When running a business, it is helpful to monitor your expenses and cut costs. One of the ways you can cut costs is through your phone plan.
Whenever you buy your phone through a phone carrier, you are essentially locking yourself in to be stuck with that phone carrier. You may not even buy your phone outright and be paying monthly in a contract. These mega phone carriers lock you in and then make you buy extremely pricey phone plans with unlimited data. But here's the secret: nobody needs unlimited data.
Instead, you should purchase your phone directly from a store like Apple, Samsung, or a retailer like Amazon, and preferably in full. Be sure to buy an unlocked phone, which means you can take that phone to any provider as simply as swapping out your SIM from the SIM card tray or, now becoming more common, changing your digital eSIM.
A budget wireless carrier is essentially a smaller company that uses bigger company networks. These budget wireless carriers are known as Mobile Virtual Network Operators (MVNOs), and they lease out wireless infrastructure from the big companies (Verizon, T-Mobile, AT&T) and repackage it at a more affordable value.
You may be wondering why big carriers would lease out their infrastructure and why you would ever pay for a big carrier again if you could pay less with a budget wireless carrier.
First, big carriers want to make sure their wireless infrastructure that they maintain is being used to cover expenses and make money. Cutting a deal with a budget wireless carrier allows them to make additional income through leasing and helps ensure more users are on their infrastructure.
Second, when you purchase a phone plan from a budget wireless carrier, you can consider yourself in an economy seat on a plan instead of first class. For the majority of people, it is essentially the same experience. However, if you were in a football stadium with thousands of people all using their phones, then the users who have plans with the big carriers (first-class seats) will get priority over the users on the budget wireless carriers. What this means is slightly slower service temporarily until space frees up again.
Mint Mobile - Offers a $15/month plan with 5GB of data, which is great for the majority of people unless you are streaming videos constantly. The great benefit with Mint Mobile is that they have their own app, which you can download to manage your subscription, offer short-term contracts, allow you to load up credit to make international calls when needed, and let you see how much data you are using and have left for the month.
Google Fi - More pricey but great if you make a lot of international calls (included in the plans) and are looking to share a plan with family members, friends, partner, etc.
Visible - A good option if you want to remain on Verizon's wireless infrastructure at a more affordable rate.
Tello - If you are looking for the cheapest option and are okay with limited service in rural areas and are a light phone user in the city. It also may be more noticeable that you are using a budget phone carrier occasionally.
Ting Mobile - An option to consider if you are looking for a pay-as-you-go phone plan.
From my own experience, I have used Mint Mobile while living in the United States and never noticed a difference in phone quality in comparison to my previous plan. The app was extremely easy to use and transparent about how much data I was using, when my contract ended, and how to cancel my contract as well. I was on the cheapest plan and believed I only used about 4GB of data per month.
Budget wireless carriers are a great way to save money and not notice a difference in phone usage. There are plenty of others I did not list, so feel free to search for some on the internet and review all the details before buying one. For additional savings, consider buying an unlocked refurbished or previous year flagship phone from a retailer like Amazon to get a high-quality phone at an affordable price. I have purchased two phones off Amazon and had an overall positive experience. Nowadays, I do prefer to purchase directly from Apple, but Amazon is definitely a great option when on a budget but still want some of the best phones on the market.
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