How to purchase a prepaid cell phone plan

Before you go to buy a prepaid cell phone you need to consider if a prepaid cell phone is going to be a good value based on your cell phone needs. You need to consider how much time you'll spend talking on the cell phone, if you'll be calling long distance, if you want text messaging or multimedia features, and more. Prepaid cell phone plans have traditionally been for those who only use a cell phone occasionally or for those unable to secure a cell phone plan contract due to bad credit or no credit.

Prepaid cell phone plans today are becoming more flexible and offer a lot of features once reserved only for traditional cell phone plans that only were available with credit checks and contracts. That said, after figuring out what your cell phone needs are there are a number of things that you should look for in current prepaid cell phones before making a purchase.

The basic concept of prepaid phones is that there are no contracts and you simply pay as you go. Most prepaid plans involve purchasing reload cards in dollar amounts ranging from 10-200 dollars or so. Rather then buying minutes to load onto the account, you end up buying value that everything is deducted from. This allows the company to deduct per minute charges as well as text messaging charges and sometimes connection fees per call. Modern prepaid phones are offering more options, with plans now allowing users unlimited calling during certain times, reduction of fees, and more features like multimedia on your phone.

So what should you look for in a prepaid cell phone? The following is a sample of what a good prepaid plan in today's market should offer.

- No contracts or credit checks: This is a staple of the prepaid phone industry and in essence is what makes the prepaid concept work.

- Low or no service fees/connection fees. Old prepaid plans often charged a fee for every call initiated, deducted value from accounts over time for lack of use, or charged high fees for text messages. These have become less frequent but you still need to read the fine print, because these fees can eat away at you balance and leave you out of call minutes when you need them most.

- Unlimited calling at certain times. Contract cell phone plans have long offered unlimited calling to phones on the same network, and unlimited calling to anyone on the nights and weekends. Prepaid phones often offer this giving you more value for your money.

- Up to date phones. Many prepaid phones used to be bare bones handsets which makes them basically a waste of money and their limitations on today's content fueled cell phone networks might leave you out of the loop. Many modern prepaid plans offer new and stylish phones and along with them have begun offering multimedia features like streaming video and web browsing to their plans. Unless you need a phone for just calling people sometimes, don't waste money on a phone that was a new model 5 years ago.

- National calling- Most cell phones offer free domestic long distance in their plans, prepaid cell phones only do so if they are connected with a network that provides that access. Otherwise prepaid phones roam which will cost you more; a price you shouldn't have to pay when so many cell phone plans give this to you at no extra charge.

You can buy prepaid phones at a wide range of locations, but be sure that you can also easily purchase the cards for your particular plan at multiple locations when you need them.