Repair-It

Some links.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmgv0WIVEdQ
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R ... s&_sacat=0
https://www.amazon.com/Unifix-Camera-Re ... word=cover

Found this on comparing 2019 MVNO plans on all 4 major networks:
https://youtu.be/BMWfGwlRq-Q

I expected Mint to dominate and they did, and he compared a LOT of offerings. But get this - Mint just upgraded their data on all plans, for the same money.

They used to be:
$15/mo for 2GB
$20/mo for 5GB
$25/mo for 10GB

Now they are:
$15/mo for 3GB
$20/mo for 8GB
$25/mo for 12GB

That is amazing. Well...3GB could be enough if I was more careful but for $5 more I can go to 8GB which is damn generous.

So I bought 3 months on the 5GB plan. But they just raised that plan to 8GB. Am I stuck? Nope!

When do I get the new data allowances? Will it increase on my next renewal?
All our customers will receive the new data buckets on their first monthly data reset after 1/29/2019. You will not need to wait until your next renewal to receive the new data buckets.

That's right, when my first month rolls over on 2/7, my 5GB plan will become an 8GB plan. This is way, way better than anything from any major carrier where you can be stuck with a stupid plan for years without realizing it is a bad deal.

Lol

Apparently this is the Super Bowl ad.
https://youtu.be/LhkcQbhiOiM

I have like 750MB left and I think it rolls over Friday. So two days. It was pretty easy to use 5GB but I definitely used more data than with the old phone for some reasons. But going to 8GB should be a very comfortable amount of margin. And remember, there are no fees that happen if I do use all the data. It just throttles to something pretty slow but still usable for basic tasks. Or I could buy more also. Very fair. So there really are no gotchas with Mint. It's pretty much what I said before.

This will be a fun experiment. Here are the risks as I see them, in exchange for the savings:
- Used phones. Who knows. Should be fine.
- T-Mobile service. Should be fine. May be better than AT&T in some situations, or even many situations.
- Mint as an MVNO. MVNO may get 2nd tier bandwidth and no roaming agreements (could impact service in more rural areas). These guys seem pretty no nonsense and the pricing can't be beat. As long as I don't have any activation issues, there shouldn't be problems here.

Plus the visual voicemail hiccup, which is resolved anyway. And have not ran into any deprioritize data issues. The funny thing about T-Mobile is, in urban areas, the RF reception is basically the best (in general) but I'd also probably be more likely to run into deprioritization issues. So the sweet spot is outside of urban areas, but not so rural that there is poor service. That pretty much describes everywhere I live, work and go. How convenient. I mean Adam can comment if that seems right as he's had T-Mobile for some years now.

A small plan clarification.

First, they brought back 3 months for $20 (8GB per month, 2 of my months will be on 8 so I mostly got the same thing). And you can apparently extend that to a full year somehow (at the $20/3 month rate). I checked and see no way to do that on mine, so it may a new offer for new customers. I would do that if it was available and I will keep poking around to see if I can get that.

But I did misunderstand something on the plans. They had 3, 6 and 12 month prepaid rates. The 12 month was the cheapest, but they were offering 3 months of service at the 12 month rate as a promo, even though it seemed like it wasn't about to go away. So I thought I could just buy another 3 months at the end of my 3 months. But the price is not what I thought it was. To get the pricing I was expecting, I have to prepay for a year. So at the end of my 3 months, I need to buy another 12 months and THEN the pricing will be the $15/$20/$25 that I was outlining before. It's not all bad, I just didn't understand that. If I only do 3 months, then the plans go $25/$35/$45 which is significantly higher. Obviously I wouldn't do that. 6 months is $20/$25/$35, which is pretty good since the 3 and 8GB plans are only $5 more than they were at the 12 month rate.

Anyway that is some fine print I didn't fully understand before. It means I do need to configure it to buy 12 months as I get close to my 3 months so it doesn't buy at a stupid rate. EDIT: I can configure it at any time to renew at whatever is available at the time my current period is over. So, right now, I can click for 1 year of 8GB/mo, for a total of $240, which is the $20/mo that has been advertised. In fact, I just did. And I just changed Jamie's to auto renew for 12 months at 3GB, which is $15/mo, as advertised.

It just emphasizes the fact that a lot of the reason for the great pricing is the bulk, up-front buying. And the savings are significant. I mean the 8GB plan is $240/yr if bought annually. People might not do that for the same reason that they wouldn't pay out of pocket $240 for a phone but happily pay $25/mo for 2 years for a phone payment (which is $600...).

kevm14 wrote:I mean the 8GB plan is $240/yr if bought annually. People might not do that for the same reason that they wouldn't pay out of pocket $240 for a phone but happily pay $25/mo for 2 years for a phone payment (which is $600...).

People aren't good at math when time is involved.

Went to Ace in NK. Service with AT&T was usually pretty spotty in there. Had a solid 3 or 4 bars with Mint. Also, in general, I've found service equivalent to Verizon everywhere I go, and speeds usually beat it. I am not saying this as a blanket statement that will apply to everyone, just what I have experienced where I go.

Data usage. I bought 3 months of 5GB initially but the last month and this month were bumped to 8GB. Mint is prepaid so no usage history is available. Fortunately the phone tracks this.

Jan: 4516MB
Feb: 4279MB
Mar so far: 612MB

Jan top 5
Podcasts 1092MB (before I turned on wifi-only download or maybe just that I was streaming because I wasn't downloading enough episodes)
Pandora 1038MB
Speedtest 514MB
Onedrive 374MB (camera upload I guess)
Edge 365MB

Feb top 5
Amazon Music 2101MB (lol....streaming I guess)
Edge 473MB
Podcasts 425MB
Pandora 363MB
News 226MB

Mar top 5 so far
Speedtest 203MB
Edge 106MB
Chrome 88MB
YouTube 45MB
News 39MB

Seems like 8GB is going to give me comfortable headroom each month which is why I am sticking with this plan when it auto renews in early April. I have it set to buy 12 months of 8GB service which is at a $20/mo rate. I have Jamie's set for 3GB and she uses a fraction of that. I'd say I wish I could buy even less but what cell service is less than $15/line?

kevm14 wrote:Data. Fortunately the phone tracks this.

Welcome to having a real phone. It can track other things too:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta ... y&hl=en_US