverage, but if I lived and stayed around an urban area with good Boost Mobile coverage, that's who I'd look into. They seem to be about the cheapest.

Coverage, coverage, coverage.

A cheap service that doesn't actually work isn't worth a darn.

I've been a VERY satisfied T-Mobile customer for about 10 years. But I suspect that you and I are about as different as two people can be. I'm on a prepaid plan and have had the same exact phone for about 8 years. I use it only rarely. Mostly I carry it around in my pocket and take it out occasionally to see what time it is. It makes a very accurate pocket watch. There are times I notice that I have no signal, but I would rate coverage as "adequate" in this area.

I use Net10. $50 a month a phone for unlimited, your choice of AT&T or T-Mobile for a parent carrier. I'm literally saving a grand a year because of the switch.

They all suck.

I've been using Straight Talk, I got in on an AT&T service SIM, and have stuck with it (they may only offer T-Mo at this point?) and with taxes and such I'm at $49/mo. Customer service isn't all that much fun to work with but I do that maybe once a year and it's because of my starting service or dealing with my carrier-locked iPhone and not them. I've been pretty happy with them.

I'm a Sprint customer - since they bought Nextel - and the coverage is terrible. The only thing they have going for them is cheap shared data plans, but the data is so slow that it's not very useful. So not Sprint.

I currently use AT&T, coverage is great, but IMO, they cost to much, I used T-mobile previously, and will probably switch back eventually. I never felt that their coverage was a problem.

Stay far away from Sprint.

I use sprint and its fine. Great coverage on florida. 4glte, unlimited data. 450 minutes. 2 phones is 170. I also get an employee discount through tire condom. Phone selection sux. Upgrades suck.

Nexus 5 will be my next phone. Maybe even X-mas present to myself. Can I use that on Net10 or T-Mobile?

I use AT&T for my personal phone and Sprint for my work phone.

AT&T has great coverage, but they want to bend you over on price, especially for iPhone customers.

Sprint has good prices, but their coverage sucks. I mean its bad. I work in high population areas. I could be on one block and have great service, then literally drive to the next block and have nothing. I lose signal all the time walking into people's houses, pull out my personal phone and it still has 2-4 bars. I have to use the Internet because of my job and it doesn't help at all when there is no signal.

Interesting theme.

ATT is priced high but has coverage everywhere.

Sprint is priced low but has no coverage.

Maybe they are priced according to the level of service they provide?

In reply to z31maniac:

Hmm never thought about it that way.

I just switched from ATT to MetroPCS and I've never been happier. Just about cut my bill in half. Sprint bites around here, but the Metro coverage seems pretty good.

foxtrapper wrote: Coverage, coverage, coverage. A cheap service that doesn't actually work isn't worth a darn.

I have straight talk at, out the door, $54 a month. Cheap, depending on phone you could be on ATT, TMobile or Verizon.

You could try Republic wireless if you wanted real cheap, like android phones, have a wifi hotspot most of the places you are and can access sprint towers.

Jaxmadine wrote: I use sprint and its fine. Great coverage on florida. 4glte, unlimited data. 450 minutes. 2 phones is 170. I also get an employee discount through tire condom. Phone selection sux. Upgrades suck.

Holy E36 M3!!! I hope they are taking you to dinner before they do that to you!

Flight Service wrote:

Jaxmadine wrote: I use sprint and its fine. Great coverage on florida. 4glte, unlimited data. 450 minutes. 2 phones is 170. I also get an employee discount through tire condom. Phone selection sux. Upgrades suck.

Holy E36 M3!!! I hope they are taking you to dinner before they do that to you!

I pay $155, but it's completely worth it to have the phone WORK. I get voice/text coverage in nowhere Kansas, Great Falls, MT and just about everywhere in between.

And when I'm in town? The LTE on my iPhone avgs 25-33mb/s down.

Fast, reliable service? Happy to pay for it.

Life long ATT customer here (Cellular One, Cingular, ATT) since 1998. Coverage has always been top notch, even in the middle of nowhere. With my iPhone and hte wife's flip with a 2GB data plan, 450 minutes shared, nights/weekends and rollover it's $74/month with all taxes/fees/charges. With the wifi everywhere I rarely use 1GB of data in a month.

z31maniac wrote:

Flight Service wrote:

Jaxmadine wrote: I use sprint and its fine. Great coverage on florida. 4glte, unlimited data. 450 minutes. 2 phones is 170. I also get an employee discount through tire condom. Phone selection sux. Upgrades suck.

Holy E36 M3!!! I hope they are taking you to dinner before they do that to you!

I pay $155, but it's completely worth it to have the phone WORK. I get voice/text coverage in nowhere Kansas, Great Falls, MT and just about everywhere in between. And when I'm in town? The LTE on my iPhone avgs 25-33mb/s down. Fast, reliable service? Happy to pay for it.

Wife's Straight Talk, uses ATT towers, get same coverage with iPhone. $53 a month.

Flight Service wrote:

z31maniac wrote:

Flight Service wrote:

Jaxmadine wrote: I use sprint and its fine. Great coverage on florida. 4glte, unlimited data. 450 minutes. 2 phones is 170. I also get an employee discount through tire condom. Phone selection sux. Upgrades suck.

Holy E36 M3!!! I hope they are taking you to dinner before they do that to you!

I pay $155, but it's completely worth it to have the phone WORK. I get voice/text coverage in nowhere Kansas, Great Falls, MT and just about everywhere in between. And when I'm in town? The LTE on my iPhone avgs 25-33mb/s down. Fast, reliable service? Happy to pay for it.

Wife's Straight Talk, uses ATT towers, get same coverage with iPhone. $53 a month.

Have her do a SpeedTest and see what she gets. I'm personally willing to pay for the blazing fast speeds I get, some aren't. That's ok.

I think I'll go with the Net10 if I can. Being on Verizon right now, I probably have a locked phone and I've had spotty luck with companies releasing their hardware.

Right now we're paying $191 with Verizon for two phones unlimited. Net10 would do the same thing (on AT&T's network) for $85 plus a $6 sim card.

Yeah Pre-Paid is the way to go.

If you can stand it the best deals are with Sprint and T-Mobile but that is spotty coverage. You can find Verizon and ATT at less than 60 per for single line all day.