We Help You Decide: You’re The Social Director

Every group has one. Sometimes it's you, sometimes it's your best friend, but every group has one person who acts as its coordinator. Not sure what you want to do tonight, give her a call and see what the good word is. Weighing your options between Party A and Party B? The social director will know which one is better. She'll decide what the group is doing and spread the word.
So you'd think that this person would need a ton of minutes, right? Well, yes and no. In our experience being the social director of our group in high school, we tended to receive more calls then we placed. Why is that? Because everyone would call us seeing what we were doing. Once we decided on something, we started a makeshift phone chain rather than calling everyone ourselves. It's like cooking and cleaning the dishes: you needn't do both.
What we're looking for is a plan with tons of minutes at about an eight- to 10-cent rate. Bonus points and high recommendations go to those with free incoming calls. Text messaging is also a big part of this. We didn't have the luxury in high school, but you can now send out a mass text message with itinerary. Plus, you likely receive a ton of “what's going on tonight?” text messages. Once again, we're looking more for an incoming plan than an outgoing one.
(read the review) The more we look at the pay-per-day prepaid plan from Alltel, the more we like it. It's 75 cents per day, and you have four options to choose from, of which you can pick two for free. Each additional one costs 25 cents per day. The choices: unlimited nights and weekends, unlimited text messaging, unlimited mobile-to-mobile, and unlimited favorite number calling. The first two are probably your best bets for this kind of situation. On top of that, peak time calls are just 10 cents per minute, so you're still on the cheap end. If you just stick with the two options, you're paying $22.50 per month plus 10 cents per minute. So $35 gets you 125 anytime minutes. Depending on your social schedule, this just might work for you.
(read the review) AT&T has a lot of prepaid options, so there's bound to be something that at least somewhat works. Here goes. With pay-as-you-go, you pay $1 per day and calls are 10 cents per minute. Plus, you get unlimited mobile-to-mobile, which saves if you have a bunch of friends with AT&T. So that's $30 per month plus 10 cents per minute to non-AT&T customers. For $20 per month on top of that, you get 3,000 night and weekend minutes. Messaging is five cents per, both sent and received, so that's on the cheap end. However, if you quickly do the math, you'll see that AT&T can get a bit costly. We wouldn't recommend it unless over 90 percent of your friends are also on AT&T.
(read the review) There's always Boost Unlimited, but unless you're in select parts of California or Texas, it's not available to you. For $70 per month, you get free nights and weekends — which start at 7 p.m. because they're with Sprint — unlimited push-to-talk (which is useless unless your friends have Boost), and 600 anytime minutes. Text messaging costs 10 cents per to send, but free to receive, which is a plus. Unlimited texting is available for $10 per month, and you get mobile web along with it. If $70 per month is too much to swallow, they have a $30 plan that includes everything except the 600 anytime minutes; calls are instead billed at 10 cents per minute. But with night time starting at 7 p.m., it's easier to avoid peak calls.
(read the review) Can you afford $45 per month? If so, you're set if you're in Cricket's coverage area. For that $45, you get unlimited calling and texting. Sure, you have to be in your local calling area to use the unlimited service, but as long as you stay in that, you're good to go. They do have a few plans that offer roaming minutes included. They may be more expensive, but none of Cricket's plans exceed $60 per month. But if you can survive on the $45 plan, there may be no better one for a social director.
(read the review) Not ready to pony up a set dollar amount each month? Need to work your cell phone into your budget? Then check out Jump. You're at a pretty 10 cents per minute within your local calling area — though it does get expensive when you're roaming. And, like Cricket, text messages are free in your local area. Yeah, there are no unlimited night and weekend minutes, or even unlimited mobile-to-mobile. Still, 10 cents per minute is a good rate, and if you can convince your friends to text you more often, the plan could pay off.
(read the review) We're very “eh” on kajeet for this kind of us. It's meant for kids, so it makes sense that social directors might not get the most use out of it. The calling is pretty cheap at 10 cents per minute, but you get charged a 35 cents per day access fee. And then texting is five cents each way. Basically, the rates are good, but there is no way for you to get a flat rate for unlimited anything. Just looking at the plans above, you can find something better (not to mention what's below).
(read the review) Here's the thing: Liberty has unlimited nights and weekends plans, but they can get expensive. They range from $40 per month for 225 anytime minutes to $70 per month for 650 anytime minutes. The problem is that additional minutes cost 20 cents each, which just isn't a good rate. Once again, better deals exist.
(read the review) There are no free anythings with Locus, so it's probably not the best deal around. You can get on the GSM plan for 10 cents per minute and 25 cents per day, but that adds up. Or you can jump on another network and get calls as low as nine cents per minute, but you either have to buy a large denomination calling card or use it only on weekends. Text messaging is five cents per, both sent and received, which is nice, but not nearly enough to overcome the shortcomings of their voice plans.
(read the review) Woo hoo! Unlimited calling. Problem is, the price that's advertised isn't what you'll pay. Sure, you get unlimited calling, including long distance, for $40 per month, but then you have to pay $3 for unlimited texting (you can't get a per-text rate), and $3 per month for voice mail, caller ID, and 3-way calling. Still $46 per month isn't all that bad. If you're in Metro's calling area, they're definitely worth a shot, as unlimited packages are the best for social directors.
(read the review) We're going to be cheezy for a minute and say: Nojo Mobile. Expensive per-minute rates and 10 cent text messaging disqualify this service.
(read the review) For the most part, we don't recommend the “nothing free” services. However, Net10 has a low rate of 10 cents per minutes and 5 cents per text message. While this doesn't make up for a free nights and weekends plan, it does make for a relatively cheap service. Then again, you're paying for everything, and if you're the social director you'll be on the phone a lot. If you figure 600 minutes of talk time and 300 text messages (we're not sure if this is accurate for you or not), you're talking $75 per month. So on second thought, this probably isn't the plan for you.
(read the review) Fourteen cents per minute? Even with text messaging at five cents per, this isn't worth it.
(read the review) Let's go ahead and use the same model we used for Net10. Now, if you're using Page Plus, you're going to want to buy the $50 refill card, because you get 7 cents per minute. And text messages are 8 cents each. So for 600 minutes and 300 texts, you're looking at a bill of $66. So you're slightly better off than with Net10, but not much. This is obviously more or less true when you consider how much you actually use the phone.
(read the review) Fifteen cents per minute? Goodbye.
(read the review) Okay, so you've got a $50 plan that includes unlimited nights and weekends, plus 100 anytime minutes and 10 cents per overage minute. Since they're on the Sprint network, nights start at 7 p.m. Texts are five cents each, so this could work out to be a decent deal. We won't apply the 600/300 model because of the unlimited nights and weekends. Don't be fooled by their 7.9 cents per minute pay-as-you-go plan: with the 25 cents per day access fee and 5 cents per text message, the 600/300 model would put you at $70 per month.
(read the review) If you buy all $100 refill cards, which puts you in the Gold Rewards Whenever Minutes program, you get calls at 10 cents per minute. And texts are 10 cents to send, five cents to receive. But, uh, you don't get much else, so basically you're looking at a Net10, except you have to buy the $100 card and text messages are 5 cents more to send. Yeah, so there's no real reason to have T-Mobile then, right? Of course, unless their signal is particularly strong in your area.
(read the review) This is another service where you have to purchase the largest denomination card to get the best deal on minutes — which happens to also be 10 cents per. However, if you have one of their newer phones, you can receive text messages for free and send them for 3.33 cents (.3 units, which at 10 cents per unit works out to 3.33 cents). Then they have the double minutes option, which can really play to your advantage. Still, when it comes to social directors, we're weary of any service that doesn't offer unlimited texts or unlimited nights and weekends.
(read the review) Finally, an unlimited incoming calls plan! So you pony up $45 per month, and you get your free incoming calls, plus unlimited nights and weekends, and 350 anytime outgoing minutes. Additional minutes are 15 cents each, but we think that even social directors can avoid this (hint: make it known that you have this plan and force people to call you). If you really need to talk, they have 600 and 1,000 minute versions of the plan. Incoming texts are free, too. You can either pay 15 cents to send a message, or pay for a plan: $5 for 250, $10 for 750, $15 for unlimited. We totally dig US Cellular now.
(read the review) The plans can get a bit confusing, and it all boils down to being expensive if you use a lot of minutes. For instance, you only get seven days of unlimited nights and weekends per month when you sign up for the cheapest plan on the PCS Network, and you're paying a 29 cents per minute overage on the Verizon network. They have good nights and weekends plans, but with texts at 10 cents per, we can really say that Venture/Lucky Aces isn't the best for a social director.
(read the review) Verizon has a huge subscriber base, so chances are that many of your friends have it. If so, you're in luck: every Verizon prepay plan has unlimited mobile-to-mobile calling, in addition to free night calling from 9 p.m. on. The dollar per day access fee hurts a bit, though, so let's look at their EasyPay plans, which act like normal cell plans. You can get 3,000 night and weekend minutes and unlimited mobile to mobile on two plans: 350 minutes for $50 and 700 minutes for $70. Add in the 10 cents per on the texting, and we're not as hot on Verizon as we thought we'd be. We suppose it all depends on what service your friends have.
(read the review) First off, forget the pay-as-you-go plan. It's either 18 cents per minute (!!) or 10 cents per minute and $7 per month. Yeah, we'll pass on that. You can get a prepaid plan, though, that can get you either a bunch of night and weekend minutes or unlimited. The best deal, to us, is the $45 deal where you get 400 anytime minutes and 2,000 night and weekend (you won't go over that unless you really jabber). An additional $10 gets you 1,000 messages, so for $55 you're set. You can definitely do worse.
(read the review) Fifteen cents per minute and a 60 cents per day access fee? Even with unlimited nights and weekends, this just won't do.