| My son Kevin is about to turn 15. We tried to hold | | | | 250 texts a month, for a mere $5.00 extra. That |
| him off as long as we could before getting him his | | | | way, when Kevin blew by his minutes, we could |
| own cell phone. But, partially due to his constant | | | | charge him an extra 20 cents a minute, and |
| nagging, and mostly due to the fact that he is | | | | actually make a bit of a profit from his lack of |
| now in high school and commuting a ways to get | | | | discipline. We thought it was an ingenious plan. |
| there, we caved. We expended a little bit of | | | | Unfortunately, we radically underestimated not |
| effort to compare cell phone plans, and handed | | | | only the popularity of texting among teens, but |
| him his phone. | | | | also our son's complete lack of discipline as well. |
| My husband and I are not big 'texters' (I can't | | | | Four days into owning his phone, he had used |
| stand it, honestly - talking on the phone seems so | | | | something close to 500 texts. AAAAgggghhhh! My |
| much easier). My son, however, and all his friends, | | | | husband took his phone away immediately. |
| are big texters. So, being the level-headed parents | | | | Unfortunately, we really wanted Kevin to have a |
| that we are, we did our best to compare cell | | | | phone while traveling to and from school. So, we |
| phone plans, and found what we thought was a | | | | did the math with him on his texts, and told him |
| reasonable compromise. We'd allow him 100 texts | | | | not to use texting any more. While he seemed to |
| per month. Anything over, and we'd have to | | | | be doing okay on the texting, we lost sight of the |
| charge him 20 cents a text. | | | | voice minutes he was using. I know, pretty dumb, |
| Knowing Kevin's inability to say no, as well as his | | | | but life is busy, and hindsight is always 20/20. Well |
| inability to even remotely consider the financial | | | | a few hundred dollars poorer, we've recommitted |
| consequences of his actions (I know, I know - we | | | | to take the time to fully compare cell phone plans |
| must shoulder much of the blame as parents), we | | | | and pay a little extra even for 'overage insurance'. |
| devised a back-up plan. We decided to purchase | | | | |