Cell Phone Warning

Tips for cell phone buyers that you may already know.....or not:

1. Pay your bill on time. If you pay your bill on time, when it's time to upgrade you can. If you are consistantly late, your service provider may punish you and make you wait a few extra months. Don't end up in the naughty corner!

2. Don't buy insurance. Insurance is nice if you want a refurbished phone. However, there are times when the phone they send you doesn't even work correctly. If not you may be coughing up more money then you expected!

3. Beware of rebates! Rebates are great however, some companies only give the rebate to the "primary" phone number holder.(see below)

4. Check the paper work. Check the paper work when adding someone to your family plan. The cell phone dealer is trying to make the biggest commission he/she can. For example, I have had my cell phone for 5 years. I decided 1 year ago to add my son;thus, I had to buy him a phone. the cell phone sales clerk put my son as the primary phone number(bigger commission on the sale) and my number as secondary. This goes back to the rebate...I can not get the rebate since my number is listed as secondary. My son can not upgrade since he hasn't been with the company a year. Bottom line...as the customer, you lose and there is NO bargaining with the cell phone company!

Because I am more polite than my cell phone company...I won't mention their name. However, I will share something that I learned off the Chris Howard radio talk show and that is Verizon ranks #1, Nextel #2, Cingular #3, T Mobile #4, and Sprint hit the bottom of the list. Nice info. but I don't ever remember Sprint treating their customers like idiots!