Is anyone using Consumer Cellular service?

[mdlearnest]

I'm looking for opinion's on mobile carriers. I'm thinking of changing from AT&T and would like to know your opinion of your carrier. I'm really interested if anyone is using Consumer Cellular and getting their opinion on them. As an rv'er who crosses the country from time to time, I thought who better to ask than another rv'er? Anyone's thoughts would be greatly appreciated, both good AND bad. thanks!

[creativepart]

Walmart owns Consumer Cellular and they market extensively to older Americans with basic phone and text services. They resell service from both AT&T and T-Mobile networks.

Most of their plans do not offer very much in the way a data allowances. So, it's not really a practical carrier if your looking for lots of internet access and data services. The best is their "Unlimited" data plans which are in fact LIMITED to 35gb of high speed data. After 35gb they will slow the speed of the service to something approaching the old "dial-up" internet of the 1990's. Consider it "Unlimited 2G" service.

If you don't sign up for the unlimited plan you will be charged for all data overages.

But if all you use are phone and text that may not matter to you.

[MRUSA14]

Some of these bargain services are great if you are RVing in the middle of a city!

[Old-Biscuit]

When we FTd we had Verizon and had very good coverage Nationwide

When we come off the road and bought S&B we had Limited Service due to location....got a Landline for everyday phone

Switched to Consumer Cellular .....been using it since 2016 W/O issue
They use same towers as the rest of the Cell services so coverage is pretty good and price is great
Works for us but we are NOT glued to our phones nor do we 'depend' on them for EVERYTHING
YMMV

[RRR]

We have been using them for several years. The only complaint we have is that text messages are sometimes very slow to deliver, as 10 minuets or longer, even in the metro area of Portland, OR.

We have had a few that later we found out from the sender that we never got but we were traveling in a area with no or extremely poor reception. Why the message never showed up when we had good signal, who knows.

Just last week I get a notice "Message to ___ failed to deliver." "Sent 336 days ago."

Overall I give the a B+.

[RRR]

Originally Posted by creativepart

Walmart owns Consumer Cellular and they market extensively to older Americans with basic phone and text services. They resell service from both AT&T and T-Mobile networks...

https://www.lightreading.com/ossbss/.../d/d-id/764983

After a bidding war that involved Dish Network, Altice USA, Ultra Mobile, a group led by Boost Mobile founder Peter Adderton and others, Chicago private equity company GTCR has purchased Consumer Cellular for around $2.3 billion.



Consumer Cellular is one of the country's biggest MVNOs with almost 4 million customers.



According to sources familiar with the transaction, the deal is expected to close by the end of this year. GTCR is set to acquire a majority interest in Consumer Cellular with existing shareholders retaining what has been described as a significant minority position.

[Persistent]

I use Consumer Cellular with the CC ATT tower SIM card. My wife uses both ATT and Verizon.

We have compared reception for several years in urban and rural areas. ATT and Consumer Cellular are identical. Verizon had better reception in a New York State Finger Lakes campground, Big Bend National Park in Texas, and one other place.

Theoretically there are certain places in the US where ATT has a special contract with a local tower system that CC cannot use. We have never found such a place.

Consumer Cellular costs about 1/2 as much as ATT and Verizon. It is hard to compare. CC pricing is easy to understand. ATT will rip you off if you are not alert to silent changes. ATT plans have 30 pages of legalize, require use of ATT mediators for all disputes and non-disclosure clauses. (Maybe not completely true, but close enough to make the point.)

CC has no contracts like ATT and Verizon. Simple price structure, no penalties for exceeding paid for data limits. CC simply bumps the data limit up and charges you for the higher limit the following month. You can easily change limits or turn it "off" on-line at any time.

Choose a low limit to start. CC will bump it up to what you actually use over time.

We lower the limit for mid summer when we travel less and raise it when we head out for weeks in the winter.

There is a soft data cap for consumers. Change to business account for higher limits. We have never come even close to the cap.

Visible.com is the place to get Verizon like coverage. They have a simple pricing structure like CC and have a truly unlimited plan.

I pay about $55 per month for a two phone account. It is summer so I am paying a low data price. I just received a CC SIM card for for my wife's phone to replace ATT. It cost $14 per month to add it to my account. Data price may automatically bump up for October.

I wish you good luck and happy trails ahead!

[chindog]

We also have been using CC for several years, and are very pleased with the service. We are traveling full timers, and have been all over the country. We did encounter some connection issues early on out in the western states. I had great reception on my phone, but my wife couldn't get a signal. It turned out that CC uses various carriers cell towers, and I had a sim card that was on AT&T towers, and hers was on something else (don't remember which company). We went to a Target store and swapped her sim card for an AT&T one. It cost about $10, but CC credited our account for the purchase. Since then, no problems at all.


We don't use our phones for streaming video. Our plan is not for that. We use our Verizon hotspot plan for data connection. Data connection for normal phone use is ample under our CC plan.

[tetranz]

Originally Posted by Persistent

CC has no contracts like ATT and Verizon.

I don't think anyone has contracts for cellular service these days.

The only contracts I've seen are basically a finance deal for a "free" phone.

[corjaguar]

Check that...........I believe Target is the provider for Consumer Cellular

[az99]

I have had CC using ATT for many years on my wife's phone. Works great and they actually have customer service if you need it. She uses very little data.

On my phone I use ATT prepaid. $300 per year with 8GB per month data and rollover up to 16. Just another cheap option.

[Billett Bee]

We've had consumer cellular for 4 years and love it. They even increased our data plan free of charge., very affordable

[RichKimball]

Originally Posted by RRR

We have been using them for several years. The only complaint we have is that text messages are sometimes very slow to deliver, as 10 minuets or longer, even in the metro area of Portland, OR.

We have had a few that later we found out from the sender that we never got but we were traveling in a area with no or extremely poor reception. Why the message never showed up when we had good signal, who knows.

Just last week I get a notice "Message to ___ failed to deliver." "Sent 336 days ago."

Overall I give the a B+.

I can attest also to the delay in sending SMS. It take hours and hours sometimes. When I queried CC customer service...they blamed it on AT&T. Yeah...I don't think so....as I had AT&T for many years without issue.
Other than that....DW and I enjoy the $60 discount of service from the big guy.

[kenautoone]

Walmart does not own consumer cellular.I have been with them since 2016.have done Sprint ,AT&T, Cricket....CC is by far the best.Been all over the west in rv,no problem....ken