Phone for 12 year old?

[Anonymous]

Ok, it’s time to get our (about to be) 12 year old a phone. I know this has been covered before, but this forum is impossible to search. We have a plan with Verizon, but I know people talk about getting Trackphones? I’m leaning against a smartphone unless it could be really limited (and not expensive).

Thanks in advance for recommendations!

[Anonymous]

Most of the no-contract or prepaid services should have flip phones. We got ours through Ting.
Also, check your current carrier, they probably still have a flip phone as an option - people still want them.

[Anonymous]

Get a gizmo if you do not want a smart phone. They are on verizon and work well.

[Anonymous]

I went to the Verizon store and got a flip phone for about $150 and added it to my plan. It has been great - he can text his friends (though it's old-school style) and can obviously make calls but there are no games or apps on it. Or internet access at all. Our child has real technology addiction issues so this was the only answer, because he definitely needed a phone (he has a summer job) but a smartphone would've been disastrous.

[Anonymous]

You should check Tello. You can get a refurb Andoid phone for about $40, and unlimited texts plus 100 min of calls for about $6/month. A much better deal than putting the kid on an adult plan.

[Anonymous]

Bump

[Anonymous]

I got a LG B470 flip phone (around $25) for my now 12 year old a while back. I put it on my AT&T plan, I think it was $10 per month.

I have recently put together a list of requirements that he must do for 60 days in order to get a smart phone (not lose the phone, answer texts from parents, obey electronics rules at school and and home, etc.). He has had the 60 days restart several times (lost the phone twice, got in trouble at school for misuse of chrome book, messed with electronic time limits). It has been a good lesson. I'm hoping that it will get him to be more responsible before he is trusted with a smart phone.

He does seem to be the last 12 year old on earth without a smart phone.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I got a LG B470 flip phone (around $25) for my now 12 year old a while back. I put it on my AT&T plan, I think it was $10 per month.

I have recently put together a list of requirements that he must do for 60 days in order to get a smart phone (not lose the phone, answer texts from parents, obey electronics rules at school and and home, etc.). He has had the 60 days restart several times (lost the phone twice, got in trouble at school for misuse of chrome book, messed with electronic time limits). It has been a good lesson. I'm hoping that it will get him to be more responsible before he is trusted with a smart phone.

He does seem to be the last 12 year old on earth without a smart phone.

This is similar to what we did with DS. He has a contract and he understands that having a smart phone is a privilege. He lost his a number of times, but I figured it's a good life lesson.

[Anonymous]

We have h2o prepaid wireless which uses at&t's network and it's a great deal. Customer service isn't the best but we haven't had to use it often. My son started with an old android phone off of craiglist and then later inherited an old iphone from his grandfather.

Even I use h2o wireless because the price is right.