Tip: Buy an iPhone and Get a Backup Phone Free

This may be the simplest tip I’ve ever written, but so many people have been surprised when I mention it to them, I figured I would write it up for everyone. It’s a common-sense technique to make sure that, once you decide to plonk down your hard earned cash for an iPhone and enter in to a two-year contract with AT&T, you get the biggest bang for your buck.

I don’t have any magic secret here – your phone is still going to cost you at least $500 – but I have a tip that might serve you well down the road (as long as you are not already an AT&T subscriber).

Before you activate your iPhone, which will create and activate an account with AT&T, activate a plain old service plan with them which will net you a free (or at least discounted) phone. Then go ahead and activate your iPhone using the number from the account you have already established.

The benefit is that you now have two phones, your iPhone and the one you don’t use. All I had to do was pull out my SIM card and put it into the backup phone and it worked just fine with my new iPhone account. Be sure to choose a free phone that is compatible with iSync so that you can put your contacts on to it. This ensures that when you use your backup phone, your experience is as close to the iPhone experience as possible.

Why would you ever want to use the backup? I am currently on vacation and my iPhone is safe at home. This way, I can take my phone out on to the boat or to the beach without worrying about damaging my precious iPhone. This “spare” phone might also come in handy if I ever need to have my iPhone serviced; I can continue to use my phone without paying Apple for a loaner. Sure, it’s not an iPhone, but it was free, I just had to ask for it before activating my iPhone.

Like I said, this is not an earth-shattering tip, but many people have thanked me for explaining the idea to them before they bought their iPhone. So, there you go!