phones with long contracts

[giggly]

Dh and I have really old pay as you go phones. We have held of getting new ones as we are due to emigrate later this year and we would not be able to honour any contract.
However what would happen if we did this and then left the country. We would return the phones before we went, not steal them Just feeling that the big companies can cope with the loss.
Sits back and dreams of an i phone

What would happen is that you would still be responsible for the monthly bill as you would have signed up to a contract agreeing to pay it...

Why don't you just wait and get a phone after you've moved???

You can buy the handset and have a rolling contract

Why would you do this instead of buying a new PAYG phone? For the cost of a couple of months with an iphone, you could get a decent PAYG phone and you wouldn't then have to worry about breaking a contract or ending up with a poor credit file (or whatever happens if you don't complete a contract). Or you could buy a second-hand PAYG phone on eBay and then re-sell it when you no longer need it (or take it with you and get it unlocked for use in your new country).

Very odd.

Legally you would be in breach of contract so the service provider would have every right to pursue you. The fact that you returned the phones would be neither here nor there - at that point they would be viewed as worthless to the company, and somewhat irrelevant to the core issue of your breach of contract.

I wouldn't do it personally - you never know what will happen in the future. I emigrated to Oz and know a lot of people who walked away from various debts in the UK. Unfortunately a few people ended up returning and are having to deal with the headaches of stuffed credit ratings, debts that had been passed to agencies so turned from a few hundred pounds into thousands (all legally recoverable) etc. Could you not buy cheap unlocked phones on Ebay and just put your sim in?

why not run up some credit cards or leave your electric bill unpaid?

no different.....

Definitely buy your handsets. I got a huge discount on my monthly tariff when I asked my provider (T-Mobile). You pay for the handset through the tariff, and it is a terrible rip off! I worked out I was paying hundreds extra over 18 months, when what I needed was a basic phone (that they didn't have available on contract) which DS could dunk in coffee and I could replace cheaply!

Check ebay for new phones, either unlocked or on your network. My last 2 phones cost about £35 each, new.

Someone said that you ignore your debt for six years it'll go away. So are you emigrating for longer than that?

Nothing i'm advising though as it's obviously a stupid and immoral thing to do.