Tuesday Tip: Pay Less to Your Cellphone Provider

By Yehudit Garmaise

You can’t “live” without your cell phone, but do you have to pay so much for its services?

Consider the following tips to lessen monthly bills from your cell phone service provider.

1. Shop around to determine who can give the best price for what you need on a cellphone. Do some research, read reviews, ask around, and check out lesser-known carriers.

2. Carefully review your plan, and remove unneeded extras: Are you paying more money for data or text messages you don’t really need? Use Apps, such as Data Usage and My Data Tracker, to monitor your usage, and then call your provider and cut whatever services you don’t need.

3. Cut your carrier’s insurance. Instead of paying for insurance through your carrier, check to see whether one of your credit card companies might be offering the benefit for a small deductible. Credit cards that provide cell phone insurance offer coverage for damaged or stolen devices up to maximum amounts.

4. Create family plans, instead of paying separately for phones. 

5. Research potential discounts: Students, healthcare workers, teachers, government employees, and current and former U.S. military service members often qualify for discounts. Call your carrier to find out whether you qualify, and ask about what you need to provide to verify that you qualify. For example, AT&T offers discounts on unlimited plans for military, veterans, first responders, teachers, nurses, physicians, and their families.

6. Choose Autopay: Wireless carriers, such as Verizon, for example, provide discounts of up to $10 per month for customers who have unlimited plans on autopay. 

In addition to saving money on your cell phone bill, Chaim Geller, who created helpmebuildcredit.com. told Rockland Daily that linking a few bills to checking accounts so as to pay monthly bills automatically is a great way to ensure that your bills are paid on time. 

7. Don’t always trade-up: Although many smartphone users often want the next new thing after 24 months, smartphones are built to last more than two years. Constant trading up can lock customers into another 18 to 24 months of payments, which adds $20 to $40 per month, per line to your bill. Consider using a used phone to save even more. 

8. Ask for better deals, by visiting a store or calling your carrier. Sometimes, politely telling carriers that you are considering ditching their company, even before your contract is over, can help you score some discounts.

9. Consider pre-paid phones: especially for trips to Israel. Prepaid phones come without contracts and are generally less expensive than phones billed monthly.