Kajeet: A Cell Phone Service for 'Tweens

Does your 'tween need a phone? Maybe the answer is yes, more likely no. But you know she wants one, and so does kajeet, a start-up from Bethesda, Md., which has designed a phone service directed at 'tweens and their parents.

Kajeet is unveiling a pay-as-you-go phone service, featuring three handsets from LG, Sanyo, and Nokia, with a twist designed to court parents' favor: No activation or termination fees, no hidden charges and no roaming or long-distance costs, either. After you buy the phone, you pay a base of 35 cents a day, as well as 10 cents a minute for talk, 5 cents per text message (in and out) and 25 cents for each picture sent or received.

Any parent knows those small numbers can get big fast, even with a 'tween, especially one enamored with the newfound gift of talking and texting. So kajeet has some built-in tools to help parents and kids set budgets and boundaries when learning how to use a cell phone.

Parents can establish a set amount of money every month—think of it as a phone allowance—that kids can decide how to use however they choose, either calls, text messages, sending photos, or downloading games, ring tones, and wallpaper. If they spend too much on one or the other, the thinking goes, they'll learn how to budget their communication money and time. (By the way, a child will always be able to dial their parents' and 911, even if the funds run out.)

Parents and kids can also decide together when the phone should be off, then schedule it to really be off during those times. Kids and parents call also decide who can call or text to a child's phone by adding and blocking certain phone numbers.

Kajeet's phones and service will be available through Best Buy and Limited Too stores beginning May 1, and on the kajeet web site. Sprint provides the nationwide wireless coverage.

Kajeet's approach is similar to Disney Mobile's, but as kajeet founder and CEO Daniel Neal notes, kajeet offers more than one brand of entertainment options, including Nickelodeon, Cellmania, and Gameloft, on its phones. "Kids want to be able to turn the channel," he said. 

In case you weren't sure that these phones were designed to be toys for 'tweens as much as communication tools, the Sanyo Katana that arrived for review just before I spoke with Neal came with a sheet of stickers. It also comes preloaded with some games, kajeet ringtones, wallpapers, and screensavers. My 'tweens will be oh so happy to learn when they walk in the door from school that we'll be testing it out. Look for my (our) review on kajeet's service soon.