Tell me why I shouldn't get my son a BlackBerry on contract!

purplepardalis

I have a Blackberry supplied by work and yes they are great.But I don't have to pay for it! And I am 32 and get bored with the handset in about a year so a teenager will get bored in less that time. My nearly 15 year old sister manages to trash her payg handset in a matter of months - If I were you I would get him a payg handset for Christmas\birthday and let him manager his data\text\minutes according to his budget. You don't get lumbered with a huge bill and he learns the value of things. If you can give him £15 top up per month (and make him earn it). You may be able to afford more but what he'll learn is one of the best presents you can give him

butterbeanmash

pimento wrote: »

My 15 year old son is pestering me to sign him up for a 24 month contract...What could go wrong?

Nothing. Nothing at all.
:rotfl:

Jakg

T-Mobile do a PAYG SIM where you top-up £10 and get free texts for the next month, and free internet, too. No contract etc. Over 24 months, your £15pm = £360, which gives you £120 saving for PAYG to get any phone you want and no contract to worry about...

watcherman

Weird all these stories of kids running up hundreds of pounds of bills, my 13yr old has had an iPhone for 6mths, and has had PAYG prior to that. Never ever goes over, I monitor her usage online, and she understands the costs involved both here and abroad when she's taken it to the U.S.

DarkConvict

watcherman wrote: »

Weird all these stories of kids running up hundreds of pounds of bills, my 13yr old has had an iPhone for 6mths, and has had PAYG prior to that. Never ever goes over, I monitor her usage online, and she understands the costs involved both here and abroad when she's taken it to the U.S.

Unfortunately not all kids are as responsible, although adults can be as bad we are just making him aware of the stories we hear on the forum every few weeks abouts £100+ ran up by going over.
Even a business man ran up £8000 of broadband usages, so it isn't just kids.
Ultimately the parent if the kid is under 18 is responsible so it is upto him what risk he takes, personally a solo fixed or payg is the best thing.

Just make sure you user a mobile operator that has good signal where he plans to use the phone, try PAYG sims with the operators before signing any contract.

MORPH3US

Please do not buy your child a mobile phone contract - it will end in tears.

How often do we see on here "i've had a £300 mobile phone bill for a contract phone my kid has" and it turns out they have been texting XFactor at £1.50 a time or something equally as stupid.

Its well worth getting PAYG even with the upfront costs.

mrscb

Quick answer....he is a teenager and has teenage friends!!! even if you trust him you cant trust his mates,they will all have a go on each others phones and do god knows what.He wont be telling them dont do this or that as my parents wont like it(far too embarrassing).PAYG i would suggest too.

maxtweenie

watcherman wrote: »

Weird all these stories of kids running up hundreds of pounds of bills, my 13yr old has had an iPhone for 6mths, and has had PAYG prior to that. Never ever goes over, I monitor her usage online, and she understands the costs involved both here and abroad when she's taken it to the U.S.

You're obviously very very lucky. For every one teenager who is responsible with their mobile phone, there must be 99 who aren't.

chattychappy

maxtweenie wrote: »

You're obviously very very lucky. For every one teenager who is responsible with their mobile phone, there must be 99 who aren't.

Perhaps not very very lucky. Perhaps parenting has something to do with it?

maxtweenie

chattychappy wrote: »

Perhaps not very very lucky. Perhaps parenting has something to do with it?

It probably does, but I'm not sure how many teenagers would be happy with their parents constantly checking on their calls online?