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TracFone - Activation Problems

TracFone • Missing minutes • Activation problems • Can't get local number • Defective phone • Network problems • Lost the phone • Advertising, promotions • Rebate problems • Inside Trac --- News • TracFone Pays $50,000 for Violating Missouri's Do Not Call Law

Darwin of Fort Worth, TX November 3, 2009

First of all, I tried to transfer service and phone number from an existing TracFone to a newly purchased TracFone and the activation was not completed. TracFone issued me a Case ID number that stated "We will contact you shortly after your case is resolved to complete Activation of your TracFone." 24 hours later, still no response from TracFone in any form or fashion.

So I initiated contacting TracFone customer service only to be read common canned response phrases and to be disconnected when requesting to speak to a manager or supervisor. I made several attempts to contact them by phone and through their website/email system. Again, it's the same canned message and they request for me to call their Portability Representatives. So I did and after almost two hours, nothing!

The Portability Representative placed me on speakerphone or laid his headset down. I listened to the department converse, mostly in Spanish for over an hour with no response to my voice calls. Then guess what, disconnected again and they did not call me back. During this call I was typing an email to Elston and providing him the details as well. Every correspondence with TracFone customer service is also being forwarded to Elston email address as well. Three days have passed and no response from TracFone or Elston!

Time is very valuable to me and I have spent countless hours trying to rectify this situation with no help on TracFone's behalf. Plus, the inconvenience of having no phone service, since they deactivated my original TracFone as well. Also, while I personally speak several languages, Spanish is not one of them, so I found it very insulting that every TracFone representative that I spoke to was not fluent in English.

Here's an important part of this whole process, TracFone does not provide 24 hour technical or customer support and TracFone claims to be the number one prepaid cell phone provider in the U.S.. Nor does TracFone mention on the TracFone website that TracFone does not provide around the clock customer support and what about the TracFone motto "No Surprises." Since TracFone's website states the customer is in control and there are "No Surprises," it seems there may be a fallacy of legality or customer deception on TracFone's part.

Also, I added the following information to my email correspondence to Elston and TracFone customer support. Since no company likes bad publicity here's some information that can help in the quest of protecting consumer rights: Contact the President and Vice President of Tracfone and place a Consumer Complaint. Contact news media in Florida, Your State, and national firms such as FoxNews, CNN, MSNBC and place a Consumer Complaint. Report (Consumer Complaint) to the FCC. Report (Consumer Complaint) to the FTC. Report (Consumer Complaint) to the U.S. Government (especially if employed by them)

Report (Consumer Complaint) to the Attorney General's Office of Florida. Report (Consumer Complaint) to the Attorney General's Office of (your state). Report (Consumer Complaint) to the Better Business Bureau of Florida. Report (Consumer Complaint) to the Better Business Bureau of (your state). Report (Consumer Complaint) to WalMart, CVS, Family Dollar, Walgreens, and Radio Shack

Nancy of Sacramento, CA October 30, 2009

I have spent hours and hours with customer service trying to get my new phone activated and the minutes transferred from my old phone. Their customer service is laughable. Instead of listening to your problem and helping you deal with it, they give you canned answers that waste tons of time and don't solve the problem. The phone connections are bad, their english is inadequate, and when a suggestion doesn't work they simply repeat it over and over with no opportunity to speak to a supervisor.

William of Stevens Point, WI October 30, 2009

Was put on customer service for 3 hours. Trying to activate my phone after purchasing time on line. Which in turn told me that I had to call customer service to activate phone. I have been calling customer service for two days. My time is valuable... My phone is still not activated and have not been able to get any one on customer service.

Stephen of Downingtown, PA September 26, 2009

Tracfone is a bum deal. Do not fall for this pig in a poke. I am not happy at all!! I purchased a Tracfone for my wife about two weeks ago from their website. I have been on the phone with support three times since then. ** First I purchased airtime online. The website let me purchase the minutes but could not download to (or activate on my phone).

** Next my wife could not make an outbound call (received a call failed message) and I could not call her ( I received a message stating the subscriber did not want incoming calls). After some time on the phone and being transferred they told me to wait four hours. The service never worked (inbound or outbound)

**Finally a few days later I called back when I had time and after a few transfers. I asked for a refund. They told me they would refund the phone (as I was within 30 days of purchase)but not the minutes, even though I can never use these minutes due to their crappy service not working. They suggested I dispute the charge with my bank. They also informed me that to get the refund I will have to pay for the shipping return of the phone and equipment.

Cheryl of Lake Elsinore, CA August 29, 2009

i recieved a tracfone for christmas in 2008. I acctivated it in jan 2009. I lost the phone in Louisiana April 2009. I reported the phone lost and had my account on the phone turned off.The phone was a double minute plan. I asked costomer service if the double minute plan would be transferred to my new tracfone,i was told it would be. Tracfone did not honor what they said they would do. I will never buy another tracfone again. the company is a rip off

George of Weatherly, PA August 18, 2009

Purchased a LG255 Tracfone from Kmart back on July 28th. Called to activate that day after failing to activate online. After 90 minutes I was told to wait 24 hours and it would activate. 24 hours later, I called back and get the same treatment,pulling Sim card, doing master reset and turning on and off many times. Still no luck and another 90 plus minutes wasted. Again told to call back in 24 hours and they would send new Sim card. Called back in 10 minutes and insisted they send new Sim. Another 60 minutes and they finally agree 2 days later, new Sim card arrives, call customer service, and after 60 plus minutes, get phone activated. Phone number is area code 610, not the 570 code we reside in or where store is located. Another 60 minutes and they say sorry and hang up. Called back, finally get a man that seems to know what he is doing and immediately tells me I need yet another Sim card, as area code cannot be changed without new card. Get card yesterday, called customer service last evening and finally get area code 570. One problem though. Cannot get incoming calls on this phone number. Don't know if I'm going to continue with this nonsense. They need to be shutdown. How long must consumers put up with such poor service?

Janet of Cinnaminson, NJ August 18, 2009

I wanted to either add time and reactivate a phone or switch the remaining units to another phone. The phone has been inactive for over sixty days. In the past I have had no problem with this; however, this time they have cancelled my units. I currently have four other active phones, one of which is for my parents to use in case of emergency. I have used tracfones for many years. My beef is if they have my address and landline phone number to send advertisements; why can't they leave me their policy changes.

Donald of Kansas City, MO August 17, 2009

I tried to use my TracFone on Friday August 14, 2009 but the screen showed that I had an Unregistered Sim. I called TracFone on Saturday August 15 to get this issue resolved. After an hour on the phone not only did I not have this issue resolved, but the phone number I had transferred from Verizon in December 2007 has been removed and the original phone number was back.

I called back later Saturday evening to tell them that nothing had changed and they told me that they could not give me my phone number back because it was no longer available. They also told me that they had never transferred my Verizon number to this phone. At this time I decided to review the calls I had sent and received on the phone and then check the call logs of the phones that were involved. Guess what, they all showed my Verizon phone number that had been transferred to my TracFone in 2007. I even found a picture that I had sent to my email address that showed my Verizon number.

Just to be complete I called Verizon and verified that the phone number I had with them had been transferred to TracFone in 2007. This prompted me to send TracFone an email explaining my issues hoping for a resolution. All I received was that this was being forwarded to customer service for review.

I sent him an email asking for help along with a copy of the email I had sent TracFone customer care. Elston call me back within an hour and had everything resolved in just a few minutes. This man deserves a raise, a big raise. Maybe he should be teaching the customer care group how to resolve issues?

Debra of Wind gap, PA August 15, 2009

I am so frustrated with this company. We have had these phones for almost 3 yrs and decided to upgrade to new ones. My son just bought a Samsung T301G tracfone. We cannot use the web browser it keeps telling him he isnt authorized to use it. I have spent countless hours on the phone only to be told I need to wait another 24 to 48 hrs and that they are going to expidite my problem and someone should be calling me shortly.

Well no one calls and My son still cant use the web browser. Then for the heck of it I checked my hubby's new tracfone he got 3 weeks ago and guess what he cant access the browser either but my phone is about 2 years old and I can. I researched this problem online and it seems none of the newer phones allows you acess to the web browser. what a rip off. We switched to [competitor] and what a difference. In five min we had a fully functional phone when we walked out of the store. didnt have to go online and jump thru hoops just to get the darn phone to work. I will never buy another tracfone again. we are out 80 bucks.

Peggy of New York,, NY August 14, 2009

My tracfone was stolen. Immediately I called Tracfone to freeze my account and I told them it was my intention to acquire a new phone to transfer my number and remaining air time and minutes to. When the new phone arrived, after hours on the phone with them and getting nowhere, they said I needed a different SIM card to get my number back, at first they weren't sure if it was available, and there were many other issues for them to sort out, most of which seemed to be out of their range of control and competency to deal with. But they they kept asking me to repeat all the various old and new identifying serial numbers for the phone and the SIM card, etc. It seemed that asking for the numbers over and over again was to create the illusion they were doing something.

When the new SIM card arrived a week later, the exact same charade was repeated over a couple of days and many hours until they determined that the replacement SIM had been invalidated because it was activated to the number attached to the phone though I had clearly requested to retain my original number. A week later they sent another SIM card and even tracking the delivery of the SIM card was a terrible ordeal.

When the new SIM card arrived, I asked to speak to a supervisor as I had begun to do for some time, and went through the same motions with specific instructions that if the phone couldn't be activated with the number I requested do not activate it since I did not want to nullify the SIM card. After over an hour on the phone, the person finally admitted in answer to a direct question that she was just repeating the same thing over and over again without hope of getting anywhere.

I asked to speak to another department or someone with other expertise and she switched me to the floor manager. This person ignored my request not to activate the new SIM card on the phone unless it was to the number I requested. He said my number was no longer available since it was deactivated for so long --I pointed out that it was not attached to another account and was therefore still available but the answer was not in the script he was reading from.

I asked how after reminding them in every one of the frequent conversations that I had with Tracfone representatives, that the most important thing to me was to preserve my number for my use --I could still lose the number. He had no direct answer just that it happened because of the length of time it had been deactivated but did not know what the length of time was.

I spent more than twenty hours on this and got nowhere. Absolutely nowhere. I don't have my phone number and I have not been offered anything remotely adequate to deal with the aggravation and time this cost me. Everyone kept saying things like "I understand" and I told them, I don't think you understand and if you do then you don't care, so stop telling me you understand.

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