Why I think US cell phone service should act more like European ones

I first got a cell phone because I had to travel in Europe. I bought an Ericsson i888 world phone (dual band GSM network support). In Europe, most people use pre-paid SIM card, unlike here in the US where most people pay a monthly bill. I prefer the pre-paid service since I rarely use my cell phone, it also gives me better control over my spending. Besides this, I noticed some significant differences between US and European cell phone services:

Incoming call

Since I first used a cell phone in Europe, I understood it as they do not charge you for receiving calls. No wonder why everyone has a cell phone. Here in the US, I made a bunch of 800 calls and received many calls, then upon receiving a $220 bill I realized it is a standard practice among all American carriers to charge incoming call (with the exception of NexTel, which offers a $60/month plan for unlimited incoming call). That is ridiculous. As long as they charge for incoming calls, they won’t ever get much more usage than they are getting today.

Per minute cost

In Europe, if you call within the country, it’s about $0.09 per minute. Here, once you run over your subscription minutes, the per minute call cost is generally very high ($0.45 for Pac Plus, Cingular). Even with pre-paid plan here, it will cost about $0.10 per minute during off-peak hour and $0.35 per minute during peak hour.

Usage

I dislike become obligated to a annual contract for cell phone service is that I don’t use it a lot. Even if I do use it heavily for a month or two, the cost of pre-paid will equal the subscription monthly cost given the same usage. With subscription (which is the what the wireless carriers here try so hard to promote, like Cingular, who tries to lock each customer into a 2-year contract). Even if I don’t use any minute, I am still charged. For example, I previous contract was 150 minutes a month for about $34 (including all tax and misc. fees - that’s another thing, when you sign up for the contract they never mention the 10 different fees you never heard of), I am paying about $400 a year just for subscription that I barely use. So I purchased a pre-paid SIM card for $50, and as long as I recharge it every 90 days, I get to keep the same number. So I put in about $10 to $20 every 3 months, that turns out to be at most $80 to $100 a year, which give me more than enough air-time. I don’t like talking much on the phone, fortunately.

Endless taxes and fees

If you ever look at your bills, you know what I am talking about. At least 10 different taxes and fees.

One more bill to pay

For a guy like me, cell phone means another bill to pay for something I barely use. So with pre-paid plan, I save money and time. I save money as mentioned in the above. Most importantly I save time as I don’t have to write the check for the bill or dispute with the customer service about my bills.

Pre-paid is good but...

For someone who doesn’t need to talk a lot on the cell phone, your best choice is a pre-paid plan. Don’t even think about getting a subscription plan. Even with its 3-month expiration date if you don’t recharge the account often, you can just add $20 each time near the expiration date. ($10 will expire in 30 days)

The problem is, wireless carriers in the US don’t take pre-paid plan seriously like they do in Europe. They see it as something secondary and bad for business. Hence they offer very limited roam on the pre-paid SIM and no data service of any kind (which means you can send fax or connect to your ISP using your modem-equipped phone). In Europe, you can take a pre-paid SIM card and once you activate International roaming to anywhere in the world where your phone can locate a network. In California, at least with Cingular, the furthest you can get is Nevada.

US cell phone network need to give their customer more options and a better pre-paid plan. This will attract more people who otherwise wouldn’t really need a cell phone to buy one.