Best Cell Phone Plans: Which carrier is best?

With all the different phone carriers and plans out there, it's ridiculously hard to determine whether or not you're getting the best bang for your buck. There are hundreds of different factors, fees, and options that different phone carriers can throw at you. To be able to find a plan and a carrier that fits your needs while saving your cash is no small feat. Reading and comparing the fine print can be arduous and painstakingly time consuming. Lucky for you, I've gone ahead and done the research for you. Here are a couple tips and tricks when choosing a plan and a carrier.

I've compared AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon. Before deciding on what plan to take on, it's very important that you first decide on how you plan to use your phone. How frequently will you be using the phone? Will you be roaming? Will you be calling people who are roaming domestically or internationally? Will you need text messaging? What time in the day do you expect to use the phone? Who will you be calling and what service do they have? Should you get a family plan? This website goes through all the questions you should ask yourself prior to picking out a plan.

What type of plan to choose?

Figuring out whether or not you should get an individual, prepaid plan, or family plans can be a doozy. An individual plan is simple enough--you pay one bill for your one phone on a monthly basis. You sign a phone contract for 1-2 years depending on the carrier and if you decide to leave the carrier, they typically charge you an early termination fee of $175 (AT&T, Verizon). Every plan with a contract has an early termination fee.

Prepaid plans are best for people who only use cell phones for emergencies (i.e. mom & dad). Some companies, like AT&T, offer 2 kinds of pre-paid plans: one, where you're only charged for the minutes you use and one where you buy a fixed amount of minutes per month (it's essentially a monthly contract as opposed to 2-year contracts). Prepaid plans are renewed whenever you want more minutes, and the best part of the deal is that you're not tied down by any contracts and you're never surprised by any surprise charges, hidden fees, or super huge phone bills. The downside is that you have to buy the cell phone full price, so typically people with prepaid plans have super cheap phones. But if you don't use it much anyway, it really doesn't matter. You'd also have to go through the trouble buying minutes every month.

Family plans are best for people who want to share minutes and have everything charged on one single bill. These also have 1-2 year contracts. The benefit in this is that you can have a fixed set of minutes to share between 2 phones which can save you money depending on your needs and how many minutes you use. Check this article out if you're interested in family plans. 2 people with 2 separate individual plans can typically get 450 minutes for $40/month each or $80 total. If they signed up for a family plan, they can get 550 minutes for $60. They'd be saving $20 and gaining 100 more minutes. The downside to a family plan is that everyone in the plan has to make sure not to go over their allocated minutes. If you have a chatterbox in your family, you'll find your bill doubling by the end of the month. Sprint & AT&T have the cheapest family plans.

Things to look for when choosing a carrier...

After you figure yourself out, you're set to choose your carrier. One of the most important things to check is coverage. Find out which carriers have great coverage in your area by visiting their site. Usually they offer up a map that displays how good their service is in their area. Or you can check out SignalMap.com. Verizon has the best overall coverage, but it's worth it to check how well all these carriers do in your area.

Roaming charges, activation charges, early termination fees, hidden fees and charges in general. Keep long distance and roaming charges in mind when choosing a plan and carrier. Lot's of carriers offer plans with no roaming fees and that's definitely something to make sure you have. Emergencies pop up and you may have to use the phone outside of your local area. Or you may have to call someone who is roaming. Either way, footing the bill once you've roamed is definitely not a pleasant ordeal. Of the three carriers I've compared, AT&T has the most expensive activation fee of $36 for individual plans. Sprint & Verizon charge $35 for activation. Hey, a dollar is a dollar. And in terms of early termination fees, both AT&T and Verizon charge $175. Sprint by far has the highest ETF of upwards of $200.

Unlimited Mobile to Mobile and unlimited nights & weekends. You always want these perks. Who do you talk to the most over the phone? Check what carrier they have. If you talk to the same person or persons on your cell phone, chances are the best thing to do is to switch to their carrier or vice versa. Having the same carrier lets you talk to those people for free, whenever you want. You can then choose the cheapest plan with the least amount of minutes and that can save you hundreds. Another thing to look for when choosing a carrier and plan is if they offer unlimited nights & weekends. Sprint offers the best unlimited nights & weekends plan because nights start at 7PM (with certain plans). Verizon and AT&T both have nights starting at 9pm. With Sprint you can chitter chatter for free much earlier than the other two.

Contract length. You don't want to be stuck in a rut for 2 years. Unfortunately, with any kind of phone plan (save prepaid phone plans), you'll be stuck with a contract of up to 1-2 years. You wanna hope for just a 1-year commitment if you can fudge it. Carriers can up charges while you're under a contract and you will have to pay. This elaborates on why you don't won't to be locked in for too long.

This article has a list of the biggest complaints people usually have. Don't end up like one of the people surveyed by checking the article out...

AT&T vs. Verizon vs. Sprint

So I decided to check out what all 3 of these phone giants offered at the very basic level of individual plans. I chose these 3 because they have the biggest networks. T-Mobile comes close too, but unfortunately doesn't as good coverage as these 3. I heard they have awesome customer service though :). I compared their cheapest individual phone plans, the only criteria being that the plan had to include unlimited mobile to mobile minutes. They all offer free domestic long distance and have the same basic features and the same typical fees (early termination & activation fees). Here's how they stacked up.

AT&T: Nation 450 w/rollover minutes ($39.99/month, 45 cents for each additional minute)

PROS: Rollover minutes. You can rollover any unused minutes to next month. After 12 months though, all the minutes accrued will be wiped out.
CONS: Highest activation fee ($36. The others charge $35. Not too big a deal.) No unlimited nights & weekends. Huuuge con, because the other two offer unlimited nights & weekends. AT&T offers 5000 minutes for nights & weekends instead. Lame. Plus, nights start at 9:00pm for AT&T. No texts.

Verizon: Nationwide Basic 450 minutes ($39.99/month, 45 cents for each additional minute)

PROS: By far, the best coverage (at least where I live in San Jose, CA and most likely where you live too.) You can text but it costs you 20 cents to receive & send a text. Activation is $35. Unlimited nights & weekends.
CONS: Nights start at 9:01pm for Verizon.

Sprint: Basic Plan 200 minutes ($34.99/month, 45 cents for each additional minute)

PROS: Activation is $35. Unlimited nights & weekends. Cheapest.
CONS: Least amount of minutes. For 4 more dollars a month, you can get more than double the minutes. Nights start at 9:00. I couldn't explicitly find how much the early termination fee was on their website, other than a statement under their terms & conditions saying that it's $200 or more. If it is $200, it's well above AT&T and Verizons ETF of $175.

Before you choose a plan, VISIT THIS SITE: http://www.myrateplan.com/wireless_plans/
It let's you do a side by side comparison of all phone carriers and their plans. Extremely useful.

At any rate, I hope you find all this info helpful to you. A simple search will also yield plenty of results where people review the services they have. The bottom line, mist important thing is to pick a service that fits your needs. Write your needs out and determine what's best based on that criteria. The best tip I can give is to write out who you speak to the most and share the same carrier as that person. Unlimited mobile to mobile is one of the best perks a plan can offer.