I hate to spend money. I've been using the same old Nokia with T-Mobile TOGO for several years ($.10/minute). So when I saw that Virgin Mobile was offering a smartphone for $25/month I thought it was too good to be true. Researching various other websites I saw that the biggest drawback to Virgin Mobile was bad customer service. When the price of the Samsung Intercept dropped from $250 to $175 on the Virgin Mobile website I figured that was a price I was willing to gamble with.

PURCHASE: I ordered the phone on Dec 14 and due to snow in the area it didn't arrive until Dec 18 (can't complain about free fedex). I was able to activate it (mostly) that night using the internet (note that it says you have to charge the phone for 2hrs minimum before use) and was soon downloading freeware to fill up my multiple screens. To activate the phone I decided to bypass the credit card option (I had read multiple accounts of "accidental" double-billing) and chose to use 'fill-up' cards that you can usually find discounted on the web (i.e. instead of $25/month I'll be paying $23 by using callingmart and other websites).

PROBLEM: The problem occured when I tried to make an actual call. I was able to text/web-search and everything else just fine. I was not able to make a normal phone call and the voice on the phone said I was out of minutes. Fortunately when it tells you you have no minutes it asks if you would like to add minutes. I said "yes." It asked me how I would like to add minutes and I said "operator" only to find that Virgin Mobile's customer service is only open from 4AM to 7PM Pacific time. I called the next morning and was told by their Indian bureau that their computers were not functioning and to call again in 2hrs. I called 2hrs later and got their Filipino bureau and was told to remove the battery for 2 minutes, and then try the phone, and if that did not work then to try it again in 1 hr. 1hr later still no phone! I called again and got Mary in the Filipino bureau. I explained the problem and within minutes she had reset my phone and got it working.

CONCLUSION: The moral of the story is that it's a great phone. You might have to jump through hoops to get it working, but the customer service is polite enough and you apparently just have to keep at it until you find the few knowledgeable techies over there. The phone does consume a lot of batterie life (I might have to look into different apps to work on this) - after playing with it for about 3-4hrs I was down to 60% battery power. The phone might look and feel plasticky, but it still seems solid enough. The slide out keyboard is awesome since I hate using the touchscreens on my friends' iPhones. The phone is very easy to work out and for more in depth explanations of icons and functions there is a manual on Virgin Mobile's website. If you were using an old 'candy-bar' phone like I was or (heaven forbid) a monochromatic phone, this is the one to upgrade with!

UPDATE: A friend of mine successful loaded GooglePhone which allows him unlimited phone minutes with this phone in the US - Therefore you can have unlimited Data/Texting/Internet/Phone for ~$25/month (the closest thing to this is Cricket, and they want $40/month!)