…and whether it’s related in any way to Tracfone?
A reader sent me a nice used cellphone last weekend, which asfaik both of us believed was a tracfone. But when I tried to activate it I was informed that it was a Straight Talk phone instead, and Tracfone refused to have anything more to do with me. I looked up Straight Talk, of course, and it is indeed a cell phone company apparently based out of Wally World but though it says “prepaid cell phones” right on the banner they promptly start trying to sell me a plan.
Anybody familiar with this? Can I get this working with prepaid cards, or am I back to buying a Tracfone at the dollar store?
I think that Straight Talk is owned by Tracfone, although it is run as a separate company. I have a Tracfone and just purchase minutes as I need them. I think that Straight talk costs you $30 month min.
You can buy service a month at a time at wallyworld if you wanna BUT if you let it expire, they can reassign your phone number and you gotta start all over again. This means the only safe course is to buy more before your current month is up; forces you to lose a day at minimum. Sneaky. I get 1500 minutes and 49,999 texts per month for about $35. I opted to have the account recharge automatically. Good luck.
Oh, and my straighttalk phone IS a Tracfone. Again, good luck. BTW, be sure to check the coverage map cuz it used to be there was coverage only around major cities and along interstates. It’s gotten larger over time.
Okay, close enough. Thanks for the info. It looks like you can use a Tracfone with Straighttalk but not the other way ’round, which is kinda dirty. I’m gonna buy a tracfone this afternoon. Might use this one as a camera if I can find a data cable, can’t be a lower resolution than the camera I’ve been using.
FYI, and not an answer to your question. I have a Straight Talk hot spot I purchased at WalMart. I pay $15/month for 1 Gigabite or 30 days (whichever happens first). So far I’m delighted with it. I did experimentally allow it to lapse for a couple weeks, and had no problem accessing my account and reactivating the device. In fact, it was far less hassle than doing the same with my Virgin Mobile hotspot.
That is very interesting information. If I could get a hotspot with coverage in my area I’d drop my satellite service right this very second. I’ll look into that next time I’m at Wally World. Thanks!
It works on AT&T and T Mobile networks, but not with the Verizon towers, so check which you are near. You need to get a SIM from Straight Talk for one of those two networks. I’m using it up in the northwest of the same state you are in, and in a pretty rural area– off an old Alltel tower bought by AT&T and it is working quite well for data. Just 3G no 4G where I am. Data on my plan is “Unlimited” which means it is capped at 2GB a month, and you get cut off or surcharged if you go above that I understand. I don’t know about the Hotspot plan. My StraightTalk plan forbids hotspot tethering it and they will cut you off if you tether, or so they say in the fine print. I bought it for a no contract Google Nexus phone and providing I say within their data bounds have had no trouble. Tech support is offshore and pretty useless– I would hate to have to try and resolve a billing dispute or technical problem, but so far anyway I have been able to handle everything through their website. They do maneuver you into automatic billing monthly, and if you don’t do that it is easy to loose your number if you are not paying attention. Walmart has the monthly cards but not the SIMS and the Walmart staff offers no service or knowledgeable support. All that said, it’s worked out well.