Mobile phone - contract or PAYG

[Madmog]

My daughter has my husband's old mobile phone and consequently won't be seen dead using it in front of her friends. Therefore, it has taken her one year to use the £10 credit.

She's asking for a more updated phone and we're trying to work out whether to get something on contract or PAYG. She accepts that the limit will be £10 per month whatever. What are your teenagers on and if contract do they get the most out of it?

Her friends are on a mixture, she also has two girls she can message on kick and another via her ipod.

Contract is much cheaper, DS had PAYG and I was forever topping it up, now he has contract with unlimited texts, not much call time but he rarely uses it to call, and doesn't use it for Internet as he has I pod/pad for this, I pay £14 a month with orange & he has Sony experia phone, and tied in for 2 years, but I'm sure you will be able to get something for £10, try Tesco (it all depends what phone your DD will settle for!)

she doesn't need anything other than the basic phone with calls and texts. if she WANTS something different she can save up for it.

if she defines her worth by a phone she needs some help to get out of the sheep mode that is so prevalent among children.

but if you still want to do it, make it PAYG with no top ups if limit reached - unless contract is cheaper. But a tenner a year sounds fine to me, it clearly hasn't made her a social leper.

Contract can't be cheaper honeybee, if she has currently taken a year to use £10 of credit!
It's down to what they can afford, in our house.
dd(14) is on PAYG- she talks to her friends in the day time, er, face to face, and, in the evenings they all message each other on Face Book.
ds(17) saved up some money (from his paper round) and bought himself a contract when he was 15 - he had to give us the 12 months payments before we would sign him up. He pays £7.50 a month for 5000 texts, some internet (can't remember how much) and 250mins. He uses right up to his limits. Up to them though - dd would rather save her earnings, ds likes to spend.

I see your point backforgood but OP said her DC wants a new phone so on PAYG you need to fork out for the phone which could be £100 whereas on contract the phone is free and gets renewed every couple of years

You can buy a cheapish "cool" looking phone and get a contract with someone like GiffGaff for less than £10 a month.

DD is 13 and uses her phone a lot. This is usual phone use for a teenager.

Thanks for your comments (so far). Have just had a look on Tescos website and there are a couple of phones I suspect she may be interested in on contracts of £7.50 and £10, so have to weigh up whether we go for contract where phone is included to pay for phone and have a set amount we will top up a month.

specialsubject, in all fairness she's asked for the phone as her Christmas present, knows the price limit and that she won't get much else, so we're happy to buy one especially as this is the first time in two years she's actually asked for something. I'm sure things will change soon though!

You need giffgaff! Free SIM and bundle of £10 guces you 500 minutes, unlimited texts and some internet too.

Agree - Giffgaff is fab & you're not tied to a contract.

You can get some super cheap sim-free smartphones now.

You can cap Tesco contracts too.

I capped my own just because I was paranoid after being PAYG forever

DD2 is in Orange dolphin (I think it is) anyhow £10 top up gives you lots of texts for a month, then she runs out the £10.

l doubt she gets through £40 a year, I don't think I top her phone up every other month.

DD1 has an ace on £13 contract, hates it and wants an iPhone.

when her contract runs out, we shall see. She will be 16 and it's about GCSE results time.

I second Tesco contracts are brilliant, a decent smartphone at a low price, make sure you cap the contract and they can't go over their allowance.

I was going to say giffgaff too - much better value than most PAYG deals, and you can change what bundle you buy each month depending on how much your DD has been using it.

You're also not tied into it for 2 years like a contract, which can be a real headache if anything happens to the contract phone before the two years are up - even if the phone is unusable, you still have to carry on paying.

PAYG every time. Giffgaff is great. I have moved them to rolling SIMs on virgin and I worry all the time about them losing them etc (they are big kids too, DS could get his own contract come January- faints!). Cheaper than GG though as they really only use unltd texts!

Giffgaff will be selling phones soon too- the list is up but no prices yet.

I'm with specialsubject about the "sheep" aspect. None of mine have exciting phones, they have functional ones that will text a lot, call rarely, use a bit of internet and be MP3 and minor games machines as needed. actually the 32GB SD card is the bit they really love. (samsung galaxy Y both the 14 and 17yr old).

And they are at a school where kids have very expensive phones down to basic (and it may still be the case that one of DD2s mates has NO mobile!). None of which are seen as an embarrassment to use.

I am getting a GiffGaff SIM card for my phone when my contract ends. The PC magazines rate them highly as a service provider. They use the O2 network, but their customer service is supposed to be pretty good.

Bunbaker the " customer service" with gffgaff is a bit " do it yourself" via the forum, however actually as he people who post are interested geeky people making their own phones work ( as opposed to call centre folks who seem to guess the answer t get you off the phone sometimes!) it is good

I really rate Tesco contracts, ds and dsd have them..."cool" phones, and contract capped so that they cannot go over - but they have the option to top up like a payg if they do want to. Ds has never needed to, dsd, frequently!
You can choose whatever contract you want, and then cap it - s'easy

Giff gaff all round in this house we all have unlocked handsets.
£7.50 a month gets you unlimited texts, a couple of hours talk plus a fair bit of internet.
I just put a bit of credit on as I use a mobile very little plus Giff Gaff to giff Gaff is free.
DCs are not image concious and they have perfectly good cheap handsets. I have a £10 Nokia

Thanks for your replies everyone. Haven't made a final decision, but have decided if it's contract we'll go with Tesco as each element can be capped so we know she won't go over. If we do PAYG, then we'll go with GiffGaff - will see if they bring out any okay phones under their new scheme, if not see what we can get unlocked.

Giffgaff way cheaper than contract.

We are all on giffgaff so our calls to each other are free

I have just ordered my GiffGaff SIM card

I've heard if you buy a phone from Carphonewarehouse it is unlocked for most networks, so you don't need to buy a giffgaff phone OP. Any O2 phone will run giffgaff regardless of where it was bought IIRC

You are right FeisMom. I'm not entirely sure but I think if you buy a phone from an outlet that isn't affiliated to one particular service provider the phone is unlocked anyway.