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For those MIT customers who receive approval to purchase cell phones or pagers in support of Institute business, this web page is intended to assist in the decision making process around what equipment and service provides the best options and pricing for the user.

The information on this page will also be helpful to MIT employees and students who want to make a personal purchase of cell phones or pagers. MIT contract pricing may be available to employees and students purchasing equipment or service for their personal use. For information regarding personal cell phones and pagers, please see Cellular Telephones.

The Cell Phone and Pager Project Team did extensive investigations on the service level and coverage on campus, price, customer service, etc., and gathered information from peer institutions, and national reports on cell phone providers.

Considerations for Choosing a Service and Equipment

Identify how the service and equipment will be used, and decide if a cell phone or pager is more appropriate. Some decision criteria to consider:

• Cell phones are feature-rich and make mobile communication easy, but cost more than pagers (both in equipment and monthly fees).
• Pagers have much better reception than cell phones in areas such as basements and interior rooms.
• Cell phones are more apt to be able to provide complete communication regardless of geographic location (e.g., if you travel domestically or internationally).
• Pagers are significantly less expensive than cell phones, are often smaller, and are more likely to withstand "wear and tear."
• Paging functionality allows simultaneous paging of large groups of people.
• Verizon now has "Push-to-Talk" functionality; however, you can use it only with other Verizon "Push-to-Talk" customers. Nextel "Direct Connect" customers can communicate only with other Nextel "Direct Connect" customers. The two services are NOT interchangeable.
• Some cell phones are also PDA devices, which allows the synchronization of desktop applications (e.g., schedules, address books, etc.) to your cell phone for convenient and mobile access to important data.

For answers to frequently asked questions regarding cell phones and pagers, see the IS&T Stock Answers for Cell Phones and Pagers.

Considerations for Cell Phones

Cell phone number portability became effective on November 24, 2003. This allows users to change cellular providers while keeping their existing cellular telephone number. In order to take advantage of this service, do not cancel your current service before applying to be switched; your current number must be active. Have a copy of your most recent bill available when communicating with your new vendor. For more information, see Cell Phone Number Portability.

• Each of the MIT preferred vendors offers some identical features, and each offers some unique features. Decide what features and functionality are important, and then choose between the different MIT preferred cell phone vendors based on your needs. For links to vendors' web sites, see Cellular Telephones.
• If you currently use a cell phone, examine your calling pattern. How many minutes per month do you use your cell phone? Do you often "roam" outside your rate plan area? Calls that exceed the maximum monthly minutes or roam outside the rate plan area are priced at a premium. As such, each cell phone should be on a plan whose "footprint" closely matches the user's geographic location most of the time. Also, the rate plan's maximum monthly minutes should be somewhat greater than the duration of calls the user reasonably expects to make.
• For MIT business cell phone service, always choose a one-year contract term. This gives the user the ability to cancel or change vendors after one year without penalty. There are no activation fees associated with any MIT business cell phone service, but there are termination fees if the user cancels the service prior to the expiration of the contract term (approximately $200).
• If an employee with an MIT-liable cell phone leaves the Institute, think about ways to reissue the phone before canceling it and incurring a termination fee. For example, if the cell phone is from Verizon Wireless, you can suspend the cell phone service for 60 days without incurring a termination fee, and reissue the phone either to the former employee's replacement or to another Institute employee.
• If you have several members of your department who have the same service provider, consider pooling your minutes. You may be able to move all users to a "share plan" at a lower monthly rate, yet users can still make the same number of calls, but at an overall lower cost to the Institute.
• Decide what features you require in a cell phone. Some of the options to choose from include weight, style, flip-top, battery life, phone/PDA combinations, and web access (there is an extra fee to access the web through your phone).
• You may want to review and test the off-campus functional coverage of your selected service provider if you expect to receive business calls off-campus.
• Will you need to make data calls from your cell phone? Different vendors provide difference levels of technical service (e.g., speed of the data call, etc.) and different price packages. Review your requirements and choose the plan that most closely fits your needs.

Note: If, within 15 days of activating service with a cell phone provider, you determine that your new equipment and service plan do NOT meet your needs, you can return the equipment for a refund and cancel the service. If you cancel service, you will be responsible to pay for any calls made during the period that you utilized the service. After 15 days, you must fulfill the contract term, or pay a termination fee if you cancel prior to its expiration (approximately $200).

Considerations for Pagers

Based on the identified paging service needs of the majority of Institute customers, MIT has contracted with Arch Wireless, which satisfies most of the Institute requirements. The Cell Phone and Pager Project Team determined, however, that a small number of MIT customers have a requirement for superior nationwide paging coverage. For this, the team recommends Skytel. The limited number of customers with this requirement did not warrant the Institute signing of a contract with Skytel; therefore, no special pricing contracts exist. For more information, see Pagers.

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