Temporary cell phone in California.
 

OK, here's a new one (I think). I often see people asking about getting a cell phone for trips in Europe, but my situation is a bit different.

Call me "living in the last century", but I do not have a cell phone (have done it twice and hate the damn things). The last yearly contract I had ran $39 a month and I averaged about 20 minutes a month on it -- or $2.00 a minute. But we'll be in California for six weeks staying in three different apartments. Two of them, including the one in San Francisco for two weeks has no phone. This is apparently not unusual these days as they figure everybody has a cell phone. So what is the possibility of getting one for maybe six weeks or even two months? I checked a couple of firms at our local mall in Florida only to be told they had a minimum contract of a year (well, one had a six month offer, but was almost double the monthly cost).

Any thoughts?

Try getting a pre-paid phone. I know T-Mobile has 'em (www.tmobile.com). Buy however many minutes you think you'll need, no contracts.

You are not "living in the last century" and I completely understand how you feel. I also agree that getting an unlocked or prepaid mobile is an excellent option.

I have more and more friends who have good mobile calling plans and are having their hard-wired phones disconnected; we have had one of the two that used to be in the house disconnected because of it.

It's just a different mode of thinking and for some it is like e-mail...once you do it enough you never want to get rid of it.

T-Mobile, huh? That's what my last service was. The fact that it rarely had a signal even though I was in the center of an area, and the idea that no one could ever get me direct, but would get a message that I wasn't available and have to leave a message, even when I had the phone on and with me really discouraged me. Maybe they're better in California?

I'll check into this prepaid phone idea. Sounds good.

Tracfone. You should be able to get one in Walmart, or other discount store, for about $20. This should also give you a card good for about 40 minutes over a two-month period. Send me (or another Tracfone user) your email address before buying (see Tracfone website) and get another 120 minutes free.

I've been using Tracfones for about 4-5 years now. Love 'em. Runs about $100/year (on the yearly plan,) and I use it so little I've never run out of minutes.

Patrick-Cingular and Verizon are the most popular in California at least among everyone I know. Cingular seems to have a pretty good pre-paid plan. You have to buy a phone but they have cheaper ones. Look on the internet under Cingular Go Phone. I only looked at Verizon for a second. They look a little more expensive for the phones but maybe you will see something I didn't.

Although we have a landline at my house, we hardly use it anymore.

T mobile used to have coverage problems, but they seem to have fixed that now. San Diego, Portland, Oregon, NYC, LA, and Boston presented no problems in my recent stays.

Hi Neo, my cellphone is with Cingular and I have always been able to use my cellphone in SF, all along the west coast etc. I am not familiar with their prepaid plan however.

Yes, in 2001 when traveling Alaska and the west coast all summer, I had Cingular. I must say it worked far better than my T-Mobile did here. I heard for an entire year, "oh, we're fixing that problem" -- NOT!

Looks like I have an exciting afternoon ahead of me -- a trip to the hated MALL and to Wal-Mart.

Bookhall, if I like that Tracfone idea, you'll be getting an email from me.

I guess I'll always have to buy a new phone -- instead of using one of the existing ones I have in a drawer.

Patrick -- I would definitely look into what type of pre-paid Cingular has. I used to have T-Mobile and I find Cingular FAR superior.

I dropped my land line over a year ago and don't regret it a bit. In fact, not giving money to BellSouth makes me very happy.

I've been with T-Mobile for many many years and never had a problem. For $39.99 I get 1500 minutes. Can't beat that. Even made a couple of calls from Europe last year - those cost a bit more, of course, but I was only on the calls for a few mins, and it was worth it to me.

Was in San Fran for a week in May and the phone worked just fine. T-Mobile has definitly expanded their coverage area; FIve years ago I didn't get service in Lake Placid; two years ago I did.

I can't stand Cingular for several reasons. What it boils down to for me is that T-Mobile offers the best number of minutes for my money.

Patrick, you can donate your old phones (with charger) to shelters for abused women. They are used for victims who don't have a cell phone so they can call 911 if they need to.

Target carries prepaid phones, and it isn't Walmart.

Ah, I can handle Target.

Huge dark storms here today, so I didn't venture out. But I did talk with a friend who has a Tracfone. He tells me that when he went to Michigan for a couple weeks he had to "re-register" the phone. Otherwise it would have had "roaming charges" when he was using it in another area. Huh? Does that mean I'd have to change it everytime I was in new city? Surely Cingular and other companies don't do that.

Austin Traveler, funny you mention the shelter for abused women. That's my usual spot for donations -- they have a wonderful thrift shop here. But they refused my phones. They also refuse all electronic devices, including my computer keyboard I tried to give them, and also refuse Christmas decorations. What am I to do with that tree stand? That's why the cell phones are back in the drawer.

It's too bad the shelter doesn't accept phones. Maybe they give the victims new phones. LOL.

Just for fun, I did a Google search and found this for you.

http://tinyurl.com/zcemb

And I did tinyrul just for you!!

So why is this so difficult?
I went to Office Max hoping someone there could help me with the idea of a Tracfone since they have no customer service you can call. (It says on their website they do, but a call only gives you dozens of options you can click, and none connect to a human being.) Lo and behold the woman at Office Max knew quite a bit about them, since she had one and her daughter had one to take to college. According to her (and I was asking because of what it said on the website) you must register the phone in your own zip code and when you travel you must re-register it in that one. You lose minutes when you re-register, and if you don't re-register you will roughly triple your units of use because you aren't connecting through the set network that taps into other networks. Not sure if I phrased that right, but the basic idea was, it wasn't for me and travel, but would be fine if I were only using it at home. I'm not.

So I go to the store for Cingular. They really don't do prepaid since "that's only for people who have no credit and it costs a whole lot more." When I explained my situation (after the guy asked me how long I was going to be in this country) the guy finally said that for $300 they could set me up with a phone and 2 months worth of minutes -- about 90 of them. No thanks.

Verizon told me they have NO prepaid plans that would work for me -- only one year contracts. Period.

Same story at Sprint.

T-Mobile was very nice. They insist they have improved their local service since I complained how many problems I had connecting when I was with them a year ago. Bottom line. I could use my same phone, they'd insert a card, and I would have 150 minutes that are good for 90 days -- for a total of $60, then can add minutes 130 for $25 for example with no other monthly fees and each add on would be good for up to 90 days. At last a system I could live with. So I did it today.

I came home and tried 8 times to call my own home number all getting immediately a "call failed" message. On the 9th call it worked. I tried calling my own cell number from my land line and it rang. Half an hour later I called my cell from my landline and nothing happens. Finally I get a voice telling me to leave a message. I do. Twenty minutes later my phone rings telling me I have a new voice message and I listen to myself. I try calling a friend. The first 9 tries come out "call failed". Then it goes through. We talk a few minutes and he agrees to call me. I hang up and wait. Nothing happens. Finally my landline rings. He tells me when he calls my cell number it says to leave a message.

I head back to T-Mobile and explain. The guy says, "you should update your phone this one is cheap and old". I tell him that last year when they sold it to me saying it was a $300 phone and one of the best they had I didn't know it was cheap. He backed off, but we both agreed that in one year a phone becomes outdated. He couldn't look me in the eye though and convince me that the sometimes working and most times not was really the fault of the phone. Of course, while I was there, it worked perfectly. I get to the mall parking lot and it doesn't work -- call failed.

So here I sit with a phone that works the same as the entire year I had T-Mobile. I'm sincerely hoping it is a local problem and this phone will work in California. Who knows?

My T-mobile phone worked just fine in San Fran... You can look at their coverage map on their website...

Thanks. But the covereage map is complete in Naples, Florida too. So that doesn't seem to mean a thing here.

Is there anyone who thinks all the call failed messages and people calling being told to leave a message rather than my phone ringing are actually because the phone is defective rather than just really poor T-Mobile service?

Neopolitan it sounds like the person from cingular was trying to get his commision. What I would recommend doing is going to walmart and purchasing a pre-paid phone and the minute cards, the phone should be ~$50 for a cheapie and minutes are typically around $0.10 each. I would recommend Verizon.

Well I've already spent $60 for a phone and 150 minutes, so until I think they won't work in California, I'm sure not buying anything else. $60 is a lot for the 15 minutes or so I'm actually likely to use in the two months out there.

I threw a curve at everyone who tried to get me to buy a simple $39.99 a month plan and I explained that $4 a minute was too much. They all said "what?" until I said that in the past year I averaged about 10 minutes a month.