Cricket Wireless Military: 36-Month Number Hold on Deployment

Cricket Wireless has no military discount, and it does not need one to be worth a look. It publishes a written deployment program: a number hold of up to 36 months with service off and AutoPay stopped. The page that describes it opens by naming active-duty members, Reserves, and the National Guard. What Cricket does not publish is any give on its prepaid 12-month plan, and that is where federal law does the work. Every Cricket fact below was read on cricketwireless.com on October 9, 2026.

What Cricket publishes, against § 3956

Cricket’s published terms, checked October 9, 2026:

The deployment plan is close to the statute’s own number rule. Section 3956(c) covers relocations of three years or less and gives you 90 days after the relocation ends to re-subscribe with the same number. Cricket’s plan holds 36 months and gives 90 days after “the final day of your deployment.” Cricket’s version is easier to use, since it takes a phone call rather than a letter, and its page sets no minimum length of deployment. The statute’s version covers anyone with qualifying orders, not just a deployment. The phone and internet cancellation guide explains the federal side in full.

The deployment plan, worked out

Take one line on Smart Unlimited, $45 a month with Auto Pay on Cricket’s plans page, taxes included, and a 12-month deployment.

• Keep paying: 12 × $45 = $540 for a line you cannot use.
• Let it lapse: Cricket’s terms put an unpaid account in suspend mode for 60 days, then cancel it and re-assign the number. Paying within 60 days of your last pay date restores it with a $5 reactivation fee on a single-line account. Past day 60, the number is gone.
• Military Deployment Plan: Cricket names no charge for it and takes you off AutoPay “to avoid paying an unnecessary bill.” Cost: $0 a month, and the number waits for you.

The plan costs you two things. Voice, data, and voicemail are off, so nobody can reach the number while you are gone. And Cricket says you “will lose any existing voicemails you have saved,” so save the ones that matter before you call. When you come home, Cricket says it sends a text reminder and you call customer support to turn service back on, within 90 days of the final day of your deployment.

The 12-month plan on orders

Cricket’s 12-Month Unlimited plan costs $300 up front, sold online only, for a new single-line account that brings its own phone. The offer terms printed on Cricket’s home and payment-plan pages say the payment “is not refundable in whole or in part” and that the plan “cannot be changed or canceled until the last 30 days” of the period. The plan’s Broadband Facts label shows a Monthly Price of $25.

Federal law reads differently. Section 3956(a)(1) lets a servicemember terminate “at any time after” receiving qualifying orders. Section 3956(f) then requires the provider to refund, within 60 days, any amount paid “for a period extending until after” the termination, except “the remainder of the monthly or similar billing period in which the termination occurs.”

Example: orders arrive and you terminate during the fourth month. Cricket keeps months one through four, $100. Months five through twelve were prepaid for time after the termination: 8 × $25 = $200. That figure is an illustration of the claim you can make, not an amount Cricket has agreed to pay. It assumes the “billing period” in § 3956(f) is one month, using Cricket’s own $25 monthly label. The statute does not define the term, and Cricket may argue that a year paid once is a single billing period; on that reading the whole year is the period you terminated in, and nothing comes back. Put the request in writing with your orders. The plan must also predate the orders; § 3956(b)(2) covers only contracts entered before you received them.

Phones: unlocks and payment plans

Cricket tightened its unlock rule this year. Phones bought on or after July 1, 2026 need 365 days of paid service before Cricket unlocks them; phones bought earlier need six months. Its Device Unlock Policy makes one exception: Cricket will unlock one device for active and deployed military who cannot meet the 365 days, with acceptable deployment verification. An unlocked phone can take a local SIM at an overseas duty station.

Cricket’s payment plans run through two outside companies: Bread Pay loans, made by Comenity Capital Bank at 9.99% to 34.99% APR, or lease-to-own through Progressive Leasing. Those are separate contracts, and ending Cricket service does not, by itself, end them. If you took a Bread Pay loan before you entered active duty, the 6% cap in 50 U.S.C. § 3937 on debts incurred before service may apply; the Comenity and Bread Financial page covers how to ask.

How to use it at Cricket

Hold or end Cricket service on orders

1. Save any voicemails you want to keep. The deployment plan deletes them.
2. Call Cricket at 1-800-274-2538 or dial 611, ask for the Military Deployment Plan, and give your last name and date of birth. Confirm AutoPay is off afterward.
3. Ask for the military unlock on the same call, or email militaryunlock@cricketwireless.com with your name, date of birth, number, deployment papers, and an email for instructions.
4. On a 12-Month plan you want ended instead, send written notice with your orders and the termination date and ask for the unused months back under § 3956(f). The letter generator drafts it.
5. Keep paying any Bread Pay or Progressive Leasing balance on its own schedule.
6. Put the end of your deployment plus 90 days in the deadline checker. That is your window to come back with the number.

Cricket runs on AT&T’s network, per its plan pages. AT&T’s own postpaid rules for military customers are on the AT&T page. For who qualifies under the statute, see the eligibility rules and the Guard and Reserve guide; the deployment checklist covers the rest of the paperwork. The statute’s full text is on the § 3956 page.

The law behind this: 50 U.S.C. § 3956

Termination of certain consumer contracts: mobile, landline, internet, TV, gym, and home security: read the statute , or read § 3956 in plain English, with its enforcement record .