Friends: We purchased StraightTalk service online.
The phones were shipped to us with SIM cards installed. Our port request failed because US Cellular - our current provider - issued a separate ID number to our accounts with a billing upgrade. I updated the information after speaking to US Cellular and port request was successful. Was assured by StraightTalk that our phones would work.
Woke up, both phones didn’t work (US Cellular and StraightTalk.) After 3.5 hours of phone time, find out that SIM cards we were issued were for a GSM network not covered in Omaha, that they need to ship new SIM cards, 3-5 days. Called and explained that this time without service represents a risk to our family and demanded overnight shipping or near to it. Escalated twice. Was informed process was automatic. Asked what they recommended we do about the risk this situation presented.
They could not give me any recommendations because it wasn’t part of their procedure.
Explained my voice, although just one man, would be used to voice to all friends and family possible about this experience, and that if there was a manager available that could speak to me and try to work something out, it wouldn’t have to be that way.
The manager I spoke with said, “There’s nothing I can do. Have a nice day.”
Obviously, this product is about price, not customer experience. Mine may have been a one-off. Make your own decision, but I do not recommend StraightTalk.
I believe the old customer service formula says a happy customer will one average tell 7 other people; an unhappy customer tell everybody. There is a brand of fishing rods with very good reputations I will never buy because the final answer I got from the president of the company was “the warranty was for the lifetime of the rod.” I don’t know of my of my friends who fish those rods either.
I have a “Trac Phone”! You can call me and I can call you! That’s all I need (although my friends tell me I need more!!). Very little advertisement for Trac Phone, no hype or wild a… promises. I like it! Owned by one of the richest men in the world, go figure!!!
I have an LG Trac Phone. I think I got it on sale at Wal-Mart for $9. Anyway I have a landline phone as well. So I do not use the cell phone much. Thus do not need a lot of minutes.
The service days and the minutes left carry over. The “other” LG phone I had was not in under Trac Phone svc plan. I think it was in a “Straight Talk” svc provider plan. Thus no 1 year card available. (point being if you do this bit be sure and be under the Trac Phone svc and not the “other” one)
It had minutes and svc days that carried over as well. But I paid $30 + $4 taxes for a total of $34 to add svc days every two months. That plan the $30 buys you 300 minutes and 60 service days. So effectively I was paying $17 per month to have a cell phone. At the end of the year I had 2,450 minutes left.
As I said, I do not need tons of minutes. So, I bought this LG Trac Phone at Wal-Mart. I believe they also have the $30 for 60 days renewals as well. But, I opted for a ONE YEAR service days plan. Memory says to me approx. $100. I did this in the past August. I now have 950 minutes left. uh…I think you don’t normally get a thousand minutes but doing it right gets a bunch of minutes bonus and ended up with 1000 minutes. I now have 950 minutes left and 375 svc days. I dunno why more than a year. I was able to keep the same cell phone telephone number but lost the 2,450 minutes built up over a year. Anywhoooo…my cell is costing me roughly $8+ a month…but paid a ONE TIME cost of $100 for the svc and minutes. I will have this to use in my 3,000 mile drive to AZ this week. Will be there for the winter. It will still be in svc 6 months from now when I drive back to Maine for the summer. So now I have a cell phone to use for a year and no renewing to do every 60 days. I have it for to use for the next 375 days. And if I run short on minutes I can always add $30 bucks to it…or do another year. Pretty flexible.
I believe Verizon has a home phone now that works off their cell tower network. I think it was $50 for the phone itself. Then it is $20 a month from there on…for unlimited long distance in the US. Now that phone should work where ever you go. So IF I had that phone and an inverter in my van I think I could use it to make calls while traveling across country. It is a 2 year contract plan.
Ditto the Tracfone. Can’t beat it for less than $7 a month and no contract. I’ve been thinking of upgrading to one of the Tracfones that you can surf the web with. Have any of you had any experiences with these? They apparently have Wi-Fi and 3G both available on them.
Bob,
That’s what mine is as it is an old phone. However, there are several newer Tracfones out that include cameras and web access. I was just curious if anyone has had any experiences with these newer ones especially as to accessing the internet with them.
we got a Trac phone for my parents about 5 years ago. they only needed it when they went out of the house. now that they are in asst. living they have no need for it so we went to cancel it. I didn’t realize that they still had money on their account and actually the people at TracFone told me not to cancel it and said "why don’t you just use it up. sent me a new phone and all. I use it when I go out to the river etc since I’m hard on phones.
a few months ago I forgot my regular phone and was on my way to Chicago for a week. Stopped by Best Buy and picked up another Tracfone that was like a BlackBerry. TraccFone swapped out the service and I was go to go in 10 min. For a cell phone company probably the best service I’ve ever had.
Dave i really haven’t had time to play with accessing the internet with the new phone but it looked fairly easy.
I have been using a TracPhone for many years and I have had no problems with them. I did upgrade last year but only because I found a TracPhone that would double all the minutes I put into it. Meaning that I could purchase a 120 minute card and once loaded into the phone it gave me 240 minutes. This phone also has a camera that I never use since I have an Optio 30 for my fishing. This double minute phone cost $19.95 and works great.
Warren just brought up a good point. When selecting a TracPhone look at the extras. I paid around 30 bucks for mine but get triple minutes for life (triple days too).
By way of update on the Straight Talk issues we were having, we were surprised to see not only our phones refunded, but our minutes that we purchased as well. Thanks, Straight Talk, for resolving that after all.
Duckster, Istopped by the “Wireless Kiosk” at Wallyworld last night. The map of their coverage is pretty complete, if I understand what they do correctly, they buy large blocks of time from the big cell carriers and resale them below the big guy’s retail price but at a profit to Walmart. Verizon and ATT have to support the infrastructure but Walmart only has admin and purchase price to add a profit to.
My experience to hopefully benefit others needing to know things. I had a bad experience with Trac Phone a long time ago. Got a phone they said would work in my area code. Did not. Sent it back. They refused to send me a new one unless I proved via a receipt that I sent it. Wonder what they done did with it when they DID receive it? Instructions were that the phone I got would NOT do my area code, to send it in and they send me another. I had purchased a $75 calling card to work with it. Never ever received anything from them. Gave the card away. Had straight talk for several years and content. Minutes carry over and service days carry over. I do not use my cell much because I have a home landline. Had 2,450 minutes built up. Had to renew service every 60 days and everything carried over. If I had 3 svc days left and renewed for 300 minutes at $34 I would receive 300 more minutes and 60 svc days for 63 days till next renewal. Content. Approx $17 a month for cell phone capability. BUT…straight talk does not have a 1 year plan or card. Dropped straight talk and bought a new minimal cell phone from
Wal-Mart which is a TRAC PHONE service and they DO have a one year plan. I bought the one year plan for minutes to my new phone and got around a thousand minutes. Cost for phone on sale was $9. Cost of the one year service plan was approx. $100. So now I am paying approx. $8 a month for cell phone service. Oh, it works off all companies cell systems I think. Bottom line answer is boaf phones had carry over minutes and carry over service days. You just must not let either expire. You need to renew before the minutes are all used up…OR…and what is usually the case in my situation, renew before the service days run out. But what ever you have on your phone in svc days and or minutes left…when you renew, the old minutes and svc days are added to what you purchase.
I think the confusion with Trac Fone and Straight Talk comes in because Straight Talk includes a home phone system of VOIP phones as well as cellular service and phones.
