I have some friends that are pretty poor. They always complain about not having enough money and many times their electricity or water gets shut off because they do not pay the bills. I told them about some government programs that they can apply to which would definitely help them in their finances. One of these programs is the free government phone service. If you were part of this program, the government will provide to you a cell phone at no cost. The phones are provided through several wireless carriers like Safelink Wireless.
These free phones are distributed based on people’s household income. You have to be living at or below the poverty line in order to get a phone. Each state has their own definition of the poverty line so you should check to see what it is for your state. Once you have checked it out and you feel that you meet this criteria, you can then apply for the phone. You will need to send a copy of your past year’s W2 or pay stub which would be used to verify your income.
I told my friends to be cautious when using the free phone with free minutes because it is very easy to run out of minutes. You do not get a lot of free minutes. You would probably only get 60 minutes per month. That is barely enough to make any significantly long calls. Most of your calls would last only a few minutes and you would only make important calls. Even though there is a restriction to the amount of minutes that you get, it is still important to have this free phone. You can use it whenever you find yourself in a situation where a phone would be handy. One example would be if your car broke down in the middle of nowhere and you had to call a tow truck to come get you. I think that is the reason for the free government phone service.
