The short answer is that you can have a free government cell phone for the rest of your life as long as you meet the requirements.
Here are the details:
As soon as you enroll, your free cell phone from the government it will be sent to your home address. You’ll probably receive it within a week or so after you are approved. At the same time you will receive your first monthly allotment of minutes. You will continue receiving this monthly allotment for a full year.
As you get near the end of that one year period, most service providers like Safelink Wireless, Assurance Wireless and ReachOut Wireless will send you an email alerting you to the fact that you need to re-qualify and tell you how to do it. Don’t worry. It’s simple.
Federal and/or State regulations require that you re-certify that you are eligible for the Lifeline Assistance program within 60 days of your annual enrollment. So mark it on your calendar.
And as long as you continue to qualify, you can continue to use your free government cell phone and continue to receive your monthly allotment of minutes.