5 Ways To Lower Your Monthly Cell Phone Bill

Your cell phone. You use it daily. It's your right hand companion to make calls, check the weather, browse the Internet to find out a quick piece of information, or play your favorite phone app games.

Just because you regularly use your cell phone, it does not mean that you have to pay an arm and a leg every month to enjoy the service.

Check out these 5 ways to lower your monthly cell phone bill.

1. Don't upgrade right away

According to Ting Mobile, most individuals now keep their cell phones for 3 or more years before upgrading to a new device. 47% of survey respondents stated that they had their phone for 3-5 years before upgrading to a new device (1). 10% of the survey responders said they upgraded only to get the hottest new cell phone model

Practicality is the new norm beyond having a cellular device with all the extra bells and whistles. Individuals are opting on keeping their phone longer while in a no contract plan to save on the costs of upgrading regularly.

Upgrading too soon can cost you money. If you are on a contract plan, you will have to extend it for another couple years to fully pay off your new upgrade.

Now if you see your phone is operating slowly even with a high quality network connection and/or if it gets too hot when in use for too long, then it's definitely time for an upgrade.

2. Get a prepaid phone service

Consider for signing up for one of the no contract plans at your current carrier. If there are none, you may want to look into switching carriers. Not only will you not have to deal with those annoying two-year contracts, but you can bring almost any phone of your choice to the prepaid carrier.

Switching to a prepaid phone carrier will give you command over how long you want to be with that company. Prepaid phone carriers such as TracFone, Boost Mobile, and Cricket Wireless charge a monthly amount based on a data package. If you know you will not be using a lot of data, you can opt for the cheapest GB plan. If you are going to use a lot of data, get an unlimited data plan.

Unlimited phone plans at Boost Mobile are $50 to $60 per month. If you want 15 GB of data, it will be $45 per month. After 6 months of on-time payments, you can start paying only $35 per month for this service package. This plan also includes mobile hotspot. (5)

The monthly charges shrink as the data plan package gets smaller. The cheapest Boost Mobile package is $10 per month for 1 GB of data. If you plan on doing all your research on home at a computer, take this deal to slash your phone bill down almost by 60% to 90%.

3. Sign up for your carrier's rewards program

Signing up for your carrier's rewards program (if applicable) will help you to lower your monthly bill by redeeming points accumulated towards free refills on your prepaid phone.

For example, the TracFone rewards program states that you can earn double the points for doing auto refill on your prepaid phone (2). You can also earn points by watching videos, taking polls, and playing games on featured on your rewards program account.

Once you hit the threshold, points can be redeemed on free service plans and high-speed data add-on cards.

4. Sign up for your carrier's referral program

Check your mobile carrier to see if there is a referral program available. Usually, you can get a month of free service or discounts off your monthly bill for referring friends to the mobile company.

For each friend that you refer to TracFone, you and that friend you referred will receive a month of free TracFone service on your no contract plans. Hence, if you refer 12 friends to the company and they all successfully sign up for prepaid phone service using your unique referral code, you will get an entire year of free phone service!

AT&T ran a refer a friend promotion in November 2020 where you would have received a $25 account credit for each friend you referred to the AT&T prepaid monthly service. Each of your friends would have receive a $75 account credit. (3)

Boost Mobile ran a refer a friend promotion in November 2019 where you could have received $150 per friend (up to $500 total). Your referred friend will have received a $25 account credit when making the switch to Boost Mobile. (4)

Hence, while some refer a friend promotions are ongoing like at TracFone, there are other refer a friend promotions that are for a limited time.

Before switching mobile carriers, check to see what their refer a friend promotions are like, so that you can be ready to take advantage of great savings or even free months of service after signing up.

5. Autopay your way to savings

If you turn on autopay, chances are you are going to save big! Check with your provider to see how you can save on your bill by turning on autopay.

AT&T's unlimited data cell phone plans are $65 per month. If you turn on auto pay, you will get a $15 discount on each of your monthly bills. That means unlimited data service for only $50 per month!

If you pay a certain amount of months upfront, you can shave even more money off your monthly bill. AT&T has a 3 month plan for $33 per month with a 8 GB data package if you pay $99 upfront. Get the same 8 GB data package for $25 per month for 12 months if you pay $300 upfront.(6)

How Will You Lower Your Monthly Bill?

As long as you do the proper research to find out how you can save with your cell phone carrier, you will eventually find the savings in which you seek.

Have you lowered your cell phone plans in another way than what we discussed? Start a discussion in the comments to offer your wisdom on what you have done to lower your cellular service costs.