I use the iPhone & iPod Touch all the time at work. But I don't own one. I am very, very very careful about adding any recurring costs to my life, I won't even subscribe to a magazine, much less take on a monthly contract for a phone. But I've messed with the latest one and I think it's time to plan for it.

But how much to budget? We are strict budgetarians and if I want to do this, I have to have facts at hand to plan for it.

Here's my telecommunications costs:

$124 on landline + DSL 1.5/512Mb service. We have no choice there, there is no competition, we can't get broadband without landline and we can't get any other wireline broadband of any kind.

We have 3 mobile phones, all Tracfones. We have spent $678.28 since August 6th 2008 on minutes for these phones. That's an average of $67.82 a month, or $22.61 per phone per month.

That makes my monthly telecommunications bill total $191.82.

Now I think I want to add an iPhone to the mix. That would drop our Tracfone minutes a very little bit (I hardly ever use voice minutes, so far this YEAR i've used 423 minutes of voice - the bulk of the voice minutes are for my wife) but I'm a fairly heavy user of text messaging - about 400 messages a month (a lot of those are alerts and other automated stuff related to my commute.

So what I'd like to know is what to budget if I go for an iPhone. When I had the Blackberry it was always about $118 a month after taxes and fees for an unlimited data and text plan with 450 voice minutes. If the cost is comparable, that would bring my monthly telecommunications bill up to $309.82. But I don't really know what an iphone costs to own and operate.

Assume an iPhone, assume a fully unlimited data plan and a fully unlimited text plan. Figure the lowest possible number of voice minutes.

So the question: What's the ACTUAL all-in monthly cost for an iPhone 3G WITH TAXES a month?

My iPhone 3G with unlimited text and lowest possible voice is $96.81 including taxes. First month was $120 something with pro-rate and activation.

The iPhone is a great product but the cost has always put me off especially with the UK service contracts which are very expensive and lock you into 12 or 18 month contracts. At the moment I pay around $30 per month for 10 Mbit/sec Broadband and 3G mobile broadband (1 Gbyte/Month download limit) as a package and pay virtually nothing (about $0.015 per minute for the PAYG VOIP connection) for phone calls (landline or mobile) using VOIP. (this gives around 1000 minutes/month for around $22 including the cost of the VOIP calls and the 3G Broadband connection)

The 3G mobile broadband connection provides the mobile VOIP connection using a portable 3G WiFi router + inclusive 3G USB dongle and a WiFi capable handset with a VOIP client (which switches automatically from the home WiFi network to the mobile WiFi and back again when the home WiFi network is detected). Portable Internet access is provided by using an Archos 605 which has a higher resolution easier to read screen than either the iPhone/iPod Touch, with none of that annoying zooming in/out to full view web pages. Of course the only issue is having to carry 2 or 3 bits of kit around, but the advantages of the flexibility, cost and not being tied to one over riding comms/network platform outweigh the inconvenience.

You will need to get data for the plan and iPhone device that *you* want from the AT&T website, but remember to factor in the 2 year contract, because like most phone plans you're paying for a full 2 years.

One question on your Tracfone minutes, your costs seem a little high to me - I buy my minutes once a year, and use the double minutes for life option that nets out to to $13/month, and I rolled over 500+ minutes last year. Are you buying minutes more frequently? They'll cost you more in the long-run.

I'm facing much the same issue - I need a better phone for text messaging, and am considering a blackberry for that. With a few more providers than AT&T I hope to have a few more price-competitive options.

I'd suppose that your multi-part kit costs more.

I've thought about the 3g->wifi router thing with VoIP, except that verizon's 3G service on my USB dongle is spotty on my commute. Not to mention the fact that I'd need to basically haul a pack with battery to keep the WiFi cloud operational for any device I carry.

But...but but...the 3G dongle is paid for by work...and I could rig up a lighter adapter to power the 3G -> wifi gizmo....
hmm

Interesting that you mention that. Turns out that's for FOUR phones, not three. I totally forgot that we have been helping out my sister-in-law who can't afford phone minutes. So it's not too bad. My wife burns down the minutes coordinating things for three kids...still, at under $30 a month per phone, the Trafone totally blows away ANY postpaid plan I can find.

The 1 thing tracfone lacks is a "messaging" phone for the prepaid market. Verizon and Tmobile have them, just a slider handset to make it easier to do SMS.

Thank you. that is exactly what I wanted to know.

I think we're going to pass on it.

I understand, the iPhone is my only telecom expense right now, I'm either at work or bouncing around from place to place with free wifi so it was justifiable to my budget.

The phone and the subscription to airport wifi runs me right around $110 a month, so I'm not going to complain. Just a few years ago it was close to triple that with DSL, land line, cable TV, cell phone, etc. Now its just cell phone and a $10/month subscription to airport wifi.

The 3G Dongle came (free) inclusive with the Virgin Media Broadband package (Cable + 3G mobile).

http://allyours.virginmedia.com/html/broadband/mobile.html

The Cradlepoint CRADLE-PHS300 Personal Hotspot wasn't too expensive - available for around $170 - available here at

http://www.amazon.com/Cradlepoint-CRADLE-PHS300-Personal-Hotspot-Black/dp/B001212ELY/ref=pd_sim_e_3

http://www.cradlepoint.com/products/phs300-personal-wifi-hotspot

The Cradlepoint Router has its own internal 1800mAhr Battery. If I need a much longer connectivity time, I can connect up the WiFi Router using its external power connector to a PowerGorilla and or SolarGorilla combo to recharge the internal battery (this basically gives indefinite connection time to the 3G network - as long as the sun shines)

The beauty of the cradlepoint router is that it allows internet access from any computer (desktop, laptop, notebook, netbook, WiFi PDA, WiFi PMP, WiFi media streamers etc) with an ethernet connection as well as having WiFi connectivity as it also allows single port ethernet connectivity and is extremely useful as a fixed line Broadband connection backup even when there is a local power outage.

A Draytel VOIP adapter can also be connected to ethernet port on the cradlepoint and a converted GPO 746 Rotary Dial phone attached to the Draytel adapter.

http://www.draytel.org/vigortalk_draytel.html



It certainly gets noticed when pulling the 746 out of a backpack on the bus/train and you can make and recieve VOIP calls. (beats an iPhone every time)

Martin,

I have an unlocked (by Apple) iPhone 3G, so I do not use AT&T. Rather I use t-mobile. I have four lines and pay about $120 - 130 per month including unlimited internet on the iPhone and 400 text messages per month each on two of the four lines. For that cost I get 1,000 minutes per month. Evenings, weekends and calls between t-mobile phones do not bite into your minute pool.

Going this route, you will pay more for the phone up front but lower ongoing usage.

Hey, if you still have a business, why not get it on your business dime, then you can write it off. (check with your CPA)

If you go unlocked, you want to make sure you get the official Apple unlocked phone (you'll have to get European or Asian phone) so that software upgrades do not lock your phone back to AT&T. The phones that are software unlocked will lock after an upgrade. And the 3.0 version is coming out real soon.

My monthly telecommunications costs per phone are pretty close to yours.