Monday, November 22, 2010

Safelink Wireless for My Mom

My mom retired several years ago. She only gets Social Security payments and has no other income. Because of this she has been forced to save as much money as possible. One way in which she trimmed cost was to get rid of her phone service. I was against this idea though. I told her that if she did not have a phone then I would not be able to call her and see if she was alright. Nevertheless, she still cancelled the phone service. I felt unease about this though. I talked to some of my friends about this problem and they suggested that I get her to apply for a free cell phone at Safelink Wireless.

My friends told me that Safelink would give her a free cell phone and airtime minutes. Granted, the minutes do not exactly amount to much but it was good enough for making calls every now and then. I figured this would be good for my mom because I would only need to call her once a week and only for a few short minutes of talking. I told my mom about this idea and she agreed. After all, she really had nothing to lose. The only thing required for her to apply for this program was that her income had to be within the limit set by the federal government. I think she would qualify since she is only living off of social security.

Now that my mom has a cell phone, I give her a call every weekend. We usually talk for a few minutes and I ask her how everything is going. I do not want to use up all of minutes so we keep the conversation short. I also reminded her not to make frivolous calls so as to waste her minutes.

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Safelink Wireless

Ever since my parents retired they have been slowly but surely canceling many services. First they got rid of their cable and now they are getting rid of their cell phone. When they got rid of the cell phone I told them that they probably should not do that. If they do not have a phone, how would I ever contact them? They are pretty old and I like to call them ever now and then just to see if they are ok. I told them that they could apply for a Safelink phone. By doing that they would get a free cell phone and free minutes.

I believe my parents would be eligible because of their low income. They are already on Medicaid so I figured that would probably help them get the free phone. I went to the Safelink Wireless website to find out more information. Luckily the program was operating within their state. My parents went to the website and applied. It was pretty easy. They only had to send in a copy of their forms proving they were on Medicaid. Then they got their free phone.

I told my parents to be careful with the minutes on their cell phone. They do not get that much minutes and it is easy to run out. I told them to make emergency calls only. They should not be using the phone to chat with their friends. They promised me that they would not do that. I am happy that they have a phone again. I now call them once a week and talk to them for 10 minutes. Since the plan offers 60 free minutes, they save up most of their minutes every month. Every since my parents signed up for the plan, their friends have all asked them about it and signed up themselves.

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Free Safelink Phone

I only make about 20K per year which is considered poverty by the government. I also have to support my wife and kids on this income. This makes living very difficult. I have to provide food and shelter and many times the money just comes up short. I have applied to several government programs to make life easier for our family. For example, I applied for the food stamps and a housing voucher. Recently, I also applied for a free Safelink phone.

Through this program, our family was able to get a free cell phone which is sponsored by the government. This Safelink phone service has been a blessing to our family. Our home currently does not have phone service so we are unable to make calls or get calls. This has been a problem for us because we are unable to conduct business. We could not even open a bank account because the application requires us to provide a home phone number.

We applied for the Safelink cell phones by going to the Safelink Wireless website. We searched to see whether our state has this program. Luckily it did. So we submitted an application. I had to provide documents proving our household income before I could get a phone. But other than that the Safelink phone application was easy enough.

Through this Safelink phones service not only do we get a free cell phone, but we also get free minutes. Of course there is a limit on the minutes. We only get about an hour of airtime. I think this is plenty for what we need. Most of our calls are business related. We hardly ever use the phone to chit chat. I really appreciate this program though. One time our car broke down on the road and we had to call for help. With the cell phone it was easy to do. I shudder to think what would have happened had we not had the cell phone. For those who are on Medicaid like some of our friends, you get these Medicaid phones by showing them documents that prove you are on Medicaid.