How to get a new phone... cheap!

*This only applies to current T-Mobile users, if you don't already have T-Mobile... this doesn't help much*

I don't know if anybody already knows about this but my friend who works at a T-Mobile store told me about this and I did it. If you want a brand new phone with out signing up for another year or paying $150 or more, then this is the best way I know how to do it know (besides maybe ebay, but this is easier and safer). All you have to do is have a non-prepaid plan with T-Mobile and then you go up to any electronic store or department store (i.e. Walmar, Target) and buy a T-Mobile Pay As You Go phone. I just got a $160 phone for $86. When you buy the phone, just discard all the stuff about prepay and insert your sim card. Viola! You have a brand new phone for half the price... although, you don't have many phones to choose from. The phone I got, Samsung x495, was the only prepaid T-Mobile they were selling at the time. I don't know if there is an easier/cheaper way to get brand new phones but this seemed like a good deal to me!

-Jonathan

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really? it sounds simple enough and yet I never thought about doing that, I figured there was some lock to keep that from happening..maybe I'll go get the RAZR and pop in my SIM.

Now, with the RAZR, you might be able to find a better deal somewhere else... the RAZR To Go is $250 which is about how much you could get one unlocked off of eBay. But you have to add like $25+ dollars for shipping and you take the chance of being scammed and not receiving your phone. If you are serious about doing that then look around, research, and make sure that doing it which ever way you do it is the cheapest and safest. I got a pretty good deal on the phone I got, because it retails from $130 to $150 through T-Mobile or a electronics store and I got it for $86 and some change. I really didn't have any other phones to choose from but I think the phone I have is the second to the cheapest they sell for To Go, with the Sidekick II and the RAZR being the most expensive. But there is nothing special you have to do to make a prepaid phone work with your current SIM card, you just pop it in and it works.

You may have been scammed yourself friend. I'm a T-Mobile employee, and while I did suspect that some customers would attempt to do this, it will not work at a real T-Mobile store.

The actual COST of a samsung x495 is $93.32. It retails for $49.99 on a new activation (a loss of $43.33 when a customer signs up for 1 year).

T-Mobile corporately owned locations will not sell this phone, BRAND NEW, for less than $100, unless we can make the money back with a contract.

Any X495 selling for lower $93.32, for just the phone by itself, is refurbished.

Qualified customers can currently get an X495 for free w/ a 2 year contract extension, or $49.99 w/ a 1 year contract extension.

I am sure that it won't work at an actual T-Mobile store but I am also sure that the phone I got is not refurbished. I got it brand new for $86 at Wal-Mart, I think that they sell them cheaper for "To Go" plans because they also get money back on the minutes that you buy. I also thought that T-Mobile would've figured out a way to make sure people can't just buy the prepaid and use it with a regular plan because of that. Now with phones like the RAZR, as I mentioned above, you aren't really getting that good of a deal because it retails for the same amount WITH a plan on T-Mobile's website. I dunno, I could be wrong with any of this so disregard anything if I am.

-Jonathan

Actually, I thought of something. I don't know if your right about the phone not being refurbished, but I'm not sure about it either now. Here is why;

A ToGo Samsung X495 costs $93.32, and Walmart may be purchasing X495s at this price and selling them for even less. However, I forgot to take into account that Walmart probably receives a commision from T-Mobile for every ToGo X495 they sell. So they probably make back their money.

I know for sure that Walmart gets a commision whenever they sign up new T-Mobile customers. But the commision goes to the corporation, not to the Walmart employee who sold the phone.

How do I make a post? I'm trying to post something about the comparison of two bluetooth headsets. How do I do that?

Originally Posted by littlezeck

How do I make a post? I'm trying to post something about the comparison of two bluetooth headsets. How do I do that?

i think you just did a post.

if you want a new thread, there's a link at the top.

Originally Posted by RRODRIG30

Actually, I thought of something. I don't know if your right about the phone not being refurbished, but I'm not sure about it either now. Here is why;

A ToGo Samsung X495 costs $93.32, and Walmart may be purchasing X495s at this price and selling them for even less. However, I forgot to take into account that Walmart probably receives a commision from T-Mobile for every ToGo X495 they sell. So they probably make back their money.

I know for sure that Walmart gets a commision whenever they sign up new T-Mobile customers. But the commision goes to the corporation, not to the Walmart employee who sold the phone.

At my T-Mobile store T-Mobile pays us $30 commission on every T-Mobile To Go handset activation. I'm not sure how much they pay Wal-Mart commission but I know that they sell a hell-of-a-lot more than we do. Now we have to charge more for our phones because we have three locations, while Wal-Mart has I don't even know how many, that we purchase phones for from T-Mobile. Since Wal-Mart makes such large orders for units, T-Mobile charges them less for the phones, which means Wal-Mart gets to sell them at a cheaper price than say a T-Mobile dealer with three locations. That is one of the upsides for consumers from competition. To even it up a bit we give extra free accessories.

cseabourn, that is not a bad commision for pre-pay. Does the rep get $30 or does the business get $30 and the rep get a little bit of that? How long is the chargeback period?

The store gets $30 and we get $10 of it. We have no chargebacks, no matter what they still pay us. Except on Post-Paid which is 6 months.

Originally Posted by jsp2005

Now, with the RAZR, you might be able to find a better deal somewhere else... the RAZR To Go is $250 which is about how much you could get one unlocked off of eBay. But you have to add like $25+ dollars for shipping and you take the chance of being scammed and not receiving your phone. If you are serious about doing that then look around, research, and make sure that doing it which ever way you do it is the cheapest and safest. I got a pretty good deal on the phone I got, because it retails from $130 to $150 through T-Mobile or a electronics store and I got it for $86 and some change. I really didn't have any other phones to choose from but I think the phone I have is the second to the cheapest they sell for To Go, with the Sidekick II and the RAZR being the most expensive. But there is nothing special you have to do to make a prepaid phone work with your current SIM card, you just pop it in and it works.

I did this, and it worked great.

People that do things like this are hurting the wireless market, I hate walmart! I work for tmobile and we have people come in all the time asking for free phones or phones that run high asking for less because of what wal mart opens, its hurting the company I work for.

Same here, we sell Post-Pay and Pre-Paid phones and there are many times when customers say, "Well I can get it cheaper at Wal-Mart." There is nothing I can do about it. Wal-Mart is hard competition, so we give free accessories when purchasing a phone.

Yeah it sucks man, I also hate when people come in the store I work at asking if we can help them with customer service stuff and phone problems when they didn't purchase phones with us, like this isnt the general public, but people in specific that keep coming to our store like they got nothing to do.