Mobile for a child

Rosalita

Hi,

Looking for a bit of advice, I'm looking to buy a mobile (pref pay as you go) for my daughter, can anyone recommend a good one for me?

I have a iPhone but don't want her to have an expensive one although she wants a Blackberry! Ideally I'd like one with GPS as we have the option with Apple to track the our phone so she can borrow mine and we can see where she is, she's starting to go out with friends on her own now so I like the idea of being able to see where she is.

So any idea's where to start?

Thanks

mazza111

How old is she?

My son has a blackberry, mainly cos I ordered it for myself then hated it!! But blackberry messenger cuts down on a lot of texts, so that's an added bonus.

Have you looked at tesco mobile. You can cap their contracts so all that's spent is what's on the contract. So no nasty surprises. I think their contracts for BB start at around £12/month. I don't know what their customer service is like for repairing/replacing though. My lad's now about to send his back for the 4th time. 3 software faults, 1 hardware... So I wouldn't recommend blackberry for that.

Failing that, have a look at places like carphone warehouse, e2save and phones4u for a payg. But remember she would need to have some sort of blackberry plan to be able to use the full functions of the it.

jamespir

id start a child with a cheap phone first and see how they get on cause children dont need mobile phones they are just an expensive toy

Stuart_W

Tesco capped option, as mentioned by mazza111, is one of the only safe ways to have a child with a contract phone (the other being T-mobile's You-Fix) but you may end up tied to a long contract with a phone the child no longer wants.

You could look at Orange's Ready Deals on PAYG.

You basically pay upfront either £60 or £120 top up credit, and this is applied to the phone account in £10 monthly instalments for either 6 or 12 months.

You also get 50% of the top up bundle value off a PAYG phone so £30 off a PAYG phone with the £60 top up, or £60 off a new phone with the £120 top up.

You could get several basic handsets free, and you would know £10 credit would be being added every month. All the normal top up rewards apply, so she could get 400 free texts and some data allowance on Orange Dolphin each month without using any of the credit.

starlight_xx

You can get a tracking app for BB the same as the iphone. I have it on mine. Id definitely recommend a Blackberry.

robpw2

how did parents cope before they had gps to check their childs whereabouts ... i don't half wonder its just appears to me to be incredibly sneaky and mistrusting its bad enough that they need to be contactable 24/7 i would go out and if i wanted to contact my parents i would have 30p for the phone box

mazza111

Well I've never used it for tracking my DS movements. But he's 15 going on 30. BBM he uses for talking to his m8s. For me he calls if he's going to be late home (house rule), or calls for a chat on way home (he sees it as an escort lol) or the usual muuuuuuuum can I get.... texts.

Would definitely go for one of the capped bundles though if you're determined to get her a bb.

Rosalita

Thanks for the advice, I'm going to have a look at the Orange deals. Although she would like a BB I'm not getting her one, it's going to be something cheaper until she's older.