Mobile phone for 11 year old

[disconnecteddrifter]

I have an iPhone se which is a bit battered and isn't up for upgrade until May 2019. My son wants a phone and it is true all of his friends have one and it would give him more freedom.
How do people afford it? Should I get an early upgrade, pay the fee and give him my old one? Or get him a second hand phone?
Do people give their kids sim only or contract?

dc at that age had a sim only 'burner' phone (cheapo one from the phone shop at the corner)
for messaging dc uses the family tablet.

i personally would use this as a learning opportunity for learning to care for ones own property and money management.

Give him a older pay as you go phone say as part of pocket money that he earns he will also earn phone money.

He needs to learn to keep a eye on credit so not to use it all to quickly

and reward him with a slightly better phone each birthday or christmas if he has taken good care of it.That way hopefully he will treat a smart phone with respect when he earns one later.

I wouldn't – a Nokia brick maybe, but not a smartphone.

And if it had to happen, pay as you go – absolutely not a contract.

But I get the feeling I'm a bit old-fashioned when it comes to this stuff; I pay attention to age limits on apps like Whatsapp and Instagram and don't see the point of a smartphone for a child if they shouldn't be using 90% of the stuff on it and aren't yet responsible enough to brush their own teeth.

My lads (13 and 16) both had phones given to them at 11 when they went to secondary school as it gave them more freedom to do stuff after school with mates (They needed to check for transport options)
They both had whatever my old iphone was at the time and I got a shiny new upgrade.
Now they both have 8's and are on contract. We have a group contract which means their bills are about £25 - £30 a month but they get a new phone every 18 months

As for age limits on things we've always had no limitations on games, apps and internet (but thats a whole thread in itself) and our Family Whats app is invaluable to keeping us all in the loop with activities etc

All of mine had their first phone for their -11th birthday and it was a cheap smartphone. I got them on contract with Tesco so any overspend is capped. I used to pay £7.50 a month, if you wanted something fancier you paid the difference (once they were 13 and earning). I now pay £10 each, still pretty cheap.

They weren't on Facebook or any other 13+ stuff but a phone is useful once they start doing things on their own. And a, smartphone is handy at school sometimes (I mean may be used in lessons eg for quizzes etc, depending on school rukes). I don't get the fear of them tbh, they are handy gadgets not guns or drugs.

i personally would use this as a learning opportunity for learning to care for ones own property and money management.

Agreed. Op you say the Iphone is a bit battered. If this is the case then he might be more careless than if he got a new (less fancy phone) As he will think well it's already a bit knackered, so no need to be careful and keep it in good condition.

I would get a less fancy sim only phone, and like a PP said let him work hi way up to a nicer phone as he gets older. It's important to remember a phone is a privilege and there's no need to have an all singing dancing fancy phone until he is the one paying for it.

I bought the cheapest smartphone I could find on offer and the cheapest SIM only contract - currently £5 per month.

I got mine a Nokia-1 smartphone £50 from amazon. PAYG SIM card. Bought an SD card for £6.99 so he could fit more games on and use google FamilyLink to keep an eye on his usage etc.

This is great thanks guys

I brought myself a new one, gave them the old one with a new simm only contract with a lot of calls and texts and very little data. They can call and text when out and about but internet really needs WiFi except in very limited circumstances so easier to still control that. Means if we discard the cost of my new phone the simm only contract is costing £5 a month so isn’t too bad.

I got DD1 a PAYG at Christmas when she was in y6 to get her used to being responsible with a phone, was about £40 and I don't think we had to top up credit in over 6 months. She is a summer born so got her the cheapest Samsung on contract for her birthday ready for high school. Think we pay £14 per month for it. I would go cheap and new rather than give him your old phone ( unless you want an excuse to upgrade).

I don't think there is any right or wrong way around it, DD had an ipod from about 5 (games were cheaper on that than a DS) then 'upgraded' to our old iphone at about age 9 - no sim though, it only worked on wifi or offline, she has had an upgrade to our old phone whenever we upgrade and got a sim card at 11 - but only because she proved she could keep her phone charged, not lose it, not break it etc.

luckily up to now there have been no losses or breaks, she is covered under our insurance just in case, but I am the only one who has ever claimed!

We have always been a techie family so figured it would make sense to make it just a normal part of life from an early age, it seems to have worked for us. the only new item she had was her ipod though - cant justify a new £1k phone for a pre-teen!