I've been going to Ryan for 5 year for my cell phones. He has provided service for five cell phones for my wife and me -- it will be six when my wife's "new" refurbished iPhone arrives in the mail this week. We have never had an issue that Ryan didn't solve immediately.
I started using prepaid service when I realized how much cheaper it is to buy a refurbished phone and then pay month to month for service. The downside is that my wife and I are always a generation behind on our phones, but we have literally saved thousands of dollars by going with refurbished + prepaid service. And it has never been an issue to increase our data plans for a month when we go on vacation.
My wife has previously been on AT&T's prepaid network, but now both of us use Verizon's prepaid network. We have seen no difference between buying minutes/data directly from the carrier and buying prepaid from a 3rd party distributer like EagleCellular.
Actually, I take that last statement back...there is a difference between buying my phone/minutes/data directly from the carrier and buying from EagleCellular: Ryan at EagleCellular is very knowledgeable and genuinely cares about repeat service (he has to...because I can go to someone else next month). The sales reps at the Verizon/AT&T stores have come off as slick and sleazy -- I suspect that's because they never expected to see me again once they had my money and my signature on a two-year contract. read more