Centennial Wireless - A decent regional providerSearch This Site: Centennial Wireless is a regional cell phone company with a couple of million subscribers. AT&T recently announced plans to acquire them in order to acquire their customers. As part of the plan, they will sell off Centennial service and subscribers in Louisiana and Mississippi. The areas inlclude Lafayette, Beauregard, Iberville and West Feliciana in Louisiana and Claiborned, MS. While Centennial offers standard contracts, it does have a prepaid plan called MyPhone. But first lets look at their coverage. Coverage in the Midwest and SoutheastCentennial Wireless provides coverage in the midwest in parts of Michigan, Indiana and Ohio and in the southeast in parts of Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas.
Coverage Map
If you are roughly in that darkened area you may be covered, which would give you the option of trying their prepaid plan.
MyPhone PlanRatesThe MyPhone plan has a basic rate for airtime voice minutes and charges various amounts for various kinds of messaging and other extras.Talk AirtimeUnder the MyPhone plan, airtime costs 20 cents per minute when in their coverage area and 40 cents per minutes. This is somewhat high especially if you roam.How to Buy Airtime
Message costsText messages cost 10 cents to send and receive while MMS messages cost 25 cents.CallerIDThere is a daily fee of 10 cents for CallerID. Presumably you incur this cost on the days you receive a call which would trigger the service.VoicemailVoicemail also costs 10 cents per day.Both CallerID and voicemail are optional services and you can choose to turn them off. DirectoryDirectory Assistance costs 99 cents plus airtime. You can try Google's free service (1-800-GOOG-411) but you'll lost airtime while listening to their ads, but probably not 99 cents worth.Call-WaitingCall-waiting is the one thing that's free. After all, it helps them for you to answer call-waiting.Airtime CardsYou can buy airtime cards for either $20,$40,$60 or $80, and the airtime on those cards is good for 30,60,90 or 120 day. So you basically have to spend $20 a month.So you've looked these rates over and decided, well you'll give them a try, so let's take a look at their selections of phones. Hey, wait a minute, there's only one . . . Centennial Cell Phone You can currently (11/2008) purchase any Centennial Wireless cell phone as long as it's the Motorola C139. The phone costs $59.99. As a comparison, Tracfone and GoPhone have usually charged between $10 and $20 for that phone for their prepaid service.Where to BuyYou can buy the phone online when they're in stock or else go to a Centennial Wireless store.Still, it's a reliable, though very basic, phone. Plus the fact that they offer only one phone should make it easier in terms of getting technical support if you ever need to call them up. One handy feature is a small flashlight that might come in handy when looking for the keyhole when coming home in the winter or when reading a map in the car. Overall ValueCentennial Wireless is a relatively expensive prepaid cell phone provider with a higher than average airtime rate. The minimum required monthly expense is also slightly higher than average.However, they may be a good deal in their coverage area. Because they are a regional provider, it might be a good idea to go to a Centennial Wireless retail location to check them out further. Already a current Centennial Wireless user?Tell us about it!Your Centennial Wireless ReviewShare your experience with Centennial Wireless!
|
