Need recommendations for economy "pay as you go" cell phones.
> This is for a 10 year old child in California -- to be used ONLY in
> EMERGENCY situations.
> My child is probably going to use between 5 and 30 minutes a month.
> I think there is no point subscribing to a plan.
> Any recommendations for a "pay as you go" economy cell phone ? (like > prepaid cards ?)
A lot of it will depend on where you are. If you're in or near a major city most any of the companies around Cingular, Verizon, T-Mobile, Alltel, Virgin Mobile, etc. will likely work similarly in that you'll have to have a compatible phone and subscribe to a company's network. You'll buy refill vouchers usually in amounts of anywhere from $5 to $100. The refills will have "expiration" times by which you either need to make a call or add more money to the account to keep the account from being discontinued. If you keep track of the account and add more money generally the money you alreay have in the account stays there and is just added to by the new refill you add to your account. You cannot however just "forget" about it. You'll need to do something such as add money periodically to keep the account.