upgrading Iphones

J

JOhnH

Touchdown! Greaser!
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What is the best route to go to replace my wife's Iphone 6S with my Iphone XSmax and get a new Iphone for myself? We have had AT&T plans since the original Iphones but I would not mind switching carriers.
I have a SAMs' club membership and a Costco membership. Sam's offers T-Mobile Senior plan and Costco offers AT&T. They both have their pros and cons.

Or I could go with another carrier that makes sense for us. Foreflight and Continental US coverage is important.

If we both didn't need Foreflight I would entertain an Android device, but that is off the table.

Perhaps I should just go to Best Buy and let the geek work it out.
 
For the last few cycles, I've been buying unlocked refurbed trailing-edge iPhones (currently on a 12), on a T-Mobile MVNO that works out to $20/mo or so.
 
Switching your current phone to your wife just mean a compatible sim. In terms of phone purchase, my last 4 have been with Swappa. I haven't had a minimum contract obligation with a provider for at least a dozen years.

For service, I've been on Verizon's network for about 20 years.
 
We switched from AT&T after 20+ years to T-Mobile (direct). We have the old farts (Senior Magenta) plan. Two iPhones and 2 “activated” Apple Watches for $104/month. Did did the watch thing so my wife could do her long walks (15,000 steps/day) without having to carry her phone. It’s been five years now and we have been happy customers. I just chatted with their Customer Service yesterday to get a deal on their home internet to give that a try. The new device should be here Monday or Tuesday.
 
Who is your home Internet provider? Do they offer a bundled cell service? Do they not make your blood boil?
 
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asicer said:
Who is your home Internet provider? Do they offer a bundled cell service? Do they not make your blood boil?
Click to expand...
I currently use a new-to-the area fiber internet provider. They deliver 10Gbps speed even though none of my devices exceed 1gb. However, I have done some testing and I can get 800Mbps on 5 devices at once. It really is blazingly fast and the few problems I had were fixed almost immediately after texting their tech support.

Unfortunately,they do not offer phone service. I have AT&T for four mobile devices and they DO often make my blood boil. If I upgrade my phones and tablets, I would be very interested in using a different provider as well.
 
I moved from AT&T to Consumer Cellular (which is AT&T or TMobile) last year when AT&T kept hiking the price. $30/mo (including tax). Swapping SIM card is trivial, but the new phones don't use a physical SIM, you call the carrier & spend about 15 min and you're up and running. That's what I did with the iPads (5 & 6) when I bought the Mini 7. Took the SIM out of 5, put it in 6 for GPS but never turned on the cell service. Traded in the 5 for the 7. Asked the shop where the install the SIM card, which is when I discovered I had to call the carrier. Turns out the new iPhones (and iPads) don't have a physical SIM, it's this fancy new eSIM technology - only iPhones & iPads and only in the US.
 
midlifeflyer said:
Switching your current phone to your wife just mean a compatible sim.
Click to expand...
See below, especially for the iPhone ecosystem.
murphey said:
but the new phones don't use a physical SIM,
Click to expand...
I dislike e-SIMs with a passion. The fact that Apple completely removed regular SIMs from their phones is such a backwards step, feels like we're back in the Verizon/Sprint CDMA dark ages.
I keep old phones around for a while, it's nice to be able to swap SIMs in seconds if needed. Or being able to buy a SIM in a foreign country and not deal with the roaming charges.
 
I want to say "paint it orange and put it in a thrower", but that would be impolite. :)
 
JOhnH said:
What is the best route to go to replace my wife's Iphone 6S with my Iphone XSmax and get a new Iphone for myself?
Click to expand...
Ok, here's what I did.

Sam's Club has a T-Mobile stand. Like many phone service providers, they offer incentives to switch from another company. In my case I was switching from AT&T.

With AT&T my monthly bill was around $145/month, but at least 3 or 4 (or 5) times a year I exhausted the limited amount of data and they automatically added antother GB (or two) for $15/GB.

At T-Mobile I got TWO Iphone 16s AND a new Ipad mini with unlilmited data.
It also has built in Starlink capability for when I am out of range.

I also get Netflix, AppleTV and Hulu free for life (I suppose that means the life of my subscription with T-Mobile.
I also get a $300 Sams gift card
A $60 sam's gift card every year for 8 years that can be used to offset the Sams Club annual fee.
And several other freebies (including their Senior Discount)
:cool:

All of this costs $153 per month compared to the limited data and old devices I had with AT&T for a minimum of $145/month.
In other words, I got all the above for about $8/month for two years.

I may have been able to do better elsewhere, but I'm happy with what I got.
 
There seems to be a fight for customers right now. We’ve been with Verizon for a very long time and were wanting to upgrade phones without 1) needing to switch to a higher priced plan and 2) paying as little as possible.

We kept waiting for a deal, we missed out back on Black Friday. Then, for no apparent reason, I got a notice from Verizon of an offer to lower our plan fee by a pretty significant amount. I called the 800 number to find out what the catch was, there wasn’t one, so I said, “Sure, I’ll take it.” It was apparently some sort of long time customer retention offer. That’s why I figured there’s something going on in the industry right now. The guy asked, “Is there anything else I can do?” So I asked about upgrading our phones and meeting the two criteria I had. A few minutes later we had 2 iPhone 16 Pros, our current plan, and a lower monthly fee.

I’m not sure we could have gotten the same deal in person at a store or kiosk, but we sure did by calling.

Might simply just call the customer service number and ask what kind of deal they can make.
 
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