Customers of a phone company can choose between two service plans for long distance calls. The first plan has an $18 one-time activation fee and charges 10 cents a minute. The second plan has no activation fee and charges 15 cents a minute. After how many minutes of long distance calls will the costs of the two plans be equal?

Question

Customers of a phone company can choose between two service plans for long distance calls. The first plan has an $18 one-time activation fee and charges 10 cents a minute. The second plan has no activation fee and charges 15 cents a minute. After how many minutes of long distance calls will the costs of the two plans be equal?

Answer 1

Try to make two equations, one for each phone company.

First plan:

y = .10x + 18

Second plan:

y = .15x

Try plugging in numbers until the two equations have the same y. If you need anymore explanations, just respond back.

Hope I helped!

Answer 2

To determine the number of minutes after which the costs of the two plans are equal, we can set up an equation.

Let's call the number of minutes x.

For the first plan with an $18 activation fee, the cost can be expressed as:
Cost1 = 0.10x + 18

For the second plan with no activation fee, the cost can be expressed as:
Cost2 = 0.15x

To find the number of minutes after which the costs are equal, we can set up the equation:

0.10x + 18 = 0.15x

Now, let's solve the equation:

0.10x - 0.15x = 18

-0.05x = 18

Dividing both sides of the equation by -0.05 gives:

x = 18 / -0.05

x = -360

However, since we can't have a negative number of minutes, we can conclude that the costs of the two plans will never be equal. The cost for the second plan will always be greater since it charges 15 cents per minute compared to the first plan's 10 cents per minute.