Phone

[foggyfoggy]

im  thinking  of  getting  a  phone   but  what do  they  mean  by  sim  free    do  not  want   monthly  plan  thank  u

[brainiac]

Why the new username, Henry?

[barry1010]

You need a SIM card to use your phone to make calls, send texts and use the internet.

There are many SIM providers to choose from offering different contracts and pay as you go plans.

SIM free simply means the phone is sold without a SIM card .  You have to find your own SIM providers.  I buy all my phones SIM free.

[foggyfoggy]

what  about  the  cost

[barry1010]

You can buy a phone on contract which means it comes with a SIM card and your monthly bill pays for your phone and the specified minutes of phone calls, number of texts and amount of internet data.  This is a credit agreement as you are not paying for the phone up front

[barry1010]

If you buy a phone SIM free you buy it outright and pay for your chosen SIM card either monthly on a rolling monthly contract (cancel any time) or a longer contract.  

Or you could get a simple pay as you go SIM.

I pay £4 a month for a rolling one month contract.

[foggyfoggy]

ta  for  all the  info

[barry1010]

What do you want to do with your phone?  That's the important question 

[Buenchico]

If you buy a phone which comes with a SIM card in it, you might only be able to use your phone with the company that provided the SIM (such as Vodafone, Three, etc).  That can trap you into paying higher costs.  So you should always look for a SIM-free phone (where you can choose which phone service provider to go with).

If I was looking for a SIM-free phone at the moment, this is what I might well go for:
https://mobile.asda.com/shop/samsung/a05s

If money was tight though, I might consider this instead:
https://mobile.asda.com/shop/nokia/c02

I think that you're right to avoid a monthly contract plan, per se, but you should definitely consider a pay-as-you-go phone service which uses monthly 'bundles'.  You can set things up so that you buy a new 'bundle', direct from your bank account, every month but there's NO contract.  (i.e. you can stop paying, or switch to a different 'bundle', at any time).

If you chose to use Asda Mobile as your service provider, you could pay as little as £5 per month for a 'bundle' that would give you unlimited calls and texts (to standard UK landline and mobile numbers) and enough data to casually browse the web now and then (e.g. to check up on the news and weather) and to send emails, etc.  If you wanted to use the internet via your phone far more often (e.g. to watch loads of YouTube videos), you could pay a bit more:
https://mobile.asda.com/sim-only-deals