How to Shop for Your Next Cell Phone Plan

My family's been using Alltel's cellular phone service for about a year and a half now, and I can't say I'm terribly pleased with the coverage area, as I'm frequently roaming despite the fact that I'm in a metropolitan area. There are a few other options in our area, mainly Verizon and Sprint, which we'll both be looking at when our contract runs out early next year. These are the things that we're going to do, and you should too, to make sure that you get the best deal on your next cell-phone and cell-phone plan.

Learn From Your Past. Look at your old bills and see how many minutes you used in previous months. If you're paying for a 1000 minute a month plan, but are only using 300 of them each month, you could scale down to a 500 minute a month plan and save quite easily. If you're paying for text messaging or for another service which you never use, you likely won't use it on your new plan either.

Do Your Homework. Go online and checkout all of the major reliable providers in your area and see what they offer for service plans. Decide exactly what you want before you go into the store. There are often extra services that'll be thrown on your account if you don't explicitly tell them that you don't want them. Also narrow your phone choices down ahead of time, so that the salesman doesn't try to talk you into a blackberry when all you need is a simple flip-phone.

Don't Try to Negotiate, Ask F or Free Stuff. You're never going to be able to negotiate down the rate of the service plan, because those prices are set nationally and aren't going to be changed for you. You can however ask for things like the activation fee to be waved, or maybe get a free accessory from the deal. Many salesman are paid by commission, and are happy to throw in an accessory to ensure a sale.

Know What You Want Ahead of Time. Come in with an idea of what you want for a service ahead of time. Your salesperson will have every incentive to try to throw on all sorts of additional services. I was recently in a Verizon store with someone shopping for a phone, and they offered him the VCast service, a GPS service, more expensive phone options, plan upgrades, accessories, and all sorts of other add-ons that he didn't really need. Go in knowing what you want, and don't fall for any of their add-ons. If you didn't think you needed it before you went into the store, you don't need it after the salesperson pitches it to you either.

When shopping for my last phone provider, I followed these steps pretty well, and came out quite nicely. We got rid of the activation fee, and got a free headset out of the equation. Go into the cell-phone store with a plan, otherwise they'll have a plan for you, and their plan doesn't involve you saving money or getting free stuff!