difficult child *could have* spent thousands on *this* month's TMobile

[klmno]

I have a pay-as-you-go trac phone but I spent a little extra upfront for it to come with a "double your minutes package". This means I might have spent $60 for it but any time I spend $40 for 200 mins, I actually get 400 mins. I've had it for 2 years- and yes, I could text with it too if I could figure out how to actually get the message sent out. LOL! I can receive and read text messages with no problem but that costs a little more than a phone call.

 

[DammitJanet]

Thats what he needs...a firefly! A pink old fashioned Firefly! With about 5 numbers programmed into it. He cant go online, he can only call the people mom and dad want him to call and it has the buttons on the front with pictures of who he can call!

 

[buddy]

I LOVE that! can they dial 911 (q has done that inappropriately once )

 

[BusynMember]

Only problem with a trac phone is like the problem with had. We got my oldest a trac phone before cell phones were all that popular. We wanted to be able to call her when she was late, as she often was. Well, she used those minutes up in one day. ONE DAY!

 

[DammitJanet]

MWM...in this case, then difficult child would simply not be allowed to go out. He would have to budget those minutes. Honestly, I would take away the phone. Done..fini. And he would work to pay off the amount of money the bill would have been even if they get some of it taken off. At this point, it is war and I would win.

 

[susiestar]

The company that has the double/triple minute cards is tracfone. Even considering triple min for life, net10 is cheaper. I did a LOT of research and pricing on this and net10 ended up being substantially cheaper than even using triple minutes on tracfone. Either of these is vastly cheaper than the big companies like AT&T, Tmobile, verizon, and the other co's.

If going for the pay as you go, I would find the cheapest phone possible because they are the hardest to text on. You can often find deals on ebay for them, not sure about HSN. You can also buy from the net10 website. Just NEVER buy the min by putting a credit card # into the actual phone. Buy the card at the store or put the min on by using the website ONLY.

Kajeet sells the firefly phone, or they did a year or so ago. They have the BEST parental controls out there. You also might look at the AARP website because many seniors do not want internet on their phones so this is an option on some of the companies that AARP endorses. I looked at phones for my mom because she was having problems finding phones she could use easily (she has wrist issues). You could also google "phones for seniors" to find more than the AARP endorsed ones. I would look at the ones for seniors and then try to find one you could use on a pay as you go network.

I did look at tracfone phones because they are reasonably affordable and n be found at lots of places. Plus they had more no-internet phones that I could find. Even with being more than net10, they are still cheaper than the other pay as you go providers. I found the samsung t101G that is available on amazon for $29.99 and problem at dollar general for about $10. It is a 'candy bar' phone and would be easy to use and problem far better for a kid who cannot stop buying stuff online via his phone. You can go to tracfone.com and search for phones from $10-$10 (click on browse all phones then check the box for the price range. It will show phones in that range and toward the bottom are the phones that won't go online.). I would look at phones first, then on the ones offered in your area because you can always check ebay/amazon for a model not offered in your area.

Hope this helps. If you do want to let him go online, go with kajeet even though it is more expensive. I have a feeling the parental controls would be worth it.

 

[Nancy]

We have verizon and I have parental controls on difficult child's line and honestly have not had a problem. A few times she was abe to text and order a subscription that was billed every month but everytime I called and reported it they took the charge off. I told them I don't want her to be able to even buy a ringtone and whatever they had to do to block everything that would cost extra they should do because I was not going to pay anything other than the bill. I do have a password on the account and they will not send a temporary password to anyone except me. If she calls them or goes into the verizon store if she doesn't know the password they will not help her.

Of course I had to pay for parental controls and unlimited text and data but I also have the ability to turn her phone off at any time I want. You could turn his phone off when he goes to his friend's house and back on when he gets back home. He would always be able to call you or other family members in the family plan.

Nancy

 

[TerryJ2]

GREAT ideas! Thank you all.