As low as $4.17 Per Month

As Low As 14.3¢ Per Minute

Always $2.14 Monthly Fee

As Long As 365 Days Re-Upping

7-11 SpeakOut GSM

Note: 7-11 SpeakOut has significantly worsened their plans. See http://www.7-eleven.com/docs/09_003_Speakout_broch_E_r04_LR.pdf for details. Since SpeakOut still has the lowest monthly cost for service on the AT&T GSM network, I'm keeping it on this site for now.
 

7-11 SpeakOut GSM service is 14.3-29¢/minute, and the minutes are good for between 30 and 365 days. AT&T network. They have a $2.14/month fee (recently increased from $1.25). $50/year minimum. No web site, you have to buy a phone at a 7-11 store, so this means that you need a store in your area. You can refill from the handset, you don’t have to go to a store. If you buy the phone at a 7-11 store outside your area then it'll still work as long as you have AT&T GSM service in your area, but you'll have a non-local phone number which some people don't like. There are a lot of AT&T areas where 7-11 doesn't have any stores. Roaming is available at no extra cost, but it’s rare to have to roam.

The 7-11 SpeakOut customer service phone number is 888-832-8633 (for existing customers, including to add money). For new customers, use 866-310-1023. You won't find this number in any of the manuals or on-line. You saw them here first!

While you can also add time by calling from your SpeakOut mobile phone, the customer service is atrocious. I called to add money, and I used an American Express Card. The agent put in all the information and it was declined. When I called the 888 number they informed me that they didn't take American Express cards!

No web site, but you can look at their brochure here.

I have a phone on SpeakOut and the money ran down to $0 after the monthly fee increase. $1.25 was already on the high side, but $2.14 is really high. When I called them, they claimed that the 911 fee charged by the government is now $2.14 per month, which is of course untrue, but I think that the agent was told to say this and wasn't lying intentionally. First, there is no federal 911 fee, the 911 fee is charged by the state, and varies widely, from as low as 20¢ to as much as $1.90 (per month). The federal Universal Service Fee is a percentage of the monthly bill, currently around 4%. So a $30/month bill would have a USF of about $1.20. Generally the prepaid carriers simply build the cost of the fees into the per-minute cost, a $2.14 monthly fee is very high. Now with their changes to their plans, I'll let the phone go when the money runs out.

SpeakOut texting is now no great deal (it used to be 5¢ per message, now it's 10¢/message).

Activation: The phone is activated when you purchase it.

Network: AT&T (roaming on other GSM networks at no extra cost, at least in theory).

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Monthly Fee: $2.14 (recently increased from $1.25).

Minimum Cost: $50/year ($4.17/month).

Per-minute cost: 14.3-29¢.

Re-upping: $10: 35 minutes/30days,  $20: 100 minutes/90 days, $30: 180 minutes/120 days, $50: 335 minutes/365 days, $100: 700 minutes/365 days.

Handsets: They only sell the service with a handset, which you must buy at a 7-11 store in the U.S.. You can then move the SIM card to any unlocked or AT&T handset that supports at least 850/1900 MHz GSM (don’t use one of the old 1900 MHz only handsets (offered when PacBell Wireless and Cingular first started GSM service in the U.S.), and don’t use one of the 900/1800/1900 MHz handsets that were popular when the U.S. had only 1900 MHz GSM).

Pros: Good coverage (though not as good as PagePlus). One year expiration of minutes on $50 and $100 card.

Cons: Relatively high monthly fee deducted from your account ($2.14). Poorer coverage than PagePlus, nearly 3x the minimum monthly cost of T-Mobile (after one year). Must make a call every 120 days to keep account active. Per minute rate is very high. You must buy a phone from them, they won't just sell you a SIM card. No on-line presence. No AMPS. Customer service is poor. Data costs a whopping $50/MB (according to SpeakOut's older promotional material data is $0.05/KB, and according to one person that e-mailed me, it does actually work--just don't ever use it!

Where to Buy Service: Many 7-11 Stores in the U.S.. You can buy refills of airtime from your phone, but there is no web site.

Where to Buy Phones: Service is sold only with a phone. The SIM card can be removed and used in unlocked GSM phones, or in AT&T locked phones. They will not sell you just a SIM card.

Unlocked dual band GSM phones (North American bands) can be found at:  http://www.jr.com/JRSectionView.process?N=11914+217742&Ne=102065#GSM

Unlocked quad band GSM phones ("world phones") can be found at: http://www.jr.com/JRSectionView.process?N=11914+217744&Ne=102065#GSM

Examples of how much time you’d get for different monthly costs:
$10: To be added
$25: To be added
 

If you want the AT&T GSM network then SpeakOut is okay, but very expensive per minute. You get a 5% bonus once you spend $100, which reduces the per minute cost slightly (

Voice Mail and Texting Uses AT&T's Systems

Because SpeakOut uses AT&T's network, you can access the SpeakOut voice mail and texting systems the same way you access AT&T's systems. This means that all the local "back-door" voice mail numbers work for AT&T so you can check your voice mail from a land line without using up any prepaid minutes which is a very nice feature (it's a nice feature for AT&T's regular customers as well!). Click here for a  list of numbers. It's possible that not every number on the list works, so you may need to try more than one. Send messages to SpeakOut phones using 10-digit number@txt.att.net.

Bottom line: Not a good deal. I can see getting it if you just want to use something like an iPhone for occasional calls and no 3G data (mainly for the WiFi).

Note: 7-11 also has a CDMA SpeakOut service which uses the Sprint network and which should be avoided.

There is a Canadian SpeakOut service sold at 7-11's in Canada.