PAYG SIM that you don't need to top up every month

[ThrilledToTiddlyBits]

Does such a thing exist? Looking for my 11 year old but don't want to have to top up a tenner every month if I can help it, even if the data etc rolls over.

Getting on this thread. Have been told giff gaff is the answer

DC have 'SiM only' from Tesco mobile. £10/month tops up automatically from my account. They can go over that amount but I have an alert set if they go over, for example, £12.

@romainecalm that's what I want to avoid. He'll need to earn a top up, not just automatically get it every month. I can get a contract phone for him for not much more but wanting to limit my monthly outgoings if I can...

I have a "Three" pay as you go SIM - top it up £10 about twice a year, and it doesn't expire . Am at home on wifi most of the time and only use it when I'm travelling. It doesn't expire.

O2 Classic Pay As You Go? It doesn't involve purchasing bundles, you just put on credit and spend it with no need to top up till it's run down, however long that takes. You need to make at least one call every six months or they'll cut you off. Rates for calls etc are way cheaper than giff gaff unless you buy their "goody bags", but the problem with those is that the minutes, texts and data that you haven't used expire when the month is up, so while you don't have to top up the next month, you won't be able to do much with the phone until you do.

@flourella that's perfect, have ordered him a free SIM. Thank you 👍👍

@52ThrilledToTiddlyBits wow, you didn't hang about! Glad I could help

My DD has a tesco Rocket sim. It's payg but for £10 pound, you get a minutes, text and data allowance. Once those allowances have run out, they are gone until you top up again.

Ordered it now before I forget, and it's free so why not?!

DH has recently upgraded with O2 so the SIM will work with his old handset which we'll give to him for Christmas. Is that stingy?! I don't really care

Managed to mess up the copy and paste somehow, @ThrilledToTiddlyBits

Isn't that all of them? The whole point of PAYG is you don't have to pay a bill.

For example I'm on an O2 "Big Bundle". Each month if I've got at least £x of credit it'll deduct that from my balance and give me a calls/texts/data allowance. But if I have less than £x of credit, the phone carries on working charging me standard per-minute/per-SMS/per-MB rates. As soon as I top up enough again it'll start a new month's allowance (starting from the top-up date) deducting credit accordingly. And if I've got now allowance and no credit it'll still receive calls and texts it just can't make them.

Not stingy at all. DD gets my old phones. No way I'm buying Miss Scatty a brand new phone.

And no, that's not stingy. I'm sure he'll be very happy with it.

Isn't that all of them? The whole point of PAYG is you don't have to pay a bill.

I was looking for my mum and it’s seems a lot of PAYG have changed to you losing any credit at the end of the month of you haven’t used it

@safariboot the issue with that is that once the month is up and I don't want to automatically pay another tenner to renew his bundle, the price for his calls texts and data skyrockets well above the price of the classic sim that Flourella has mentioned. I'd rather let him learn to budget his balance and make it last longer.