The Anatomy of a Cell Phone Bill

BILLSHRINK THE ÄNATOMY OF A CELL PHONE BILL WHAT ARE YOU PAYING FOR? We broke down all the fees in your monthly bill and found a few surprises. 10 Colo 10 Nowadays with smartphones we need to access more and more data. Carriers often disclose the cost for data services in hard-to-understand terms. Sometimes carriers also charge you a flat fee as well as a fee based on the size of your picture. verat-Mobrint ITEMIZED BILL ------------------ --- MB USED BILLED RATE TOTAL CHARGE Pay-Per-Use Data Access Picture Cost - Rules of Thumb 33.886 $0.01/KB $351 PHONE'S MEGAPIXELS IMAGE SIZE COST MESSAGES SENT/RECVD -150K6 -225K6 -425K6 -750Kb $3 $5 $8.5 $15 1.2MP Text Messaging Charges 2MP ЗМР 5MP 350 $0.10/MSG $2.40 MINUTES Airtime Charges 125 $0.20/Minute $178.25 This 911 Surcharge is imposed by local governments to help pay for emergency services such as fire and rescue. 911 Surcharge $0.75 $0.75 Universal $0.40 $0.40 Connectivity Charge Although the Universal Connectivity Charge is not required by the government, many carriers decide to pass the costs on to their customers. This Monthly Recurring Service $60 rge money goes into a fund to "assure telephone service to all households". TOTAL $592.80 If you're able to negotiate your carrier into removing these charges, you can save yourself upwards of $50 (the cost of a month's service) over the lifetime of a 2-year contract. If you happen to be going on a cruise -- turn your phone off! Most rates are an expensive $2.49 per minute, some carriers (T-Mobile) will even charge you even if you don't pick up the call and the call gets forwarded to your voice mail (a charge of $4.99 for a miss call). Turn the phone off! verat-Mobrint DETAILED BILL AIRTIME CALL LENGTH RATE TOTAL Roaming Call 10 MINUTES $2.49 $24.90 Call to voicemail $4.99 $4.99 Have a text message plan add-on in your cell phone plan? You'll still pay for sending/receiving text messages when you're traveling abroad. Text messages are still the cheapest means of communication while roaming, with receiving a text while abroad generally the cheapest (-$0.20 per text message). Incoming Call 60 MINUTES INCLUDED IN PLAN Incoming Call 15 MINUTES INCLUDED IN PLAN Incoming Call 40 MINUTES INCLUDED IN PLAN TEXT MESSAGING MESSAGES SENT RATE TOTAL Roaming Texts 12 $0.20 $2.40 Normal Texts 338 $0.10 INCLUDED IN PLAN You Tube Leave the smartphone off or turn the data roaming off while traveling abroad. If you really want to send a video message to your pals while on vacation, the cost of a video message can be a whopping $7. While roaming internationally, if you want to download a 5 megapixel picture attachment in your email, or watch a 3-minute YouTube video while waiting at a terminal, it will cost you about $40. DATA TYPE MB TOTAL Roaming Data YouTube Video 2.6 $39.00 Normal Data Internet Access 31.2 $312.00