Prepaid Phone Card – When Did It Really Start

When the use of mobile phone was first introduced during the 90s, a prepaid phone card was needed in a prepaid plan and you have to load into your sim card to be able to use it for calling or texting.

This was the start of the cellphone or wireless era that lasted until now and it kept on improving and getting exciting.

Filipinos are known to one of the races in the world that puts great value on family ties and contact with family members is very, very important.

And for sure, this is what big wireless providers, telecommunications companies and mobile phone manufacturers think about when each thinks about why telecommunications especially the mobile phone industry is very successful in the Philippines. Actually, the country already earned and is being presently recognized as the texting capital of the world because of the overwhelming texts sent per day to friends and more so to family members. Almost everyone in the country, young and old has one cellular phone use to text or call another party.

Indeed, the use of mobile phones in the Philippines had become the longest trend that ever hit the country for the longest time now. Not only communicating with style by using different mobile phones that keeps on getting better and better, thanks to Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Samsung and Motorola among others. Besides these giant mobile phone manufacturers, mobile network providers, SMART, GLOBE, and SUN are also around to provide great deals and quality service to varied customers. The prepaid phone card was one of the two modes to be able to use a mobile phone. Denominations of the phone cards before were only 300 and 500 but today Globe has a 100 prepaid card.

On the other hand, maybe only few can recall that the use of a prepaid phone card is not really new. Before there were Globe or Smart, PLDT had already came up with the same technology of using prepaid cards. It may not be that frequently used because:

1. land-based telephone lines are being use through out the country. These telephone lines are capable of connecting you whether you are calling locally or using the long distance direct dial to call other parties and telephones in another provide or country.

2. these prepaid phone card can only be used in specifically installed phone booths and phone racks which are usually not that many. Sometimes, you may find yourself lining up just to use your phone card.

3. the telephone booths and racks were often destroyed or dysfunctional dirty thus you may have difficulty using your card. In most places, vagrants like street children and those who sleep on streets misuse and destroy these booths and racks.

4. dirt and dust may have settled on the phone units and parts presenting it to not hygienic at all.

5. the denominations of these cards may not be that expensive but the perception of the people of it being expensive is another reason why it did not really hit it big before.

The use of prepaid cards made a second wave, as mentioned, during the inception of the cellular phones. Today, not only PLDT prepaid cards bounced back but the phenomenal wireless communication trend opened the door for several prepaid cards not only phone cards:

• mobile phone prepaid cards become more diverse and loaded with lots of freebies and promos.

• Internet cards were also launched, the same as the prepaid mobile plans, you can now avail of a prepaid internet connection offered by internet providers

• prepaid telephone line cards now emerged. It uses the concept of the cellphone load. Before, landlines have fixed rate but today, landlines can already come with a prepaid plan kit wherein you can load it using a prepaid card.

You can see that the prepaid phone card had really gone long way, from the time it first started to be just one variant until today that it comes in twists and modifications. And for sure, things can only get better in the next years to come.