At risk of the list police cracking down, I'll mention that I use T-Mobile for prepaid cell phone service.  I paid $100 initially, four years ago, for each of two phones.  I have paid $10 a year per phone since, and have never even come close to running out of minutes.  The $100 bucks bought 1000 minutes.  I still have around 500 minutes on one phone, and around 750 on the other.  I will keep up with this so long as it continues to work and be cheaper than alternatives.  I don't know what the buy up of T-Mobile by AT&T  will do to this service.  No good, I suspect, because AT&T does not do anything good.

I always carry one of these phones with me in the Vanagon, whether I am making a short local trip for service, I am on the road, or I am going camping.  Of course, with T-Mobile, like with all service providers, there are places that my Vanagon takes me that the service does not reach.  Though I am  resistant to new technology just for the sake of it, I definitely have come on board regarding the cell phone as an emergency and convenience tool, just not the cell phone contracts and service generally available.  I also find no reason to just use the thing to gab all the time.

mcneely

---- Rob <becida@COMCAST.NET> wrote:
> At  7/5/2011 03:20 AM, ed donnen wrote:
>
> >   You continue west on 66 hoping to be pulled over by an officer
> > (You don't have a cell phone).
>
> A cell phone in the glove box would have helped a lot.  Less than
> $100 a year to keep one 'active' in your glovebox & these phones &
> cards are sold all over the palace.
> http://www.virginmobileusa.com/   The normal way to keep the phone is
> $20 every 90 days (4 times a year).  They have an option where if you
> put $92 on your phone you get the number for a full year and $92
> worth of calling at 20 cents a minute.
> This operates off the Sprint network. I've been with them for several
> years, still a good deal for what you get
>
>
>
>
> Rob
>
> becida@comcast.net
> Western Washington State, USA

--
David McNeely