Scott Bush

We recently paid ATT Wireless/Cingular/ATT Wireless again way more than they deserve because we ran over our “Family Talk” minutes. Ouch. Our fault for not keeping up on it. That’s why I’m posting a couple of useful tools for my “in-network” brethren (and sistren… is that a word?).

Check your minutes
Dial

*646#

and hit send. You’ll get a message a moment later displaying your remaining minutes in the billing cycle. This may not include recent calls, so if you’re getting low be conservative with this number.

Find out who you can dial for free

I discovered a cool tool on ATT Wireless’s site that allows you to enter a phone number and see if it’s “in-network.” If so, you can dial it for free if your plan has free mobile-to-mobile calls (and I think most if not all do). Log into ATT Wireless and enter numbers into their “in-network” tool. If the number is found, I recommend you put that number into a group (if your phone supports it) with a different ringtone. That way you’ll know if you can talk with impunity.