14 DAY TRIAL // Wireless carrier Sprint and Walmart recently announced the launch of Common Cents Mobile, a new addition to the operator's prepaid portfolio. The new brand, bringing forth 7-cent minutes that Round Down and 7-cent text messages, is meant to offer great value for money to budget-conscious consumers. According to Sprint, the new brand should debut on May 15 exclusively in over 700 Walmart stores in Birmingham, Ala., Detroit, Houston, Orlando, Fla., and more.
“In recent months, consumers seeking no-frills, pay-by-the-minute plans have been somewhat overlooked with the popularity of unlimited plans in the market," said Dan Schulman, president of Sprint’s prepaid group. “These customers want to stay connected -- to a point -- but don’t want to waste time or money on services they don’t use. The addition of Common Cents combines easy-to-use handsets with a simple pay-by-the-minute service that can save them money.”
Some of the features that Common Cents Mobile sports include Round Down, with minutes for which customers pay only what they use, or less, as the service will round down calls in a different manner than most carriers do. For example, if a call ends at 1 minute and 46 seconds, the user won't pay for 2 minutes, but for only one.
Another feature of the service includes a series of mobile phones available for purchase, which should appeal to cost-conscious users through the simple, basic functions they include, such as voicemail, text messaging, caller ID. The phones are priced in accordance to the 7-cent-minute cost, and include: the LG101, priced at just $19.77, the Samsung M340, which goes for $39.77, and the Kyocera S2300, which features a price tag of $69.77.
Sprint also notes that, being “developed for consumers who seek ease and simplicity, Common Cents Mobile lets customers activate and add money to their account with two service options: - $20 Refill card = 30 days of service, up to 565 minutes of talk - $30 Refill card = 60 days of service, up to 848 minutes of talk."
Those interested are offered the possibility to add unlimited messaging for $20 per month, as well as data access for $1/megabyte per day. One can buy Refill cards or register a credit card, a debit card or a PayPal account online at CommonCentsMobile.com in order to add options to the monthly balance. No contracts and no activation or termination fees are required.