Edward
Bartender
- Messages
- 25,082
- Location
- London, UK
I'm not sure how it's a good deal for me. Instead of paying $200 for a phone and $50/month for service, I'm paying $800 for the exact same phone and $50/month for service. Yes, the former locks you into a 24 month contract, but the penalty for leaving the contract early is paying the additional $600 on the phone or the remainder of your monthly fees, whichever is less. I'm not seeing how paying an additional $600 for exactly the same thing us much of a bargain.
Soundsl ike an odd business plan. Here in the UK, the free or reduced-price phone is nothing of the sort - it's recouped from the contract. I killed the old contrat when the two years had run up (or they'd have carried on charging me at that rate), went sim-only at a vastly cheaper plan-rate for the same service, bought my own phone and saved money. Maybe your provider is gambling more on you spending a lot more on top of the contract price than mine did (and it's once in a blue moon I do spend over the contract).