Net10 rated "best bang for the buck" prepaid provider

For once, we’ll let the press release take the opening paragraph:

Based on its recent analysis of the U.S. prepaid wireless market, Frost & Sullivan recognizes NET10 with the 2007 U.S. Frost & Sullivan Award for “Best Bang for the Buck” Pay-by-the-Minute Prepaid Wireless Plan. Net10 earns this distinction for providing superior consumer value in terms of three critical aspects of any wireless solution – affordability, simplicity, and subscriber certainty for voice calling.
Frost & Sullivan is a market research and consulting firm that’s been around since 1961. We’re not sure how weighty their awards actually are, but it’s neat that they’ve handed one of them to Net10, one of our favorite prepaid providers. The competition for this award: Alltel, AT&T, Boost, Tracfone (parent company of Net10), T-Mobile, Verizon, and Virgin. That’s quite the crowd to beat. Apparently, though, this was purely based on Net10’s per-minute rate of 10 cents being good all day, every day. Or at least that’s how it’s portrayed in the press release. We definitely think that there are better considerations for that. Then again, this is a “bang for your buck” award, not an overall service award. This got us to think: what’s the real meaning of this award? They didn’t really do much other than browse each companies’ websites and determine who had the best per-minute rate. Heck, we do that every week. But you don’t see us handing out awards and issuing press releases about it. Still, though, it’s nice to know where you’re going to get the most for your money. [Earthtimes.org]]]>

Posted in

49 Comments

  1. charley8 on July 16, 2007 at 8:58 am

    The Frost & Sullivan analysis and award to Net 10 are TOTALLY RIDICULOUS. Anyone past the age of 12 knows that “cheap” as a sole criterion for evaluating anything is meaningless. Are these people stupid or is it just that they’re being paid off.



  2. KendallAA on July 17, 2007 at 11:28 am

    Cheap is not the only thing that is good about NET10. Their customer service is outstanding. Face it your going to have dropped calls with cellular service that is just a fact. I tried to order 2 reconditioned phones from NET10’s web store and it would not accept my credit card. Well I called NET10 and after a few minutes of working through the issue NET10 sent me 2 brand new phone for free because of all the trouble I’d been through. I call that customer service!! I recommend NET10 to anyone who is looking a prepaid cellular service.



  3. Ron on October 1, 2007 at 7:35 pm

    Have a Net 10 for 2 years. Loved it. Bought anther today for a family member. On the package there was to be 300 minutes with the phone upon activation, only got 10 minutes. Called customer service, they changes the policy, gotta buy three cards and get your 300 freebee’s 100 at a time per new card. Didn’t care what the package said, even spoke with Rawle Employee # 51108 Customer service supervisor. Wouldn’t honor the advertising. Gonna take it back to Office Depot.



  4. kr on October 2, 2007 at 8:23 pm

    I’ve found Net10’s customer service to be horrible. I haven’t been able to set up my voice mail at all, and now I cannot call out, I get only a high/low tone. And if I call tech support I get a guy in India or somewhere who cannot understand what I’m trying to tell him, and if I try emailing tech support, they tell me to call in. Thank goodness I can get rid of it.



  5. Brenda W. on October 5, 2007 at 10:06 am

    I have had to contact net 10 each time I have had to add minutes purchased. My Net 10 phone will not automatically add purchased minutes when the pin is put in. Today, October 5,2007 I contacted Net 10 because I purchased normal 300 minute card at Walmart and I inputed the pin# from the card. My Net 10 phone informed me that I would receive my airtime minutes shortly. I never received my purchased minutes. I called Net 10 customer service today at 9:15 a.m.. I gave the customer service representative, Sandra, my receipt information. I informed her that I had discarded my Net 10 300 minute card because of the message I had received on the screen display. Sandra, informed me that I would not be receiving my minutes without the pin# which is on the discarded card. She gave me Net 10’s decision after being placed on hold 4 times in order to converse with a supervisor. I requested to speak with a supervisor because I have a receipt from Walmart with the Net 10 card number I purchased and this was debited from my account. She refused to give me the location of the office I was calling, the first initial of her last name, her supervisor’s name, nor her operator number. I realize this was an offshore representative however, there still needs to be an identification number or a record of the calls made regarding a particular cell number. Well, I am still on hold at it is now 11:00 a.m. I have been on hold for a supervisor since 10:00 when I was transferred by Sandra. This is lousy customer service at best. At worst this is poor and shady business practice when a customer has a receipt of purchase and they are refused the item that was purchased.



  6. CHARLIE on October 18, 2007 at 8:00 am

    I received an email telling me I would get 100 min.free for adding airtime to my phone.Guess what I DIDN’T.(No big surprise) so I called customer service and was told I did not receive that email.This was said by a supervisor.Its bad enough for them to lie but they would not even give me an email add. to foward it to.I am going to trash this phone and cut my loss if you got any brain you will to.



  7. CHARLIE on October 18, 2007 at 8:14 am

    NET10 HAS ANOTHER 100 EXTRA MINUTES WAITING FOR YOU TODAY!
    Add an airtime card soon and we’ll add an EXTRA 100 MINUTES! Just BUY AIRTIME online, at a retailer near you or by calling toll 1-877-TEN-CENT (1-877-836-2368). Then, ADD AIRTIME to your NET10 phone and we’ll automatically add 100 EXTRA MINUTES… it’s that simple.
    tHIS IS PART OF THE EMAIL i GOT THAT BYRON ID # 52254 THE SO CALL SUPERVISOR SAID I DID NOT RECEIVE



  8. Savannah on October 31, 2007 at 9:26 pm

    I bought mine and bought a 600 minute card and it told me i would get 100 bonus minutes and guess what? I never did it pisses me off when they lie to get you to buy something.And you can’t download ring tones at all



  9. Mikee on December 15, 2007 at 5:27 pm

    I always research consumer items before purchase. Net10 does appear to be to good to be true based and customer reviews. My search continues for a pay as you go. I guess it comes down to you get what you pay for!



  10. Les Young on December 29, 2007 at 2:02 pm

    Net 10 use to offer 15 dollar cards for 150 min. and I called to recharge the phone .My visa was charged 15 dollars and then a person came on the line to tell me they no longer have that plan .I would have to have the month to month plan to get this 15 dollar card now. I am not happy with that fact and the customer service said to they could not take my call.I called back and spoke to a sales person that was pleasnt. I was told my 15 dollars would be back in my account in 24 hrs .I have yet to see it and I didnt recieve the min.



  11. mrsmithster on December 31, 2007 at 1:08 pm

    works great, got it for xmas. hassle free activation and adding time. easy hook up took approx 5 min online. my sister got one also, same ease of hook up. we are both very happy with the sevice. no lost/dropped calls in so cal area. nice phone with camera. bad ring tones



  12. nancy on January 26, 2008 at 1:02 am

    I signed up for the Easy Minutes plan for $15.00. They charged my visa but never gave me the 150 minutes. I e-mailed them and told them I wanted my minutes. They said for me to call them and they would discuss it. When you call them, they continually put you on hold. After calling them, you will definitely need more minutes. They are a scam as far as I am concerned. I am still trying to get my money back. I will never purchase a Net10 phone again.



  13. John on February 15, 2008 at 2:48 pm

    After trying US Cellular, Verizon and Sprint, Net10 is hands down the best provider out there. All cell phones suck for where we live, so you might as well pay the least amount. If you look at Net10’s pricing, it boils down to about $15 per month. No contracts, no hidden fees, no playing around. All the other guys charge some sort of monthly fee to get 10 cents a minute. There cell phone works as good as any other cell phone, or better. Used these guys for 2 years now, and its fine.
    The only problem is customer service is always in some far-off third-world country, so you takes your chances getting someone to speak English, but I’ve had the same problem with the “Name Brand” carriers also. Just have patience and try to use the website as much as possible.
    Net10 is just reselling minutes from other carriers, so your reception is the same or better.
    Also, Net10 = Tracfone, just at half the price. Otherwise its the same company. Tracphone is marketed towards the upscale areas of the country, but just use Net10.



  14. nichole on February 23, 2008 at 8:51 pm

    i have had the worst time getting my phone number to be shown. they said it could take two days to show!!?? so then i called a friend and she had to tell me my phone number. pretty pathetic of a phone service if i add. im going with t mobile in the next month. this net10 sucks. plus i call the lady and she was getting mad cause i needed help. what kind of service is this? out of a home service?



  15. Will on February 24, 2008 at 4:48 pm

    I had my phone exactly 1 month when it was disconnected by the Fraud Prevention Department. I called customer service and was connected to a very RUDE representative of Fraud Prevention who accused me of using my phone in offshore waters to make international roaming calls. I told him my phone had not been outside of the Athens, GA area. I also told him I was 250 miles from the neareast coastline. He agreed to turn my phone back on but said if it ever happened again, my phone would be disconnected permanently. I would suggest that HE check with his OWN personnel to determine HOW my phone number was used offshore since the company is located in Miami and most of its customer service personnel are OFFSHORE.



  16. kjw on March 31, 2008 at 7:45 pm

    I have been a Tracphone user for 4 years and switched to Net10, with NO problems. The ten cents a minute is the BEST deal in wireless. I use the phone for business, don’t care about texting or web access, so it works for me. I travel throughout the US and find it funny that I have access just about everywhere and often have to “share” my phone with the Verizon and AT&T users, as they have no bars. My experience with customer service has been outstanding. The only comment is to make sure that you keep up on your minutes. The GREAT thing is that you can add minutes at any time and unlike MOST carriers, they NEVER expire.



  17. Joe on April 10, 2008 at 3:47 pm

    Net10 is the best deal out there. Period. Having been trapped in contracts for a few years, I decided to go prepaid and Net10 was my first (and only) choice. You simply can’t beat the price and service.



  18. ralfwalker on May 19, 2008 at 5:43 am

    You guys do not realize the amount of analysis that goes into each of these awards…To convince the jury is the hardest thing to do ….So dont discount the work of the analysts at Frost



  19. kolbpilot on July 21, 2008 at 5:14 pm

    I bought my net10 phone for 39.95 w/300 min. included. LG 400 phone. This was on 29 May. Activation went as advertised. Had to deal w/cust ser. to get the voice mail to work but other than a 30 min inconvenience (reimbursed) I had no problem dealing w/them. Smooth sailing ever since. I find I’m averaging 300 min. a month. The phone is a simple device but does what it’s supossed to. No complaints.



  20. Jean Denes on August 23, 2008 at 6:47 pm

    Which of the net10 phones is recommended for someone with a hearing impairment? thanks, j.



  21. Nina on September 2, 2008 at 9:59 am

    Worst customer service ever. I didn’t think such morons existed. I had to go through 3 different people just to talk to someone who wouldn’t repeat the same thing over and over again. No one that i talked to listened to anything i said, instead told me that i needed to buy more minutes. what a joke. I would never suggest net 10 to anyone, ever.



  22. justin on October 22, 2008 at 11:12 pm

    bought a net 10 lg it was supposed to come with 300 minutes free upon activation… i activated it and got no airtime. I am returning it. I also bought a 300 minute card and it wont even load the airtime on the phone. this is a joke!



  23. les young on November 16, 2008 at 1:36 pm

    I have posted a coment in 2007 about my not recieveing the min and was charged 15 dollars.I finially got that resolved.It took time but i am still a customer of net 10 .I have 3 actavated phones and feel you get what you pay for and thats cheap 10c a min calls and 5c a min text .I see other companies have a charge of a dollar a day or what have you and net 10 doesnt.I feel you get your moneys worth with net 10.If their is a problem they do usually fix it .I am recomending them as it stands today. Les Young and family



  24. dale on December 17, 2008 at 12:03 am

    i just recently purchased a net 10 lg600g.i am really pleased with the phone bluetooth works good web access works well.i have had a tracfone for approx. 2 years never had a problem getting mins or any problem resolved.i love net 10 because 10 cents a min. is the way to go for me.



  25. Dean on February 17, 2009 at 11:01 am

    I’ve been a Net 10 user for 3 years.
    18 months ago, my phone was stolen – right after I put 1000 minutes in at $100.
    I called Net 10. They told me to purchase a new phone, which I did, for $19 and it came with 300 free minutes.
    Net 10 refunded my 1000 minutes, restored my original phone number and disabled the stolen phone.
    Unless they turn evil and do stupid stuff, they’ll have my business for a long, long time.



  26. David on February 26, 2009 at 9:14 am

    If considering a regular cell company (Verizon, Cingular, Sprint, etc.), go only to a CORPORATE store. Don’t go to an independent merchant selling for a regular cell company. The CORPORATE store will cause you to be able to contact CORPORATE customer service within the U.S. The independent merchant will cause you to have to contact customer service contractors out of the U.S. The Sprint phone bought from an indenpendent merchant store had constant problems & therefore required having to deal with customer service in the Phillipines (yucko to the max). I almost gave up with Sprint until I unknowingly went to a CORPORATE store & worked out the existing problems. NO PROBLEMS in over 2 & 1/2 years. Plus when I’ve had to ask a question, I always get someone in the U.S. You really do get what you pay for. 🙂



  27. Jason on February 26, 2009 at 10:09 am

    I think NET10 really deserved this award. The service I’ve received from them has just gotten better and better. I almost never get my calls dropped, it is still the most affordable service available and the couple of times I had to call customer service, it was a breeze.
    It is a shame that people tend to post negative remarks when unhappy but seldom take the time to post positive remarks.



  28. Keef Rob on May 1, 2009 at 9:35 am

    NET 10 will not transfer promo minutes from a destroyed fone to a new fone. Therefore their terms and conditions are unacceptable. If their per minute price was lower than everyone else’s maybe I would not be upset about this fact and could post something positive.



  29. gene vallee on May 28, 2009 at 7:35 pm

    I’ve had Net10 for over a year now and I dare say it is the best cell phone I’ve ever had. I’ve tried Sprint, Nextel, T-Mobile and even Verizon and their coverage all suck in the Northeast. With Net10 I have never had a dropped call and never any problem with coverage. And I do alot of traveling. Net10 gets a big thumbs up from me and I highly recommend it if you live in New England. I will agree about the criticism of their customer service people not speaking good English. Damn this is America, hire people who speak proper english.



  30. Skippy on July 24, 2009 at 3:17 pm

    Net10 is great. I have it for 3 years now. Yes, customer service sucks but eventually you will get set up and you will have no problems with it in the end. Just have some patient in setting it up. Remember, Net10 hired foreign people so that they can cute down the cost for their consumers. Well, that’s what I hope. LOL



  31. Permanent Net10 Customer on July 27, 2009 at 11:57 am

    A family member and I were moving south on the east coast. We needed a prepaid cell phone for travels so I was eyeing up Net10 among others. I had to research them and found that they are from Tracfone. I though, “Ewww…Tracfone?”. We gave Net10 a chance though. I do remember having to do the funky airtime card purchase to get the free minutes. About the service, we drove through an underwater tunnel, over bridges, through valley and forests. We never lost signal, not once! In the tunnel, we got down to 2 bars of service but we still had service. Net10 gets service where others can’t.



  32. Permanent Net10 Customer on July 27, 2009 at 12:00 pm

    The trip mentioned in my previous post was a little over a year ago. They do now give 300 minutes and 60 days of service right off the bat though. The only thing I do not like at all, is the fact that Net10 has discontinued their $15.00 airtime cards. 🙁



  33. Paul Hitt on September 4, 2009 at 10:14 am

    **Update on previous post**:
    Stayed on the phone with customer
    svc for 2 hours this date; Was told they
    would not be able to transfer my
    remaining 500 minutes from my old phone
    to my new phone, because they couldnt
    locate the original serial number from
    the old phone; Asked to speak to supervisor who advised they still
    couldt transfer my original 500 minutes
    to my new phone;Argued with her for
    30 minutes and was finally credited
    with the 500 minutes after threatning
    to go to another cell phone carrier
    …..long story short: Stay away from
    Net10: customer svc is extremely poor,
    phones are often defective (This is my
    third one), minutes often wont transfer,
    replacement sim cards often dont work;
    etc, etc. I wont renew through net10
    after I have used my 500 minutes; its
    not worth the hassle you have to go
    through.



  34. Tomas Cruz on October 7, 2009 at 12:53 pm

    I need a cell phone only for emergencies, the problem with Net10 is that I can not purchase only 10 dollars in minutes, if I spend 30 dollars I will have to get more minutes afer 60 days, by then I will have lots of minutes that I never use, so the best option is T-Mobil, I can get 10 dollars and last for 90 days.



  35. David Shinn on October 13, 2009 at 10:44 pm

    I have been a Net 10 client for over a year. I purchased the phone for my 9th grader to use.
    Recently, I purchased a new LG flip phone that came with 300 minutes. I called tech support (India) to have my existing phone number transfered to my new phone and the remaining minutes transfered too. That in itself was a cluster…. took three days and was totally without phone service for two days.
    So, I notice that the new phone sounds like I talking in a barrel of water…. so I call tech support again. I got the run around for two days before I was told by a manager in India that “no replacement will be sent, your phone is fine,”.
    I am DONE with Net10. I called my credit card company and disputed the charge for the new phone. If they aren’t going to make it right… I’m not going to pay for it.
    I am now on a mission to spread the word of lousy customer service. Maybe if Net 10 used people that could SPEAK ENGLISH, they would not have so many problems.



  36. Lex on October 16, 2009 at 1:32 am

    Worst company ever! Total scam. I bought one phone, defective, called them for hours and they sent a new phone, defective again!! I asked for a refund and they didnt want to. DONT BUY anything from NET10!



  37. Ali on November 19, 2009 at 6:05 pm

    I agree with Lex, Net 10 it a total scam. I bought a phone it was defective also, can’t get anyone to give me refund. DON”T buy from them, they are a scam.



  38. Net10 rocks on February 22, 2010 at 7:16 pm

    I was looking for a phone to replace my old tracfone I liked tracfone but I wanted a better phone. I wanted a phone with a camera, Internet, and a keyboard. I found Net10’s samsung t401g and I bought it immediately. I have had it for 5 months and Iove it. It is a cool phone, the ten cents per minute plan can’t be beat and it has great service, it has never dropped a call. I an on staying with Net10 for a long time



  39. Kimberly on March 17, 2010 at 2:04 pm

    Despite a lot of negative comments, I decided to give Net10 a chance based on my own research – I’m so happy I did. I was spending more than $100 a month with my previous carrier on a phone I didn’t even use that often – the IPhone just wasn’t worth it. I bought a Samsung texting phone for $79 plus activation and I haven’t looked back. It was so easy to just go to Best Buy to purchase everything and the savings are huge – I’m on the $60/600M plan and texting is only .03! I even had international calling for .15 cents which is great for travelling. No contracts and the benefits of the TMobile calling network made Net10 a great choice for me.



  40. chris parsley on May 2, 2010 at 11:03 am

    dude i got a phone from net10 last month and it was no good so i called them but they send me a another phone but still having problems out of it now they say that the phone is not for my address it won’t work so they took me for $42 dollars that i am trying to get back they should told me first before i buy it they are scams that took me for my money looks like there phones are fake they won’t work they should be out of business for selling junk to people and taken people for money its bad that you cant trust people like this



  41. Garrick S. on July 10, 2010 at 1:45 pm

    Net10 customer service cannot fix any technical problem except for taking payment and adding minutes. Their technical support answer to every problem is “I apologize” and “We appreciate your business”, and “It will take 72 hours” buy nothing is ever fixed. T-Mobile or ATT may be more expensive, but I need voice mail and my number to be transferred to a modern new phone. Both of these seem impossible for Net10 to accomplish.



  42. Cassidy on August 30, 2010 at 2:04 pm

    I just made the switch to Net10 and so far so good. To start off, I got the basic phone which was practically free since it comes with 300 min. upon activation which was basically the cost of the phone $29.99.I have great reception and it’s very convenient to be able to buy minutes right from my phone. I see a lot of complaints about their Customer Service but I haven’t had to call them yet..so let’s hope for the best 🙂



  43. Barb on January 14, 2011 at 4:59 pm

    DON’T BUY 750 PLAN!!!!!! I accidently bought the $25 card for 750 minutes. It removed 400 minutes that I had originally. IT costs $1 per minute. I have gotten no where with customer service. PLEASE, WILL SOMEBODY HELP ME GET BACK TO THE 10 CENT A MINUTE PLAN??



  44. Drew Angleson on January 30, 2011 at 5:23 pm

    @charley8, Not only is Net10 cheap but they have an awesome phone selection and a plethora of options for a variety of people. Net10 is also on the Verizon network and has amazing service.



  45. Slava on February 9, 2011 at 7:45 pm

    NET10 phones are ok and the connection as well, however their CUSTOMER SERVICE is SUCK, SUCK the worst thing you can ever imagine. I tried to call net10 customer service and spent 15 minutes to get a representative and 25 minutes for him to pull out some info (that I did not even asked him to do).Second time I called and spent 1 hour and 2 minutes and NO ONE ANSWERED, same thing third time. All I wanted is to transfer my old phone number to my new net10 cell phone. Well, I guess I`ll just return it to Walmart and use my old one. I would not recommend anyone to buy anything expensive from them or give them your credit/debit info because in case of a problem you will wait and wait for ever.



  46. ken on February 23, 2011 at 5:12 pm

    Ok I went to pilot truck stop on feb 22/2011 and purchased a 300 min card from net10. Their cash register printed out a receipt with a pin, i entered the pin infront the the teller and it said invalid pin. After 1 hr on the phone wit tech support they told me they could do nothing and that pin was used on feb5th . This is the securest system out there. No scratch cards, the pin comes directly from the receipt from the cash register. I watched it print out and he handed it to me. Net 10 is sending out used poin numbers on there servers. BEWARE. They gave me my money back as i refused to leave the store as i did not receive what I payed for. So the next day the story gets better. I went online thinking using my visa to purchase minutes would be full proof. I entered my info and hit submit and got an error. I did this 3 times without success. Then I called custom care and tried that way, and they got an error. Then I called my visa company and asked them if any charges had been added. They told me 4 30 dollar changes were added in 5 min. I never got any pins NOTHING and 120 dollar charge. Visa will send this to the fraud department if net10 does not withdraw these charges as this is stealing and is liable to criminal charges!



  47. Duke on March 19, 2011 at 11:38 am

    I purchased a crummy little Net 10 phone. That was the first stupid mistake. Added minutes. That’s #2. Net 10 wiped away those minutes within 2 days. I had purchased the $50 unlimited minutes (50,000 minutes for 30 days). I called customer service somewhere overseas, sounded like maybe India. On hold for literally 45 minutes, then, someone, speaking in tongues, answered. 1 hour and 50 minutes later (total of 2 hours and 35 minutes on the phone), they added the minutes back on the crummy little phone. I actually watched True Grit in its entirety while on the phone. 4 Days later, they wiped out the minutes. Longer story shorter, they’ve done it 4 times now. The last 2 times, they said the minutes would be put back on the crummy little phone and then…..I got cut off with no minutes added back on. I’m persistent so, I continued to call and each time was eventually successful in obtaining the replacement minutes that I had paid for but, I think I’d rather have a hemmoroidectomy than have to deal with Net 10 again. It doesn’t take a Phd to figure out that this is a scam. I even asked the rep on the phone, he called himself Raphael, exotic huh, who the parent company was. Raphael said he couldn’t devulge that info. Hell, I wouldn’t allow it either if I were part of the parent company. Absolutely, the worst, blatent, in your face rip-off I’ve seen in a while. I too am on a mission to inform folks about this horrible, so-called “service”. I agree with the many others that consider Net 10 a very, very, very poor choice.



  48. Peter on July 26, 2011 at 12:39 pm

    Net10 is a ripoff. Starting in May this year, we were getting billed twice a month for the same $25/750 minute service. We called their customer service and talked with the “supervisor” who denied that Net10 was charging us twice. We told him that our bank statements don’t lie. I asked to speak to his supervisor and he said he was the main supervisor. I then asked for the address of Net10 Billing so I could write a letter to complain about it and he REFUSED to give me the address. The guy sounds like he is in the Philipines and my guess is that someone in their billing dept has stolen the account numbers for customers and they are double billing people each month and hoping no one would notice.
    We ended our service with them last week a lo and behold, we got billed AGAIN in July 2011 for service we did not have.
    Along with an F- in customer service, they are now double billing as a scam. We will NEVER use NET10 AGAIN!



  49. Marylou on September 30, 2011 at 12:14 pm

    I have used Net 10 for literally years and years. Have never had any major problem that could not be resolved quickly. If I receive a customer service rep that has very bad english I just keep asking for someone else and they transfer my call. Thought about Track Phone for about a minute then figured better to stay with what I know works. Besides I like that all my minutes and time roll over.