One Year Cell Phone Options?

[Dhiana]

A 23 yo Japanese friend of mine will be leaving for the states soon for a 1-year work contract. She has questions about obtaining a cell phone so therefore, so do I :)

I am aware of VirginMobile which I have used in the past with reasonable success but I know she is interested in continuing with an iPhone. She already has an older model here in Japan that is under contract.

She is mature and responsible and her English is great but as you know many of us native speakers are confused by that small print in contracts.

So my questions are:

1) What is the most reasonably priced option for obtaining an iPhone for only a year in the states? Not necessarily the cheapest, quality of service needs to be considered also.

2) What options/companies are available that is simplest for a non-native speaker to understand?

3) What would be the best smart phone option if the iPhone isn't a good fit?

Thank you for any assistance you can provide =) It's been a long time since I've been back to the states, Dhiana

[SteveinMN]

1) What is the most reasonably priced option for obtaining an iPhone for only a year in the states? Not necessarily the cheapest, quality of service needs to be considered also.
Quality of service will depend on where your friend is most of her time here. Along rural interstates away from large towns, Sprint and some local carriers are king, but even they don't cover everything. In major cities, almost everyone works decently well. If you can provide a location (even something like "mid-sized West Coast city"), that would help.

Also, is her iPhone a GSM phone? If so, she could bring it and just buy a SIM card from a U.S. carrier. There may be issues with data speeds (3G, 4G, LTE) but U.S. carriers use those terms very loosely, so it's hard to offer much advice here. If she will be dependent on cellular data (not Wi-Fi), the carrier will make a difference.


2) What options/companies are available that is simplest for a non-native speaker to understand?
As English-centric as the U.S. is in general, your friend probably would have to be in an area with a fair number of Japanese. Then she could go to a store run by the big carriers or some of the independents and have a likelihood of someone who spoke Japanese. I don't know as any of the four big U.S. carriers has an edge on serving customers who speak other than English and Spanish. Smaller carriers like the Republic Wireless (frequently mentioned in these forums as a cheap choice) are that way because they don't spend money catering to an international clientele.


3) What would be the best smart phone option if the iPhone isn't a good fit?
There really is nothing like an iPhone :D. Not to say Android or Windows Phone are worse; they're just substantially different from iPhone's iOS.

I can't imagine why an iPhone would not be a good fit almost anywhere in the U.S. If your friend's iPhone won't work in the U.S., maybe her best bet would be to buy a used iPhone from a generation or two back, so it still runs her apps. Buy it from a known seller of used phones and she should be alright. She should just make sure she is buying the phone outright, not under any kind of contract. She then could sell the phone when she comes back home.

Or your friend might want to consider spending $100 on an iPod Touch, which essentially is an iPhone without the phone part (it can use Wi-Fi to run iPhone apps) and then getting just a "dumbphone" for voice calls and texting. Kind of a pain to carry two devices and have to sync contact lists separately, but it would be the cheapest way out if, for some reason, an iPhone just won't work. There also are people who use their iPod Touches like cell phones, using Wi-Fi connections for voice, but I think that would be a huge pain and service would be really spotty, especially on the move.

[shadowmoss]

There are a few of the indendent, no-contract carriers now that allow IPhones. Since I don't have one, I'm not sure which ones, but there is a huge thread on it at MrMoneyMustache.com in the forums. I think Air Voice is one. Ask this question over there and she may find a much cheaper plan to fit her needs.

Editing to add: The independents use the the same towers as ATT and the other big carriers, they just lease from them. So in general the coverage would be the same as the big carriers. The only difference is that the larger carriers have agreements about roaming that wouldn't transfer to the smaller independent carriers. Some besides Air Voice are Ting, and Consumer Cellular, but I don't know that they allow IPhones.

[SteveinMN]

smaller independent carriers. Some besides Air Voice are Ting, and Consumer Cellular, but I don't know that they allow IPhones.
Ting uses Sprint's network, so really only Sprint-compatible phones can be activated. That pretty much translates to "nobody else's phone" can be activated. :(

Consumer Cellular uses at&t's network, so it would be possible to activate any GSM iPhone on it (assuming they permit it). The problems would be roaming (as you pointed out) and data speeds. For example, once they were off contract, people were taking at&t iPhones to T-Mobile for better service/lower bills. Problem was that 3G on the iPhone on at&t's network turned out to be only EDGE speeds -- less than a quarter of 3G speed.

In an additional twist, some carriers treat prepaid (which typically is much cheaper than a month-to-month contract) differently for data roaming. Our carrier, T-Mobile, does not permit data roaming on their prepaid plans, only on their contract plans. (boo! hiss!)

We really need to know more about what Dhiana's friend is looking for in service before we can get past conjecture. The facts are correct, but I'm guessing many of them will be inapplicable.

[Dhiana]

She'll be working in central Florida for the mouse. She'll mostly use it for social apps to connect with friends back here in Japan but also for calling taxis, bus schedules, finding where things are located. Researching basic day to day life stuff in a new country.

You've given me a lot of ideas already to research, I really appreciate that! Ease of sign-up/set-up I think is important. Even though her English is really good, stressful situations such as an overseas move like this can make one completely forget even the most basic of 2nd language skills! I know from experience :P

Thank You so much!

[shadowmoss]

Go to this site and ask your questions. He is the answer guy on MrMoneyMustache.com forums for cell phone companies. He helped me when I was swiching.

http://www.techmeshugana.com/

This is his personal website, and you won't have to wade through page and pages (and pages and pages) of the thread on the MMM site. Tell him shadowmoss sent you. :)

[rutter]

"3) What would be the best smart phone option if the iPhone isn't a good fit?"
My son wanted an Android phone. I bought him a Nexus 4 direct from Google http://www.google.com/nexus/4/ He's on the prepaid T-Mobile $30 100 minutes, unlimited text, throttled at 5GB unlimited data plan http://prepaid-phones.t-mobile.com/prepaid-plans
He's really happy with it