Cell Phone Plans

How to pick the right one.

There are so many cell phone plans that it's tough to pick the right one. For example, a quick search on TeleBright for providers that cover zip code 20002, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., identified 176 options from five of six of the nation's largest carriers: AT&T, Cingular, Nextel, T-Mobile and Verizon. (TeleBright doesn't track Sprint.)

"It's hard to compare apples to apples, because someone is always selling peaches," Derek Kerton puts it. Kerton, a wireless telecommunications industry analyst in Milpitas, California, says you need to know algebra and have lots of time on your hands to really do it right. Who does?

But TeleBright and MyRatePlan.com can help. Each site allows you to pick the features that matter to you--including carrier, price, number of minutes, free nights and weekends, and free mobile-to-mobile calling, among other options.

TeleBright

At TeleBright you enter your phone number and zip code, then select the number of minutes, a national or regional plan, and how much you want to pay. Then pick from among seven features, including free night-and-weekend minutes, and the carriers you'd like to consider. A search in the 20002 zip code for 300 or more minutes, at about $40 a month, with free night-and-weekend minutes, free mobile-to-mobile calling, free long distance, and a family plan, with any carrier, revealed eight plans from four providers, a far more manageable number than 176.

The plans ranged in cost from $40 for 450-minute plans offered by AT&T and Cingular and a 400-minute plan from Verizon, to $50 for 600-minute plans from AT&T and Cingular, a 400-minute plan from T-Mobile, and a 500-minute plan from Verizon.

All the plans included unlimited mobile-to-mobile and night-and-weekend minutes, except Cingular's $40 monthly plan, which has 5000 night-and-weekend minutes. None of the carriers charge for calls carried on other providers' networks, except Verizon, which charges 69 cents per minute. AT&T holds its customers to two-year contracts; Verizon and T-Mobile require one-year contracts. Cingular offers one- or two-year contracts.

MyRatePlan.com

At MyRatePlan.com, you start by choosing a rate plan, carrier, or phone. Then enter your zip code and add or subtract carriers, choose how much you want to pay per month and how many minutes you need, and select features such as unlimited long distance.

The filters on MyRatePlan.com are more specific than those used on TeleBright. For example, they allow to choose whether you need unlimited long distance or just some free long distance. A search for a national plan for a family in zip code 20002, costing no more than $63 dollars a month and with 510 minutes, including unlimited long distance, free family calling and free nights and weekends, yielded just one plan: the $60 AT&T Shareable National, with 600 minutes and a two-year contract.

The lesson, as you may already know, is that cell phone service comes in a lot of flavors. Don't sample them all. A useful Web site can help narrow your choices before you pick the carrier and plan that's right for you.