Anybody use Cingular pay as you go phone for regular cell phone?

Long story short, Cingular customer girlfriend phone gets run over and physically destroyed with only about six months passed on a two year contract. We go to Best Buy to look at replacement phones. Sure enough full retail is pretty expensive, $200-400, depending on phone. Best Buy sales rep comes over and hears our story. He recommends and says what he did is to buy a Cingular pay as you go phone which is only $30 for the cheapest model, insert SIM card from old phone and phone will work fine and then can get a better phone when eligible for a upgrade. I asked if it would be in violation of her current contract and he said no, they go by the info that's stored on the SIM and they really don't care as long as they get their monthly payments. So we buy the phone, go home and open the box up. It comes with it's own SIM which they say to put in the phone, then call an activation number and then enter a password, etc., but sure enough when she inserted her old SIM, the phone came right up just like it had been in there all along.

Just wondered if anybody heard of anybody doing that and do you think she'll get in trouble with Cingular?

Yes I've heard much the same thing over on the Cingular forum on PhoneScoop

The phones are carrier locked to cingular but I don't think they're locked to any particular calling plan. Also, you can unlock the phones, people do that all the time, Cingular will even do it for you once you've had the phone for a year or so.

Unlikely. The phones are razors and the air time is the blade. They make a *TON* of money on those blades.
One place I worked bought phones at retail and sold them at a loss just to get their share of the money made. Bit of a sleeeze ball business and frequently run by people who tried tanning saloons and health food MLM's.

Ok, then it sounds like the Cingular cops won't be busting down her door then. The phone is ok for a $30 phone. I wonder if they can manufacture it that cheap or do they take a hit as mentioned, the money is the minutes used.

I bought a couple of Cingular PAYG SIM cards in USA couple of years ago, on a trip from UK.

$30 each, never used up all credit in two weeks.

Best feature, you could phone each other for FREE !! (Whilst in USA)

I used to pay $29.95/month for a phone for my wife. She barely used the phone and we ended up "wasting" money each month just so she would have a phone for the few times she needs one.

We ended up moving to a pay as you go phone from Cingular and have been very happy with it. I would rather pay $100 for a year of service than $360. It all depends on how much you use you mobile.