What Mobile Phone Plan is Best?

Knowing how to compare mobile phone tariffs can be a tricky business. It’s tough enough trying to choose the best mobile phone from all the gleaming shop displays.

Here are a few tips that should make it easier to find and compare cheap mobile phone deals..

Pay-as-you-go vs pay-monthly

There are three main ways of paying for your mobile phone use:

• Pay-as-you-go (PAYG)
• Pay-monthly contract
• Sim-only contract

The best option for you will depend on how much you use your mobile for calls, texts and internet browsing, and how often you want to upgrade to a new handset.

To get an idea of which mobile providers offer the best value for money check out our ‘best mobile networks’ page, which includes the results of our customer satisfaction survey on mobile operators.

You can also take a look at our mobile phone reviews for expert help on choosing the best mobile handset. We put hundreds of mobiles through our tough lab tests to help you narrow down your options.

Pay-as-you-go (PAYG) mobile tariffs

With a PAYG tariff there’s no fixed monthly fee and you don’t have to sign up to a direct debit agreement.

Instead, you pay for your mobile phone use by ‘topping up’ your mobile credit in advance. You can usually get top-up vouchers in a range of high street stores, and many PAYG mobile providers let you top up online or by phone or text. Once you’ve used up all your credit, you won’t be able to make outgoing calls or texts until you top up again.

PAYG pros

• You only pay for the call minutes/texts you use. There’s no monthly contract fee to pay.
• You can only use your phone when there’s credit on it, limiting the risk of running up unexpectedly high bills.
• It’s suited to light users (less than 50 minutes of calls and 50 texts a month, say) and those under 18, as you don’t have to sign up to a mobile contract.
• No credit check.
• No contract so you can terminate your PAYG deal whenever you want to without penalty.
• Watch out for terms and conditions that fix your mobile handset to a particular mobile network unless you pay a fee to unlock it.

PAYG cons

• You’ll probably have to pay full price for a handset up front.
• Less mobile models to choose from.
• Some operators require a minimum PAYG mobile top-up to qualify for certain incentives (such as free weekend calls).
• Calls per minute and texts may cost more than pay monthly customers.
• You must top up every time your credit runs out.

PAYG credit warning

If you don’t use your PAYG mobile for a long period, your provider may assume it’s no longer in use and deactivate the number. If this happens you could lose any credit that’s on the phone.

If you have a PAYG mobile for emergencies only, we recommend making a quick call on it at least once every three months so the provider knows your phone is active.

Pay-monthly mobile contracts

With a traditional mobile contract, you pay a fixed minimum monthly fee by direct debit and get a free or subsidised mobile phone as well as a fixed number of inclusive call minutes and texts. You’ll have to commit to a 12, 18 or 24-month contract.

When you’re tying yourself in to a long mobile contract, it’s crucial that you pick a mobile operator that will deliver top-notch customer service.

Pay-monthly pros

• Customers get a wide choice of free or subsidised mobile phone handsets.
• Some of the latest handsets are available.
• Monthly fees include a fixed amount of call minutes, texts and internet usage. If you stay within your usage cap, you’ll never pay more than your minimum monthly fee.
• You’ll never be left without a mobile phone service because your credit has run out.

Pay monthly cons

• You must agree to a minimum 12, 18 or 24-month contract, which involves signing a direct debit form.
• If you want to cancel early you may be charged a lump sum to cover all of the monthly payments for the remainder of your contract.
• Your minimum payment is fixed, whether or not you use all your mobile call minutes/texts.
• If you exceed your usage cap, you’ll have to pay extra for each additional minute or text.
• Calls to some numbers ? such as international calls or calls to 0800 or 0870 numbers ? won’t be part of your inclusive minutes and will be billed on top of your minimum monthly fee.
• If you have a poor credit rating, you may have problems getting accepted for a contract, particularly if you want a high-spec handset such as the iPhone.

Sim-only mobile contracts

With a Sim-only deal you get a new mobile Sim card but not a handset. Sim-only contracts, such as O2′s Simplicity, usually tie you in for only 30 days at a time. Orange, T-Mobile, Virgin Mobile and Vodafone also offer Sim-only contracts.

Even if you want a new mobile handset, you might still be better off with Sim-only. When we compared a range of Sim-only mobile tariffs with equivalent pay-monthly mobile tariffs that included a free handset, we found that the monthly savings you would make from choosing the Sim-only tariff over an 18-month period would often pay for the cost of a decent mobile handset outright.

Sim-only pros

• More flexible than lengthy mobile contracts that include a free or cheap mobile phone.
• You’ll get more mobile minutes/texts for your money than with a mobile contract that includes a handset.
• You can save up to £15 a month compared with traditional pay monthly mobile tariffs with equivalent minutes and texts.

Sim-only cons

• No free or subsidised mobile phone.
• You might have to unlock an existing mobile phone with a new mobile service provider.
• If you want a top-of-the-range mobile handset, you might be better off with a traditional contract

Each time a new mobile phone comes to the market and the inevitable clamor for the consumers to get their hands on it more and more old phones find themselves relegated to the back of a dusty drawer. Most of these  old mobiles will never again see the light of day and are kept purely as a backup.

But as in most things in life one mans rubbish is another mans treasure and your old phone can either be refurbished and sold around the world where users are not as fussy or keen to have the latest all singing and all dancing super phone or simply stripped down and broken up into parts.

Many companies have been set up in the last few years and will buy your old phones off you and for more than you think with even the oldest phones have some value. Often you can search online and get a fixed price for your mobile , the purchasing firm will them post you a prepaid bag and you pop it in the post box and return it to them. They will them test the handset and deposit the money directly into your chosen account.

Lots of these firms will also guarantee to wipe the mobile phone of all data including SMS , photos and telephone numbers. Perhaps more importantly, many phones do contain some very nasty substances including Cadmium, Rhodium, Beryllium, Palladium and Lead and without recycling most of it would end its days buried in a land fill site or the tipped into sea

If on the other hand you wish to donate your old phone to charity many of the bigger charitable organizations such as Oxfam ate now actively asking you to send them your old mobile phones and with over 20 million upgrades in the UK alone this year they are hoping for a share of this growing market.

I read an article about VoIP recently and the first line seemed to stick in my mind. It spoke of the one and only golden rule and that was “ never pay for any VoIP calls you make from your computer” so I thought I would do some digging and find out how hard it would be to make free calls to my brother currently working in for a UK bank in Mumbai. To make the matter slightly more difficult I chose to call him on his mobile rather than at work or home.

Making free calls to India from pc to mobile would save me a few bob as I call him once a week and calls normally cost about five pounds for just 10 minutes. My PC at home is nothing special in fact most computers manufactured in the last three or four years plugged into a standard broadband connection should be able to cope with this task. I bought a phone that plugged un one of my USB slots on eBay for £5 and I was ready to go. I could have used the inbuilt speakers and microphone that came with my but I was told that the plug in phone option would give me the best call quality.

The phone came with details of many of the free to download VoIP packages available and I set to googleing them all to see which ones were recommended and which to avoid. The golden rule of “never pay” was always at the forefront of my mind and I skipped any provider that had some cost implications concentrating on the free VoIP calls option only.

Within an hour I had made my choice, logged onto their site , chosen an account name and password and was ready to roll. I dialled the number and after a couple of extra fractions of a second the line was ringing, he picked up and we chatted for 15 minutes. I had read that The quality of the phone call is sometimes better than a standard fixed line as the data that is carried is far higher with a VoIP and it helps to collect sounds over a wider range of frequencies..  Of course the speed of you connection has some bearing on the matter but my call was perfect and I get an average of just over 2mb speed.

Consumers in the North Yorkshire area were recently issued with a warning from the Police force in the area, after it was discovered that fraudsters had been obtaining the credit card details of cardholders by pretending to be from a well known company. Police in the area have now said that the cases that have come to light show just how easy it can be to conduct this sort of crime, and just how easily consumers can fall for it.

In one of the cases highlighted a fraudster had contacted a cardholder under the pretence that he was from British Telecom and was chasing an outstanding payment. He pretended to cut off the phone line simply by hanging up and then picking the receiver back up again, which was enough to convince the consumer that this really was someone from BT. The cardholder then gave out credit card details to the caller, and within a short space of time his account was down by several hundred pounds.

The incident has highlighted just how easily determined fraudsters can get hold of credit card account details from consumers, and just how convincing they can be. Authorities are now keen to get the message across to consumers that they should never give out details to someone that has called them or turns up on the doorstep claiming to be from a company.

If cardholders do receive calls such as this then the recommendation is to call the company back before giving out any details. An official from the local police force commented on the recent scam, stating: “This case highlights the lengths that criminals will go to invent a highly believable ploy to get you to part with your banking details. It is always better to be safe than sorry and a quick call to BT Customer Services will clear up whether or not this type of call is genuine.”

Dear Friend,

I trust you are well and still determined to fulfil your dreams. There is something i want you to have in mind as you move closer to your goals.

Obstacles will come, some are big and some are small.

You have what it takes to break through them, but you just have to believe and refuse to quit. Obstacles are hard but they all have an expiry date..

In this Issue:

Article Item 1:Planing for Success Article Item 2: Persistence Article Item 3: The Subconcious Mind

Planing for Success;

It’s a well known fact that nothing just happens in life. Something or someone has to make things happen. Look around you, you will see you are surrounded by products of someone’s imagination.

The car you drive, the clothes you wear, the house you live in etc. All these things were once a product of someone’s imagiantion, but today we take them for granted and somethimes loose sight of wear they originated from.

What do you want?

Only you must decide by planting that very thought in your mind. Make sure you nuture it with encouragement, action, determination and focus.

Your personal definition of success can only be created by you and only you but you must have a well organised approach.

Below are the key things you must commit to:

1,Surround yourself with a group of people who will help you carry out your action plan.

2,Before selecting the people you need. Ask yourself what can you offer them in return, how can you create value for them. 

This is very important because no intelligent person would work indefinitely for you or with you without some form of adequate compensation, and money is not the only form of compensation. (Be Creative)

3,Commit to a regular meeting with your group to evaluate and work on your plans.Your meeting could be once a week or twice a week it does not really matter. What matters most is your commitment to this meeting.

4,Maintain a good relationship with all the members of your group if you want your plan to succeed. Remember part of what makes us human is the need to be valued, appreciated, and a sense of belonging. 

For your plan to succeed you can not afford to be careless in this area.

5,Never, ever, try to dominate your group. Remember you are a team working towards a common goal. Dictatorship always come crashing down so guard against this.

6, Do not under any circumstances invite someone who is in competition with you, into your group because they will not work with a spirit of perfect harmony. The problem with people who are in competition with you has to do with one thing.

They are focused on doing better than you, or becoming for successfull than you are so it’s me, me, me focused instead of us, us ,us focused.

You need people who will work with you not against you.(This is not x factor, but you factor )

Persistence:

Persistence is an important ingredient needed if you are to create the life you want or to achieve your goals. It’s being said that without persistence failure is guaranteed. I remember sending out my manuscript to 250 publishers because i was  determined to achieve my dream of becoming an author.

I received lots and lots of rejection slips almost daily, which was a very discouraging experience for me. I determined in my heart after receiving 144 rejection slips that i will keep going until i make it. Few months later i  received a letter in the post from my now publisher which read:

“We will be honoured to publish your book”

For me it took 144 rejection slips to achieve my goal. I don’t how many rejections it will take for you. I don’t know how many obstacles you will have to overcome, i don’t know how high your mountain is and when you will climb to the top.

 What i do know is this:

You will make it if you keep going.

Disraeli said this:

“Everything comes if a man will only wait…
 a human being with a settled purpose must accomplish it, and nothing can resist a will that will stake even existence for it’s fulfillment”

The Subconcious Mind:

The subconcious mind is a form of consciousness that forces every thought impulse to reach the mind via the five senses. The subconcious mind operates like a well organised filing cabinet. You can insert files and you can extract files whenever you want.

The subconcious mind is never tired, it does not have to sleep, it;s constantly in motion. Whatever you desire plant it in your subconcious mind and watch what happens. You will start to receive messages with detailed instruction on how you can make your dreams become reality through the application of various ideas and plans your subconcious mind will  deliver to your concious mind

The subconcious mind acts on the most dominant thought in your mind. So if the dominant thought in your mind is how, to loose weight. The subconcious mind will act on that and deliver to your concious minds, ideas on how to do just that.

The subconcious mind as powerful and helpful as it can be when used in a positive way. It can not, and will not do the job for you. You are still the person responsible for acting upon the ideas given to you buy your subconcious mind.

A farmer has to plant a seed before nature takes over.

We have to put food in our stomach before our body can digest it.

“We become what we think because our subconcious mind makes it so.

Thoughts gives birth to emotions, emotions give birth to reaction, reaction gives birth to action, action gives birth to result.

The father of thought is what you were thinking.

Wishing you much success,

Seyi Eyitayo

About Seyi Eyitayo

Oluseyi Eyitayo worked as a Sales Consultant for blue chip companies such as, Virgin Energy, Bupa Health Care, Universal Provident, British Telecom, and Intelligent Finance Credit Card before starting his own business in 2005 and his journey from being employed to running his own business has taken him on a journey of self discovery and empowerment. He now runs a successful property investment and management business in London.

Contact Seyi directly by email at hello @thepowerofselfbeleif.com or visit my website at www.thepowerofselfbelief.com for more information.