Sample mobile telephone bill

Sample mobile telephone bill
Figure 1 is an example of a typical wireless telephone bill. The fictional user has a Telephone Company D phone in the St. Louis market. Mobile phone bills have three sections: cover page with payment coupon, account summary, and the call detail. In this particular bill, the customer pays $50 per month for access and gets 500 minutes of free airtime. Additional airtime costs $0.10 per minute. The plan also includes “first incoming minutes free.” This customer is paying $3.25 for “handset replacement insurance.” If the customer damages the phone, Telephone Company D will replace it. The replacement plan may carry a deductible.


Figure 1(a): Sample mobile telephone bill: page 1.


Figure 1(b): Sample mobile telephone bill: page 2, account summary.


Figure 1(c): Sample mobile telephone bill: page 3, phone charges.

This customer has a couple of options to reduce this monthly bill. First, the customer is paying for the 500-minute plan but only used 291 minutes. If Telephone Company D has a 250-minute plan for $25, the bill could be reduced by about $20. Another way to reduce the bill is to cancel the $3.25 monthly fee for “insurance.” Mobile phones rarely need repairs; so as long as the customer is not tough on the phone, this plan is a waste of money. The customer also had 60 minutes of calling to an 800 number. This airtime could be eliminated altogether if the user would use a landline phone, such as a payphone. If the calls were made while driving, this option is not feasible.