Prepaid Reviews blog

PagePlus $39.99 Unlimited Talk N Text plan will get 500MB data

May 24th, 2013   |    Page Plus   |    No Comments

One huge reason I hope Tracfone‘s pending purchase of Page Plus Cellular doesn’t cause too many changes at PP: there’s always great info to find on the brand via dealers on Howard Forums. The latest comes from Diesel Wireless, who reports that the Unlimited Talk N Text plan, one of Page Plus‘s flagship plans, will get a bump in data from 200MB to 500MB. That change will take effect sometime next month. He also shares some quotes from “higher ups” that suggest that not much will change in the short term, save for PP having access to a wider range of handsets. Still, I wouldn’t expect everything to stay the same in the long run. America Movil is known for tenaciously cutting costs. I don’t see why it would be different for PP.

Via Howard Forums.

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Cricket announces Samsung Admire 2, Galaxy Discover, Galaxy S4 launch, and LTE roaming

May 23rd, 2013   |    Cricket   |    No Comments

It was a big day at CTIA 2014 for Cricket wireless as they announced a few new handsets plus an LTE roaming agreement that could certainly help their stock. For starters they’ll launch the Samsung Galaxy S4 on June 7th for $599.99. Thankfully, for those who don’t have $600 to burn, they’ll have a financing option that will let you walk out of store with the S4 for $59.99. That will increase your monthly payment, of course, but it will cut down on the wallet shock of shelling out that much for a phone. For those who don’t want to pay that much, period, for a smartphone, Cricket announced two more affordable Samsung models.

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Boost and Virgin Mobile pick up the Galaxy S3

May 22nd, 2013   |    Boost Mobile   |    2 Comments

Not to be outdone by Straight Talk, which added the Samsung Galaxy S3 last week, both Boost Mobile and Virgin Mobile will pick up the Samsung’s 2012 flagship device. Parent company already has the Galaxy S4, and is offering the S3 for free with a two-year contract. The S3 will go on sale with both Virgin and Boost in June, though the company declined to provide pricing or specific availability date. If they can pull it under the $300 mark, they could attract a number of customers looking for a top-end phone at something of an affordable price.

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Tracfone parent America Movil to acquire Page Plus

May 21st, 2013   |    Page Plus   |    No Comments

Delivered by mainstream outlets, the news of Tracfone parent America Movil buying another MVNO looks benign enough. Headlines suggest Movil purchased Start Wireless, which is true. What many people don’t know is that Start Wireless owns Page Plus Cellular. That changes the game a bit. Page Plus is a relatively popular MVNO, one that is well known among veteran prepaid subscribers. Something tells me that the Page Plus faithful aren’t going to like this acquisition. You can read some initial griping at the Howard Forums thread.

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Straight Talk adds Samsung Galaxy S3

May 20th, 2013   |    Straight Talk   |    5 Comments

Strange, I saw this on the Straight Talk website last week, but it didn’t really click that it was something new. Lo and behold, the Straight Talk blog announced on Friday that they were indeed selling the Samsung Galaxy SIII. We needn’t run down the specs for it at this point; nearly every carrier, prepaid and postpaid, carries it at this point. It’s actually a great time to get one, since it’s getting discounted with the Galaxy S4 about to hit markets nationwide. It will cost you $439.99, which isn’t half bad for a non-subsidized phone.

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Verizon again increases data allotment for prepaid plans

May 17th, 2013   |    Verizon Wireless   |    1 Comment

It appears that the nation’s largest carrier understands the opportunities in prepaid. For the past year or so Verizon prepaid has made many moves that cater to a prepaid crowd. While their efforts started off as typically overpriced big carrier offerings, they’ve wizened up and started offering more data and more plans. Their latest move adds even more data to their prepaid smartphone plans. The $60 smartphone plan now gets 2GB of data monthly, up from 500MB. The $70 plan now gets 4GB, up form 2GB. Remember, these smartphone plans work only on 3G EVDO and not Verizon’s 4G LTE network. These plans will be available to consumers on June 6th.

Via FierceWireless.

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MetroPCS to reach 100 million more, thanks to T-Mobile

May 16th, 2013   |    MetroPCS   |    No Comments

While the fundamental services offered by T-Mobile and MetroPCS won’t change any time soon, MetroPCS will realize one enormous benefit following the merger. They will cover 100 million additional potential customers by the end of 2014, starting “very quickly” according to T-Mobile CFO Braxton Carter, who previously held the same position with MetroPCS. For a carrier that exists only in select markets across the country, expansion of this magnitude could bring enormous gains. As long as they don’t come at the expense of T-Mobile customers, it could be a big, and underreported, win in this merger.

Via FierceWireless.

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What we missed: AT&T prepaid, Zact MVNO, Consumer Cellular

May 14th, 2013   |    Prepaid Services   |    No Comments

After a much-needed week away, let’s catch up on some prepaid wireless stories from the last week:

Sprint MVNO Zact brings custom usage. Do you use all the voice minute in your plan? All of your texts? Do you max out your data usage? Chances are you don’t. Zact, a new MVNO, aims to change that. They feature a sliding scale of plans that fit anyone’s patterns. When you go to their plans page you can pick a custom level of talk, text, and data. It sounds like a great concept.

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Approach Boost Mobile iPhone rumors with caution

April 30th, 2013   |    Boost Mobile   |    No Comments

We have seen it before, so pardon me if I view it with a skeptical eye. For the past year or so, @evleaks has provided plenty of valuable information about upcoming phones, particularly for prepaid carriers. We’ve cited them on a number of occasions, and they tend to come through. So you can imagine people got excited when @evlinks tweeted about the iPhone coming to Boost Mobile in Q3. But before you start making plans to buy an iPhone from Boost, you could use a history lesson. That @evleaks tweet could just as easily have come from last year.

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T-Mobile and MetroPCS expect few changes following merger

April 29th, 2013   |    MetroPCS   |    No Comments

After months of jumping through regulatory and shareholder loops, the T-Mobile/MetroPCS merger has gone through. They’ll make it official this Wednesday, May 1. Now that the journalists and analysts have had their field day, we get to the question at the heart of the matter: what does this mean to you, the customer of either MetroPCS or T-Mobile. The answer, in short, is that nothing will change immediately. While the two entities will fall under the same corporate umbrella, they will continue to operate as they have previously. The only small change might be expanded handset availability, but with T-Mobile’s limited LTE coverage that might not be a big consideration in the short run.

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Ultra Mobile adds $19 plan

April 25th, 2013   |    MVNO   |    1 Comment

It appears that Republic Wireless isn’t the only carrier offering a $19 prepaid plan. Ultra Mobile, which we mentioned with other interesting MVNOs last year, has introduced its own $19 plan that provides unlimited global text messaging. It doesn’t have the benefit of Republic’s unlimited data, but then again it’s not aimed at that kind of user. It’s made for a heavy texter who doesn’t talk much — the plan provides for just 250 voice minutes. It also provide 50MB of data, which is plenty enough for basic mobile web usage. If you’re on a smartphone you can add 500MB of data for $10. Then again, more data-heavy users will probably prefer Ultra Mobile’s $29 or $59 plans, which cater more to the smartphone crowd. Ultra Mobile is an MVNO of the T-Mobile network. You can check out the plans at Ultra.me.

Via The Full Signal.

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