I've always bought the cheapest PAYG phone I could find and used it as little as possible. I top up £20 at a time and it typically lasts 3 months or more. I've sent about 50 texts in my life.
I've been thinking for a while about getting one of these so many free minutes and free texts monthly deals.
I've also been thinking about getting a camera phone.

My current phone went through the washing machine last weekend and died 🙄 so I'm thinking now is the time to make the change.

There's a bewildering array of deals out there and, well, I'm bewildered.
What I want is…
O2/Tesco seems to have the best reception where I live.
The camera is only for web pictures, not high resolution prints. 2Mb should be adequate.
I don't want to get tied in to a long term deal. Buying a phone then getting a rolling monthly contract sounds like the best idea to me.
There's a good chance the new phone will get dropped/lost/run over/mauled by foxes, so cheap is better than technologically advanced.
I send so few texts because I haven't got the patience to press those stupid little buttons up to four times to write one letter. A proper on screen or slide out key pad would be nice.

What phone for an accident prone, miserly Luddite ?

Avoid Vodafone. Their aftersales customer service is some of the worst I have ever had the misfortune to experience.

Fox proofing technology has moved on since you last bought a phone.

You can get robust but fairly basic phones like the Samsung Solid – that would be my recommendation.

I find Orange good but I live in the SW where they are based.

O2 Simplicity, rolling month contracts or 12 month, are quite good.

As for phone, any mid-range Nokia or Sony Erricson should be fine. Personally I would avoid Samsung as I find their operating systems unnecessarily labyrinthine.

Nokia 5800 might be an option. Touchscreen gives you a basic keyboard or handwriting recognition. GPS is really good for outdoorsy stuff. Camera is OK, easy to upload to flikr straight from phone. Its not mega robust but mines been dropped a few times and is still going. Cheap, too.

nokia x6 5mp camera on O2 £15 per month, £1 max for surfing???

Avoid Vodafone. Their aftersales customer service is some of the worst I have ever had the misfortune to experience.

That's not my experience. I've been with Vodafone for many years now and I've needed to contact them with a bill query a couple of occasions and they've refunded money / sorted things out without a fuss. They've always cut me really good deals as well at renewal time to the extent that I have virtually unlimited calls and texts for £20 a month.

Everyone's experiences are different I guess, but my wife has had crap after sales service from Orange. Depends you get put through to I guess.

If you want to stay with payg can highly recommend an o2 sim with a htc smart. You can get this on a 10 quid a month contract but it's cheaper to buy the phone and use payg.

I paid 75 quid for the phone then pay 10 quid a month which includes 300 texts, unlimited internet and 11 quid call credit.

If you don't want to tie yourself into a contract and want to buy the phone you're better off sticking with a payg. There's plenty of ones where you get freebies too if you top up a certain amount per month but you're not obliged too. I used to get unlimited texts but just swapped to 300 texts and unlimited internet for topping up 10 quid a month but there are other deals too.

I've also got an htc smart, it's a perfect comprise phone for me. Not too expensive, good battery life, big screen for internet.

(sent from my htc)

John1973. No problems with deals etc.

Just wait till your phone breaks, you will experience a whole world of incompetent, t*athanded f**kwittery.

Just wait till your phone breaks

It has in the past (maybe about 8 months after I bought it). I took it in to the Vodafone shop and they sorted it for me within a few days. Did even ask for proof of purchase or anything, just took my phone number and checked it was in warrenty. Got text message updates (I put the sim in my old phone) at each stage of the repair. I really can't fault them tbh. Sorry to hear your experiance is different – I can only speak for myself of course.

I've been looking on the Tesco and O2 sites and I'm still confused.
Nokia X6 with satnav and 5Mp camera with 100 minutes for £20 a month for 18 months from O2 looks OK.
I know this is probably a dull question, but if there's no keypad and it's a touch screen, does that mean the keypad is on the screen like a PDA ? It doesn't slide out from behind or something like that ?

There's an O2 shop in town. I'll call in and see if they can give me a demo.
There's at least three phone shops in town all together. They've always got special offer signs in the window. Are they worth looking at or will I always get a better deal on the web ?

Avoid Vodafone. Their aftersales customer service is some of the worst I have ever had the misfortune to experience.

Strange – they're by far the best I've ever used. Have remained with them since 2004 and wouldn't change (unless for an exceptional deal).

if you've another half, better to get a phone on the same network as them – usually have free calls between the same network, or at least 3 do