The advantageous service plan of my prepaid phone has made me addicted to it. But things were not the same when I was under a 1-year contract with a cellular provider. On a friend’s advice I switched to prepaid connection with a service plan of my kind and things have changed for the better.

The pre-paid cellular providers offer service plans that are tailor made to serve the diverse needs of different individuals. Customers, who SMS more and make lesser calls, can go for those plans which contain free messaging facility every month. Those who make only local calls and seldom need to call up out-station or abroad can select service plans that offer local calls at discount rates.

Companies also provide such plans where in calling within the same service provider will be free of toll. There are also STD packages. In these service plans, the tariff applicable for STD calls are lesser than the usual rates and are appropriate for those who make a large number of STD or outstation calls.

Apart from call tariffs, service plans also vary on value added services (VAS) and validity. If you receive more incoming calls and don’t make much outgoing calls, it is advisable that you go for a plan that offers you comparatively lesser talk-time but a long validity. The various companies competing in the market provide a large number of value added services to promote their products.

The caller tunes or ring-back tunes, poly phonic ringtones, monophonic ringtones, sing tones, GPRS, picture messages, call baring services, missed call alerts, astrology, jokes, beauty tips, news headlines, and sports alerts are among such value added services. The brands in the market offer various service plans with discounts on VAS as well. Using a pre-paid phone with an appropriate service plan is more feasible as you have already paid for its usage and don’t stay under the threat of a huge bill at the end of the month.