I'm frankly astounded by the number of phones and lines everyone here, owns and administrates.
We've got one( unlimited talk) home line, and a cell phone each, for limited necessary communications.
How many hours, talk text data (gbs) do you use? how much do you pay for your internet?
How much do you pay per how many people for communications per month?
My gold standard , has always been $50 per month for 2 + about $10 per month per each additional user.
Some years we are under some years not.
Far too many. I have 5!
-mine
-When my wife needs to use one (rarely) she can use one.
-One that I don't mind taking a beating for running with
-One for the car
-One gsm one for travel since the others are on sprint.
Plus ooma at home, several foreign sims, truphone sims and freedompop sims etc.
It boggles my mind.... how the heck do you keep track of 5 phones and 5 bills?
+Plus ooma at home, several foreign sims, truphone sims and freedompop sims etc.
I have phones and hotspots on every network. We spend a lot of time traveling and need to be in contact with our business at all times. Even when we're in remote areas we can almost always find a way to stay connected.
FreedomPop, Verizon 3G, Truphone, Tracfone (Verizon), T-Mobile, Piranha Mobile and RingPlus (now moving to Tello).
Probably 15 devices, in all, and monthly expenses of under $100.
I keep track of everything on a spreadsheet.
We love to travel and our communications devices make that possible.
(Typing this from New Orleans on my unlocked AT&T tablet that I bought at Wal-Mart for $40 and which has a FP Global SIM in it.)
Wow,
Iv'e got to digest this, 15 devices,, 7 mvnos;
all combined under $100 per month,
Meanwhile , enjoy new Orleans. I was posted there for a year and and enjoyed.......
Many fond memories.
Phones that we use
I use a Nexus 6
Wife has two Motorola's. Second one is for freedompop data.
Kids have the iPhone 6S Plus
Activated Backup phones
A GSM Blackberry on Lycamobile in a permanent cradle in one car. It's always charging and available handsfree.
Another GSM Blackberry on Lycamobile in the other car is a glovebox phone in the literal sense of the word.
CDMA LG Volt that I got to try out R+. Activated on Ting because of the $35 credit.
Unused phones
CDMA Lumia that I got because I wanted to try out a Windows phone. Could be activated if a primary device above fails.
A Moto G first generation. Could be activated if a primary device above fails
Another GSM Blackberry. A backup for a backup
A Tmobile flip phone that I've never used and have lost the charger. Should work on Lycamobile
A GSM Nokia 8210. A phone that I kept from a long time ago because it was unlocked and good to use when I travelled. It was and still is a classic
A GSM Nokia 8110. This is the phone from the Matrix. I've kept it because it's a classic
Broken phones
A GSM LG that was the first and only phone that I rooted which got bricked when I reflashed the rom. I don't know why I've kept it!
Quick reading; seems like you have 7 activated and 14 total phones?
How in the world do you keep track , and pay for all of them?
I could use buying a used Truphone SIM with even a tiny balance if anyone's selling that or knows where to find one. (Don't want to spend $30 on a new one.)
Holy Cow! another phone?
Because of how the sim is activated and the dashboard works, I don't know that would be a good idea for either party, nor how it would work in general. The Sim is attached to the name/address/phone number of whoever activates it. In fact, I was told what my phone number would be before the sim was ever sent to me. Sure I can pop it into a variety of phones, but to actually give it to someone else? No, I wouldn't do that, they could get access to too much information, even if I tried to change the info first, a new party would have access to my full call history. Thanks but no thanks.
Sure, I'll play.
I have 3 mobile phones:
[ul]
[li]My Primary phone (number in Google Voice) w/ FreedomPop[/li]
[li]My work mobile, which I try to use only for work.[/li]
[li]"Car Phone" using CellNuvo that I'm dabbling with[/li]
[/ul]
In addition, I help manage 8 other lines for my wife, kids, in-laws, and parents. All our numbers have been in Google voice for a while. We were all formerly with RP+ and have moved everyone to FP.
On average, we each use 10-50 min/month (with one user averaging closer to 200-300 min/month), unknown texting (since it's unlimited via Hangouts), and 200MB-1GB of data a month (the younger the age of the user, the more the usage).
Additionally I have 11 FP SIMs (combo of Global and new LTE SIMs) used for free data in iPads and hotspots that help augment our data usage. I got most of my SIMs for free since Ryan over in our FB group gives out cards for free. So for us, it's essentially free each month free since we're with FreedomPop. I might sign up my mom's line for Premium Voice since she talks more.
At home, we use an Ooma device that provides for unlimited minutes. Bought the device for under $200 8 years ago and it's been working fine ever since. We pay ~$5 in taxes each month, but that's it.
Home internet is $40/month at 50Mbps/50mbps (for another year) before they jack it up...but we just bounce back and forth between providers every 2-3 years if they don't give us better rates.
I'll play too. I have a business phone (consultant) and It's currently still with R+, soon to be Ting, and then on to mintsim. I use around 250 minutes a month, a handful of text. I do use 1-2GB data. So, mintsim is something like $16/mo for unlimited talk/text, and, 2.5GB data. Once I retire at end of year, and, once mintsim term is over, I will likely convert to FP.
I take care of my wife phones, and it is currently tello. She uses maybe 20 minutes a month, and a text or two. She uses maybe 200MB/mo for data. Likely down the line, we will convert this over to FP as well. She pays around $7/mo.
I also have an iPad Pro 12.9" (the largest phone is WAY too small for my use). That is using the T-Mobile $10 for 5 months of 5Gb data, so, that's $24 a year. Likely, I will end up converting that over to FP when I can get a deal. My use here varies depending on if any urgent work trouble comes up. I probably average 500MB/mo/
My wife has an iPad also. She is on freedompop and cost is $0. She uses maybe 200MB/mo
I also have a FP global sim hotspot. This is for times we are real rural just to maintain coverage. Cost is $0/mo. I use maybe 50MB/mo
I also use a Google Voice number I've had for years as a home "POTS" line. Of course it's not POTS, but, hooked up as if it were one with phone service via home phones as any house used to have. That works via an OBI adapter. That costs $0/mo for unlimited minutes.
So, it appears our current monthly cost is ~$25. I expect that to go down to almost $0 in a year, assuming nothing happens to FP.
For home internet, since I am very rural, there is no home internet other than DSL, and, recently, microwave (WISP). The WISP costs me $79/mo and gets me 20MB down/4MB up.
Personal/Family:
5 T Mobile
1 Sprint
1 Verizon
Manage for others not related:
4 on RP+ still waiting to port out to Red Pocket
1 RedPocket
3 FreedomPop
I have already made the announcement that I'm stick a fork in it done managing phones. I won't even get into cost :pinch: :whistle: :pinch: :pinch:
My Family's Phones:
Nexus 5X: Ringplus, then CellNuvo
Galaxy S3: Ringplus, then CellNuvo
Sprint Phone Connect: Ringplus, then Ting
Moto E 2nd Gen: CellNuvo
Freedompop Devices:
2 Mifi 500 devices
Netgear 6100D
Netgear Zing
ZTE Pocket Wifi
LG G Pad 7
Mifi 2
2 Global sim cards
Home Internet:
I previously had AT&T U-verse 3Mbps for $32, then they raised it to $37. The other option is Charter Spectrum, $45 for 30 Mbps. Last August, I bought a Mifi Jetpack 6620l flashed to the Verizon prepaid $5 unlimited 3G data plan. It works well as it usually isn't much slower than DSL, sometimes as fast as 3.1 Mbps.
Nice collection, Ente!
We get by, with home phone service from straight talk@$15 per month
.I'm on a legacy tmobile gold paygo and we have 2/ 800 minutes tracfones this year,
It does cover out basic needs , but it would be nice to have mms and data as a luxury. We ditched the major carriers years ago, So ringplus with $30 top up ended up being an expensive learning experience.
I'm seeing folks on this forum happy with voip for home phone and utilzing data from freedompop, any simple suggestions to get us old fogeys a bit better minutes mms and some data simply???
Howdy Friend !!
We scratched that itch by porting to Twigby with their free goodies & bonuses, also trying out Ting via the same route which also felt good as it'll cover what we spent on top-ups at RP, and Cellnuvo as a direct (but better) replacement for RP.
Given that we had several lines there & only 1 was on the cheapest paid plan lately offered - and that our phones were all dirt cheap used ones from C7 - we really have no complaints moving forward.
And of course since we both also have the really cheap year of GSM services via Tracfone to cover amyplace there is no CDMA to be had - altogether we're still spending less than we did just having a pair of ancient feature phones on Consumer Cellular with their monthly bill to pay.
My take on the ultimate end-product of these efforts:
-IF- Cellnuvo turns out to be as solid as it seems thus far with good ways to get enough 'points' to cover our needs, then once we've gotten past all the promo stuff at the others we'll just port to Cellnuvo & smile alot.
But for now it's all about using the services, watching how things pan out & learning what works best for us.
My Communications setup:
Home phone is a Obi 202 tied to my google voice number. I've had it about 4 years (over 8000 calls) no problems. Obi cost about 40 and zero cost for last 4 years 
My cell is Nexus 5 on Tello. Cost 9 bucks a month. Very happy with it.
My wife's cell is a IPhone 5C (that I bought off Ebay like new for 99 bucks) on Tello for 9 bucks a month. Also very happy.
My back up phone is a ZTE Sprint Force that I now have on CellNuvo. 14000 points so far, so good.
My Internet is Comcast bundle 75 down and 10 up plus cable TV all HD and cloud DVR and HBO and Showtime X1 platform all together 105 per month (tax tag and title)
My "experiment" phone is a jailbroken Iphone 4S that I use a Truphone SIM (free incoming calls and texts) and several different FP sims for data (no cost)
So my monthly Cells are only 18 bucks and my cable/internet is 105 per month. Not bad all things considered.
P.S. I have 2 Acer Chrombooks each only 179 bucks for over a year and they are great! Light, quiet, fast, boots in 7 secs, 15 inch screen, long battery life. Very happy.
Not much to it. One is a monthly bill and the rest are on tello paygo and cellnuvo which don't require much attention. Ooma is autopay and the sims don't expire or require adding credit other than one needing use every 180 days.
I will take your word for it but it is far beyond anything I could manage.
Never have I had a reason to have more than one cellphone and certainly not multiple siims.
I do use Google Voice but that is primarily for cases where I have to give out a phone number (car repair, etc)
Mainly for communication I rely on a landline with an answering machine that has a priority code for known callers. All other calls go to voicemail.