Dilemma over sons mobile?

Any

Prothet_of_Doom wrote: »

The phone "embarassment" ... Oldest son, (20) has the cheapest mobile, which double's up as a music player, on a PAYG tarif, lives at university, and takes the mickey out of all his mates with smart phones. He took the mickey out of me, when I got my phone out to check my account balance before I ordered food in a restaurant.
I admire his "I don't care what anyone else thinks" attitude. He is amused by anyone who lives their life by brands and image.
His sister (17) has a android smart phone on a contract....she persuaded us, to take out a 2 year contract based on a cost vs benefit and factored it in as a joint Christmas and Birthday Present, and she makes good use of it, to run her life. She also has a 'don't care what you think" attitude, and points out that functionality is more important than image, and laughs at people who buy anything by apple.

Aaaahhh....
Not dictated by brands but snubs at people WITH brands..
Sorry, that is not called "not caring.. "
That is called "I am better then you out laud because I really feel sh*** for not having better"

People who really don't care just DON'T CARE!!

peachyprice

Prothet_of_Doom wrote: »

The phone "embarassment" ... Oldest son, (20) has the cheapest mobile, which double's up as a music player, on a PAYG tarif, lives at university, and takes the mickey out of all his mates with smart phones. He took the mickey out of me, when I got my phone out to check my account balance before I ordered food in a restaurant.
I admire his "I don't care what anyone else thinks" attitude. He is amused by anyone who lives their life by brands and image.
His sister (17) has a android smart phone on a contract....she persuaded us, to take out a 2 year contract based on a cost vs benefit and factored it in as a joint Christmas and Birthday Present, and she makes good use of it, to run her life. She also has a 'don't care what you think" attitude, and points out that functionality is more important than image, and laughs at people who buy anything by apple.
Interestingly, both my wife and I have the same phone as my daughter, as having seen the functionality, I decided that it would be great for tethering my lap top to when I need to work somewhere where there is no wifi.....but more than that, my daughter and I, thought my wife would struggle with the technology, and our knowledge of the same phone would help her better.
The kids were not allowed to take phones to school, and my wife enforced this rigidly. If there is an emergency, then there is a phone at school in the secretarial office, if you are going to a friend's house, they will let you use the land line to tell us.

Ironic post of the week.

[Deleted User]

LEJC wrote: »

just checked and the last credit of £10.00 was put on in june and has £9.70 still remaining!!!!!

That's on the lines of my mobile phone usage.

duchy

Anyone who thinks an iPhone for a teenager is a good economic option is nuts. The iPhone sells on the apple name and pose rating. It's refreshing to hear of teens who actually realise this. I'd be proud to have kids who aren't sheep too.

Hermia

duchy wrote: »

Anyone who thinks an iPhone for a teenager is a good economic option is nuts. The iPhone sells on the apple name and pose rating. It's refreshing to hear of teens who actually realise this. I'd be proud to have kids who aren't sheep too.

I assume you are referring to Prothet of Doom's post. Would you really want kids who are looking down on others and laughing at them? I'd want kids who follow their own path, but I'd also want them to allow others to live as they wish too.

jellyhead

Melonade wrote: »

Lol I'm not about to scream and shout at him :rotfl: I had the conversation with him yesterday when he didn't take his phone again. It's getting old to go over the same thing every day with him.

I'd have to start a new thread about his other antics lately for everyone to understand why I'm about to "flip my lid"

I did say earlier that I don't mither him on the phone or call him everyday after school. But sometimes I'm not here when he's due home and have to let him know. He doesn't have his own key because he's lost one already.

He sounds like my eldest - a bit, erm, disorganised

In the end we put his door key on a cord that was attached to his bag on the inside, so he couldn't lose it or leave it in the door. He only became interested in charging a phone once he had a girlfriend to text.

He's not influenced by brands, but it's a sort of inverse snobbery that some of them have at his school by deliberately avoiding brands. His unbranded black trainers that I bought from amazon were coveted by his mates, and when I bought similar Airwalk ones he sulked for a bit, then agreed with me on the better quality sole, and used a marker pen to colour in the brand name.

He didn't want a smartphone because his old brick with a cracked screen still worked. He only agreed to have a new phone when he lost his mp3 player and wanted one for a residential trip, and realised that he could get a new phone and use it as both a phone and an mp3 player (we couldn't get headphones to fit his ancient brick phone).

It's all about function with him. He's rarely used apple products, so they may well be superior in terms of function but we wouldn't know having never been able to afford them. As long as what he has can perform the function he requires he's happy. I'm currently paying £7.50 per month to Tesco Mobile for his phone, but before he got a girlfriend he used PAYG, but with a company where the credit lasted for ages. With some companies the credit disappears after a month!

Iirc with virgin phones there was an option to text a parent with a message saying 'this person wants to call you but they haven't got any credit' ... would that be an option if you go for PAYG?

Either that, or a contract where there are lots of texts, so even if they run out of minutes they will be able to text you.