Time for a Quickie....

I have HORRIBLE credit but was able to get one with great ease through my phone company (Qwest). No credit check, no deposit, good plan, billed on my regular phone bill. The phones weren't free ($50 each) but they were cheap enough to make it worthwhile, and the price of the plan was competitive with other wireless offers. Our plan includes UNLIMITED MINUTES between all three phones (the 2 mobile and our home phone). It is exactly what we wanted/needed.

In short, check with your phone company. HTH

 

Sprint will put a limit on the maximum that you can have on the bill (mine was $125) if your credit is not great. They'll send you a text message if you hit 80% of your limit letting you know that you are getting close.

I switched to AT&T and they pulled credit, but didn't require a deposit. I guess it depends on your score and your definition of bad.

 

FICO was around 620 at the time, and a bunch of derogs with late pays 180+ days for Sprint. All three CRA scores were hovering around the high 500's with AT&T.

 

I don't know if Verizon pulls a CR or not, but I got a phone with them about 5 or 6 years ago when my credit wasn't great, and I didn't pay a deposit. Sorry, I didn't know about all this back then, so I don't know what my score was and I don't remember what my report was like, but I'm sure I had a bunch of lates.

Verizon is my local phone company, so my home phone was with them. I don't know if that mattered or not, but I'm sure I had some late phone bills back then as well.

I really like their service, and coverage area seems to be good. I live in Maryland, have used the phone in southern California, in North Carolina, and in Las Vegas with no problems.