Tracphone-Prepaid cell phones- Opinions?

Anybody have any experience with these things? I do not have a cell phone and rarely have a need for one. It would be nice to have one for this weekend in case I had a breakdown while driving this truck back from Texas. It seems that if it is used solely for emergencies it would be the most economical way to go, but if you were going to use it all the time it would be cost prohibitive.
Thoughts?
Kywookie

i have a cingular prepay phone, you have to put money on it when i gets low...if you run it over you got to pay to reactivate your phone. it has $.35 a min. and $.10 after night and all weekend..hope this helps

[img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_cool.gif[/img]kywookie, i am in the same boat you are. i also have no cell phone. i have been looking at plans because i have been thinking about getting one. i also use phones very little, so most plans are too expensive to use(for nationwide coverage which i would need they tend to start around $30 a month). the only real problem i have with pre-paid plans is that if you dont use the minutes with in a certain period of time, you lose the minutes. some prepay plans allow you to roll over the minutes if you buy more with in the allowed time, but you may as well get a monthly plan at the point.
[addsig]

I have used the tracphone, and I liked it for the occasional usage thing. The wife wanted to use it more and so we went with the contract deal. I hate it. The minutes are cheaper, but you pay just as much in the long run. I haven't looked into the other prepay phones out there. There might be some that are a better deal, but I wasn't dissappointed with the tracphone. If you have more questions, email me, I'll try to help.
[addsig]

We have a Tracphone and like it. We don't use it much but it's nice to have for emergencies and traveling. We buy our time cards at Wally world 40min for $18.00, so 9 bucks a month it's bad. I have found the coverage is as good as any other cel phone. We have the Motorola phone, it has the longest batt life, but has fewer features.

Thanks for the info. I checked the Tracphone website. If you activate a Tracphone you have to enter the zip code where you will be using it most. The bad thing is I live in one zone and work in another. Since the phone is only for emergencies I guess that is not a big drawback but it still sucks. I am still looking for one to borrow for the weekend. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]
Kywookie