Guest Author - Katelyn Thomas

If you’d like a pre-paid phone with all the bells and whistles, take a look at Virgin’s pre-paid service. Virgin has a wide service area and users say it is very easy to re-load when you run out of minutes. However, you do need to buy phone time every ninety days. As long as you use your phone regularly, this is no problem, but if you don't use it for a while, you will miss Virgin's reminders and end up with an inactive phone. This can be a big problem if you only use the phone for emergency calls and are in the middle of nowhere with no service, so be sure to refill your phone before the ninety days are up.

Virgin's bells and whistles include a variety of ring tones, text messaging, games, and internet access. Check to see how many minutes each of these activities use up to avoid unpleasant surprises.

Based on the opinion of Virgin's users, this phone deserves three out of four stars for ease of use and reliability. The need to buy a new card to stay active every ninety days seems to be the only drawback.