Day 236 of writing every day.
When getting a smartphone in Japan or just signing up to get mobile phone services, the norm in Japan is still 2-3 year contracts that lock you into a provider. Things aren’t as bad as they were when I came to Japan 10 years ago. Back then you were charged a fee for “breaking” contract by opting to switch to another carrier that was trying to outcompete the other by offering phones for free basically if you switched over and signed a two-year contract with them instead.
I’d say the monthly rates are pretty high at just under 7000-8000 yen for data plans with large carriers that have increased in the amount of data you could use as 5G began to change the game. My plan actually gives around 1500 off a month or so if I keep my data usage under 3GBs, so I stick to WiFi when using apps that require a lot of data. I don’t even watch videos while on the go like so many people seem to do on the train or while waiting around.
The cheaper alternatives are just providers who bought the right to use data from the large carriers basically at wholesale rates and my guess is they can provide lower prices because they don’t have the cost of building towers needed to send signals and have far fewer stores that they need to staff and whatnot. Some even set up shop and partner up with the carrier they bought distribution rights from.
The plan I use allows me to write off the remaining payments on my current phone if I switch to a new phone and start paying monthly for that instead. While this does allow me to upgrade my phone as the next generation comes out, it unfortunately also means slight upticks in prices as the new generation tends to increase in cost as well. So unless I switch to a phone with lower specs, the price of my plan with phone payments actually will go up.
Smartphones aren’t made to last a long time and switching at two years probably puts me in the middle. I’m sure there are people who switch phones when the next model comes out and are always looking to get their hands on the latest tech available. Only the most frugal will hold on to their phones until it becomes unbearably slow and the buttons or screens stop responding normally.
The value of a phone seems to drop drastically as well and it almost seems like the amount you can sell it back for is between 5 to 10 times less than the sticker price you paid for it when you first bought it not even two years ago. Smartphones are basically bad investments, and I doubt any current phones will increase in value as a collector’s item like the original iPhone or something. So holding on to it will be pointless unless you have uses for it that differs vastly from the average consumer.
It always feels like a hassle changing phones though. I have to make sure my data is backed up and ready to transfer. I’ll need to check my login and passwords again for when I start using the new phone and need to log back into everything.
The only convenient thing is that I don’t need to go into a store to change my phone for my carrier. I can do it all online and through the post. In fact, it might be better to do it online as store staff will basically try to sell you things you don’t want or need because they need to do so to improve their sales and get noticed as employees.
Well, I’ll try to get it all done this month as enough time has already passed for me to qualify for trading in my current phone and canceling all the payments left on it, and switching to a new one.
Thanks for reading!
One Chance Works 