It’s official, Virgin Mobile has announced that beginning June 29th it will start selling pre-paid no-contract iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S at a basic rate of $30 per month. This announcement came quickly following the news of Cricket Wireless offering no-contract iPhones.
Virgin Mobile USA will sell the basic iPhone 4 model starting at $549, with a monthly service fee of $30 per month. The iPhone 4S, with 16 gigabytes of memory, will sell for $649. Since these are not subsidized phones, customers will have to pay for theses non-contract phones upfront.
Virgin’s monthly Beyond Talk plans consist of 300 minutes of talk time. For $40 per month customers will get 1200 talk time minutes; and unlimited talk time for $50 per month. All three plans include unlimited messaging and unlimited 3G Data. Rates vary in other countries, such as Australia. Customers can save $5 per month by setting up an automatic monthly payment plan with their credit or debit card.
While subsidized iPhones under the Sprint mainland plan cost $99 (iPhone 4) and $199 (iPhone 4S), Virgin Mobile pre-paid plans don’t lock customers into a 2-year contract. The latter is possibly a better deal especially for users who like to upgrade their iPhone more frequently than the two-year contract allows. Note also, Sprint is the mobile service provider for Mobile Virgin in the US, so essentially with either pre-paid or subsidized plan, you’re using the same company.
If you can afford to pay the upfront cost of a non-subsidized iPhone, according to CultOfMac.com, you could save “over $1000 over the course of two years on the Virgin Mobile plan compared to AT&T, Verizon or Sprint’s subsided plans”. See this page for a comparison chart.
Will you be getting a no-contract iPhone? Why/Why not?
Source: TechCrunch
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I always thought that why didn’t iPhones were sold without contract in India? And moreover paying full prices for them and remaining in contract is puzzling.I think that Apple iPhones will grow in India fully if they sold unlocked phones as people will embrace them and carriers will earn more money from them due to increase in demand of high speed data connectivity.
Susendeep, your points make sense to me. Thanks for your feedback.
hmmm looks like Virgin is decent to switch to
Jon, thanks for the feedback.
Wow. I wish Virgin UK would do the same as it sounds great not being tied into a long term contract. It makes it alot easier to upgrade when a new model comes along. If you’re looking for a great place to sell your old mobile or iPod check out this place – Sell My iPod
Kames123, thanks for the tip about Sell My iPod. And yes, hopefully Virgin UK wil get on board with not contract iPhones.