How can I save on my cell phone bill?

[JoeP]

The easiest way to save is to first avoid contracts. The monthly plans allow you portability if/when your usage habits change. You are at their mercy if prices increase while you are in contract.

Second, decide if you are willing to change your usage. Do you "really" need that much data, or can you hold off until you are near a wi-fi hot spot?

Finally, decide how important customer service and coverage reliability are to you. Some places have lots of dead spots, even for voice. Also, companies like h2o and red pocket that use bigger networks often have very bad customer service and cut you off if you exceed usage limits, despite the word "unlimited" in the sales pitch, and it can be a hassle getting reactivated after this happens.

Personally, I am at the point where I need to text more to stay in touch with family members, and my current T-Mobile flip is not cutting it (network is spotty where I live). So I am leaning toward a phone like the Moto G on an AT&T no-data $25 monthly plan. I don't need data now, but the monthly plans like these allow you to switch in either direction pretty easily.

[figuringmoneyout]

Agreed, prepaid is the way to go! I've used Straight Talk and liked it. I switch to using Virgin Mobile because I wanted a fancy smart phone (although I think Straight Talk has some too)? But basically my phone bill is $40 for unlimited everything. It's pretty spectacular especially when most of my unconcerned about money friends pay 2-3 times that.

[NetSkyBlue]

I also use Ting, and my average bill is between $17-25 a month. I guess I got really chatty that one month it was $25. I don't use a lot of minutes, and 90% of the time, I'm under 100 minutes, 100MB, and I average about 130 texts a month.

The internet service in my area is super crappy though. I rarely use it, only when I REALLY need to look something up on the go, and even then it loads pages only maybe 2/3 of the time.

It's still worth it, over the $70/mo I used to be paying.