Regifting that old cell phone is only a click away Posted On: Monday, Dec. 31 2007 12:19 AM By Jon Schroeder
Killeen Daily Herald

It's like an online store, but in reverse.

Instead of allowing customers to browse through items and buy them, cellforcash.com lets them browse through cell phone models to find a particular phone – and then sell it.

For $4 and up, Copperas Cove residents can get cash for old cell phones. Many of the low-end phones, enabled for 911 calling, are given to abuse victims. The Web site lists phones made by 25 manufacturers, including Nokia, Motorola and LG.

On average, the site pays $25 for a phone, but for a few select models, the buy-back price is more than $200, according to a recent release.

Generally, simpler phones with fewer features are bought by the company for less money than more complex models – on the site, old Nokia models sell for $4, while one Blackberry model with a full QWERTY keyboard sells for $139 and Apple's 8-gigabyte iPhone sells for $167.

Cellforcash, run by RMS Communications Group, Inc., donates the cheaper phones it buys to the 911 Cell Phone Bank, which has distributed about 50,000 cell phones to participating governmental and charitable organizations. Ultimately, the phones go to victims of abuse.

"If (the site) says it's more than $20, we give you the cash and resell the phone," said Linda Zimmerman, marketing and public relations manager of the site.

Calling unwanted cell phones "hazardous waste," she said some states already have laws which require cell phone retailers to accept phones back to dispose of properly; some states fine for throwing away cell phones as well.

Texas does neither, said Zimmerman, whose company runs out of a Florida office.

"Please recycle (your) phones rather than sticking them in a drawer or putting them in a landfill, where they can damage the environment," she said. When cellforcash receives phones which won't meet their requirements, it gives them to the 911 Cell Phone Bank, which "scrap recycles" the phones.

The 911 Cell Phone Bank, a 501(c)(3)-pending organization run by The RMS Foundation, accepts phones from cellforcash.com and runs its own collection Web site, at 911cellphonebank.org.

Coryell County doesn't use any of the above programs, but it has something similar in place to help local abuse victims, said Trinity Huntsman, administrative assistant at the Coryell County Crime Victims' Office.

Abuse victims "need some way to contact the police department," she said. In getting these cell phones, "basically they have a more secretive way to contact someone to help them."

Locally, Families in Crisis, a United Way Agency, distributes the phones to Coryell, Bell and Hamilton counties in need.

"It's nice to have that comfort," she said.

Suzanne Amour, community relations manager for Families in Crisis, Inc., said the program gets "quite a few" phones donated and redistributed in the area.

It's important, she said, because "it provides someone who is being threatened with further violence or potential violence or perhaps being stalked with piece of mind."

To donate a working cell phone, call (254) 634-1184 or drop one off at the Families in Crisis business office in Killeen.

Contact Jon Schroeder at jons@kdhnews.com or call (254) 547-0428