View All TracFone Reviews

This is the worst company I have ever dealt with!! My son’s phone suddenly was deactivated, even though we still had units and time. I called their AWFUL customer service in the middle of India. They reactivated the phone, but told me it had been deactivated because we had made ‘too many calls to the Dominican Republic’ (never had).Two months go by, and again, his phone is deactivated. When I called, they told me that they would not reactivate my phone because I ‘had made calls to the Dominican Republic’. Now my 16 yr old new driver is without a phone and we have lost 363 minutes of paid service. The customer service is HORRID!!! When they finally answer, they give you a fake, American name like Kristy, but can not speak a stitch of english. They have NO concept of what you are talking about, just repeat everything that you say, looking for that ‘key’ word that they can find in their script and direct you in that direction, never truly answering your question. This company is the biggest rip off I have ever seen in my life. Granted, the minutes are cheap, but you really pay for it in the end when they deactivate you with 363 minutes left that they will not refund.Before you buy a tracfone, think about how many american jobs are being sent to underpaid, incompitent idiots reading a script, and some big wig stealing your money.

I don’t like it much. I mean i am a teenger and i like to talk on the phone. i am always running out of minutes. there phones aren’t attractive enough for my age group. and the minute cards are so expensive! i want something that is not a contract (cause my parents hate contracts) but is cheap to let me talk alot!

I have had four phones with tracfone and I cant get any songs or anything on my cell phone. Im getting so sick of this phone. I just got a new one three days ago and I cant do anything with it. I need help on getting songs on my phone. I have 10 mins coming to me if I sign up on the computer and it will not give it to me what is going on with this tracfone.

have been with tracfone for about 5 years. Good coverage, they use verizon’s system in my area. customer service is BAD. Biggest complaint it poor selection of phones. No cool phones.

Tracfone has been good. The Motorola W370 on the motorola site it says ‘This device supports Bluetooth profiles. In order for Bluetooth devices to communicate with one another, they must utilize the same Bluetooth profile. To determine the profiles supported by other devices, visit www.hellomoto.com/bluetooth. For other devices, contact their respective manufacturer.’ Does this mean that the phone is bluetooth our not.On the tracfone website it does not say anything about bluetooth.So

When I tried to upgraade to a new phone a Tracfone customer service represented deleted over 1040 minutes I had accumulated. After 4 phone calls and one email the problem was still not resolved. The only response I could get was that there was no way to verify that I ever had the minutes and therefore they could not be restored. I am looking at other prepaid plans.

I bought a new trafone from walmart on a wednesday,and a week later,after 5 calls to trafone,they still had not transfered my phone number and 576 units,to my new tracfone.The 5TH time i called them,i spent over i hour and fourty five minutes talking and WAITING,for someone who had enough sense to transfer my service to my new phone.It NEVER happended.I lost a new phone,a new charger,and 576 units. their computers are JUNK,and their people have -not a clue what they are doing.IF THEY WOULD SPEND AT LEAST A YEAR LEARNING ENGLISH,it might,just might help someone else from getting RIPED-OFF like i did.

You cannot recieve texts for free. They charge you .3 units each text recieved as well.

I love mine! Recently ended my contract with Sprint (Thank God!), and I think I will always go prepaid from here on out. I can no longer find the $9.99-30 minute cards, so that’s a bummer,but with the $19.99 card you get 60 minutes that expire in 90 days instead of the 45 days with the 30 minute card. I have the $20 Motorola flip phone. There are no special bells and whistles on this model, but for someone like me who only uses the phone for very short conversations and emergencies, this is a great buy! I used to have an AT&T prepaid phone years ago but that one cost $100. $20 is much easier on the budget. I’ve never had a problem with dropped calls or reception. I’m buying a TracFone for my mom,too. I wasted over $2000 being stuck in a Sprint 2 year agreement ($100/month for a family plan). If you’re not a cellphone junkie who is constantly yacking, prepaid is the way to go!

$0.10 per minute with double minutes card. Even though getting through to customer service takes forever, once I did, they graciously transferred the 600+ minutes from my broken phone to its replacement. Even gave me extra! My only beef is I used to get free incoming text messages but the new one charges $0.33 for incoming and outgoing texts. Haven’t found a prepaid phone with lower per minute cost.

The absolute worst coustomer service I have ever encountered with any company. They have stolen money from me. I had a TracFone that was working perfectly, no problems. I purchased a minute card, went on their web site to add the minutes to my phone and received a message to contact customer service, because my phone needed to be replaced with an upgraded phone. After 3 calls to the customer service department, average calling lasting 2 hours and the reps do not speak english, I finally got the replacement phone sent to me. I then had to call customer service to transfer my phone number, minutes and expiration date. He deactivated my orginal working phone transferred all my minutes and expiration date to the new phone. The new phone would not work does not receive or place calls. It has now been two months and I still do not have a working phone. Many excuses have been given the last 3 weeks has been I need a new sim card, which they say they sent, however I have never received one. I have logged more then 30 hours of phone time with the non-english speaking company actually based in the country of Beleaze, not sure of the spelling of the country. They tell me that the sim card has been delivered by DHL to me, when I ask what the delivery address was, it does not match my address, they pretend to not understand that the card has not been delivered to me. I think this company is running a scam to steal money from people. They do not refund airtime minutes and forbid the retail locations to refund the money spent on the airtime cards. BE WARNED that NET10 IS THE SAME COMPANY!! I got so frustrated with TracFone I was Going to switch to another pre-paid and was going to go with NET10, purchased a phone and minutes then discovered in was owned by tracfone. I did get my money back on the phone but am stuck with the minutes and the charge for them.. I would rate this company a negative 10 if it was possible on this site.

Great phone at cheap price. buying minutes can be done online

My biggest complant is:Adding minutes/time on the phone. I usually have to call customer service on another phone to do that. I was able to bypass a human by calling in my airtime card on their computer(with another phone) and when that fails the computer ask you to says troubleshoot then their computer will give you the codes for the code entry mode to get your phone working again.My second complant is that they usually sell GSM phones but CDMA phones usually have more nationwide coverage. If I wanted cheaper minute I would have gotten a net10 but that would a giving higher monthly charges.Some people here complained about losing their minutes after having their phone stolen but that is still better than the thief running hundreds of dollar or more on a postpaid phone before they notice the phone was stolen. Also it is more unwise to lend a postpaid phone to someone for the same reason.

Unfortunatle 1 star is the lowest rating that i am sllowed to give. Tracfone is a plague in the cell phone world. I work at a wal mart connection center and have had 15-20 customers( this is just my personal experience not of my co workers who have had simalar problems with Tracfone) buy tracfone and it would not actitvate or they would never get there minutes. i myself have tried to activating their phones buy calling tracfone but to no success. And trying to keep the customers happy i tried to refund their money. but were unable to refund the time card and tracfone flat refused to help the customer in anyway. I am completly disgusted with tracfone and i discourage anyone from even thinking about gettin tracfone.

I had the misfortune of having my TRAC FONE run over(I can still receive calls and make calls, but I can not read my screen). I was given as a gift an identical TRAC FONE, but was unable to register the phone. Customer service informed me that I either needed to show my receipt of purchase or get information from the box. I have neither-it was a gift. Now I need to take the phone to a retailer so that they can scan the phone so that I may activate it. They were also not able to tell me how many minutes I have on my current phone. I was told that they would have to deactivate my phone and it could take up to 2 weeks to find out. BEWARE- They do not work very well with the customer!!

After adding 90 days and 60 units I WROTE down the new expiration date and it agreed with the date on the TRAC FONE UNTIL that day arrived THEN the date in the phone showed 2 days earlier and my phone was no longer usable! Then I was told I could not reactivate as there were no more lines available!

Their rates are pretty good, and I get service almost everywhere I go. I hate the fact that you can’t recieve picture texts if your phone isn’t a picture phone. Also trac phones have horrible backgrounds/wallpapers and screensavers!! A good feature is that it is really easy to pay for , considering all you have to do is buy a card at basically any local store.

I would give them 0 stars on service if I could. Stay far away from this company! Deceptive, lying, WORST customer service I have ever experienced. They sold me a year of service via a promotion, but now they won’t let me buy minutes separately. A supervisor told me (it took more than a half hour to get connected after every 2 minutes a hispanic idiot kept endlessly repeating ‘ may I put you on hold for 2 more minutes while I connect you to my supervisor’) that it was my fault for buying the promotion, nobody forced me. All double-talk! Expect to speak to English-challenged Indian people overseas on tech questions and Hispanics on all other issues. I had no previous preconceptions but am now convinced that Hispanics have no clue on how to have good relationships with their customers. Nor do they care. So… Adios!

I LIKE TRAC FONE BECAUSE YOU DO NOT HAVE TO SIGN A CONTRACT. BUT, I HATE THE CONSTANT ADVERTISEMENTS THAT THEY TEXT, AND THE CONSTANT REMINDERS THAT YOU ARE DUE TO BUY MINUTES BY A CERTAIN DATE.

ACTUALLY THEY SHOULD HAVE A OPTION FOR NEGATIVE STARS, BECAUSE i WOULD AWARD THEM NEGATIVE 5 *****(minus)WORST CUSTOMER SERVICE. KEPT ME ON HOLD FOR HOURS. WOULD NOT LET ME SPEAK TO A SUPERVISOR. DISCONNECTED MY PHONE WITH 6 MONTHS AND 300 MINUTES ON IT BECAUSE I MADE A LONG DISTANCE CALL ON IT. CUST SERV REP SAID I WAS NOT ALLOWED TO DO THAT. EXCUSE ME BUT I PAY UP FRONT AND IF THE CALL WENT THROUGH NOT MY PROBLEM SO I LOST MY MONEY, AND SPENT USELESS HOURS TRYING TO SPEAK WITH SOMEONE WHO DOES NOT UNDERSTAND THE RULES FOR PROPER BUSINESS ETIQUETTE OR CUST SERVICE.

Customer service sucks. Mine won’t work in florida does great elsewhere. Would be great if they would fix thier customer service. (english speaking would be nice)

For everyone having problems with tracfone, I have a new ‘customer service’ number for you1-800-323-2366skip all the mumbo-jumbo and get to the person.

I sent the folling e-mail to tracfone we’lI see… have had a tracfone (037*******0) for several mo. I have not been able to use the tracfone to recharge units. I know this is a new feature so no problem. Then on or about 11-11-07 I was unable to make or recieve calls. I called cos. service. I punched in numbers into the ‘code page’ like many other times.My phone number was changed without being informed. Also the number I was given is long distance to everyone I know. So was the first number. I called customer service to resolve this and spent 30+ minutes on my other tracfone (268**********848).They suggested I get in my car and drive to the pay phone like I have done many times before.(I have punched a thousand numbers into the ‘code’ page).All I want is reimbursement in units for all the problems I have had with your service. I would also like a phone number that people can call me locally.I have put up with a lot of minor problems in the past,and have spent a lot of time at the pay phone inputing code, but when my phone# was changed without notice(I found out by calling my other tracfone) I was angry because I have missed a lot of calls over a few days. I also had to call everyone to tell them my ‘new’ number.I have generally been satisfied with tracfone but when I called customer service on my other tracfone, I used over 30 min of time and to no avail.I asked to talk to a ‘supervisor’ but none was available.What I want is 500 units added to my phone(very reasonable considering all the problems I have had), a number that people in my area can call locally, and 30 units added to my other tracfone that was wasted talking to customer service.If this is impossible, I will not spend one more cent on tracfone.Please E-mail me a response one way or the other.Sincerely, Tim

All the negative reviews are ‘right on’Stay away from this company I was given a notice that they had a new provider in our area and i had to replace my phone, but i could not get thru to customer service to do so. I was on the line for over an hour, but still could not make contact.{I am not kidding} I lost my phone with over a 100 minutes of air time.Tracfone has no real customer service and it is a fraud for them to say they do and i suspect a class action suit for fraud is in their future.

I am really dissapointed in Tracfone. They offer absolutely horrible, poorly designed phones with no features. However, the two decent phones they offer can only be activated in metropolitan areas. Unbeliveably, they sell these un-activateable phones in local retailers. I bought one of the better phones (a $50 motorola) and took it home to activate it. When i attempted to activate it, i was told that it couldn’t be activated in my area and that they would send me another phone that could be activated as long as i sent them my newly purchased phone. So about a week without a cell phone passed, and i finally received the phone. The phone i was sent is complete crap. A 19.99 peice of plastic with a few annoying ringtones. To make matters worse, when i tried to get back the 30 dollars that i had lost in the trade, they would only reimbuse me in units, rather in dollars (to my dismay) and when i was told by the sales rep. (barely understood her) that my units would be sent shortly and that i could hang up. So a few hours later I was sent 10 units. I tried to call back to get back my lost money but I was kept on hold for an hour and seventeen minutes. I was fuming for days. Today my mother needed to replace her dinasour of a phone and she bought a tracfone. I tried to activate for her but they wouldn’t move her old phone number to the new phone. Having opened the package to activate the phone i cannot return it which is more money lost. I am incredibly angry with tracfone. The only reason i rated my review two stars is because text messaging is relatively cheap compared to other prepaid plans and that signal strenth is usually good, with no contracts.

While the service itself is fine, woe be it to you if you ever encounter a problem. I bought a 120 unit airtime card at Target. My effort to redeem the units produced no results. Despite 7 phone calls (you must explain everything all over again, each and every time)and two emails on their website, the best answer they can give is ‘an error in our system’. It has been 20 days of frustration, and still no results from them, or even an estimate of when they will correct their ‘error’. They have offered no recourse; no replacement phone or card, even though I offered to send them both, plus my receipts. When I ask what I should do next, they have no answer except its ‘pending’. It is the worst customer service I’ve ever encountered – there would seem to be no one at the company who has the knowledge or authority to correct their problem. They assure me there is nothing wrong with the phone, nor with the airtime card – its a ‘code problem’. I’ve now spent more than 4.5 hours over the course of 7 phone calls, with ‘technicians’ whose English is VERY difficult to understand, without result. I would NOT recommend this company.

tracfone sucks! every single time i order minutes online they never come through! i waste 20 dollars every month for minutes that wont even come through to my phone. when i call customer service i always get the same guy with some screwed over accent and gets really angry when i cant understand what he’s saying! he never even helps! he says that my minutes will some through in about an hour which was of course a lie! so i stopped ordering minutes because it was hopeless and my service expired! so i have no phone! i hope that screwed over accent guy is reading this!!!!!

i really like tracfone. the phone i bought does everything i want. i have been through the ringer with Verizon. Now i am with a company i like.

I switched to tracfone from a major cell phone company because I do alot of driving for my job and I end up on the outskirts of the city in the woods. Alot of time I could not get signals and when I did it was poor reception or dropped calls. Since I only use the phone for emergency I switched to tracfone and never got a drop call, poor reception, and great signals. I have never had to deal with customer service so I can’t rate them on that, but the service part is way better than your big companies. I also agree it is not for someone who talks alot on them. I was paying an average of $60.00 a month on crappy service to an average of $20.00 a month. So I do recommend tracfone for light users and who wants good receptions, even in the woods.

My Motorola C139 is wacko! I plug it in and it says ‘Invalid Battery’. What is up with that? I appreciate any help. Thanks

after the third sim card they gave me a new phone.i asked them to hold my number, that was not to be.1 star is too much.thank you.

I’ve been using Tracfone for about 4 years and have never had a problem with either the phone service itself or their customer service department.Yes, it’s frightfully expensive on a per-minute basis, but I use the phone so little (maybe 300-350 minutes per year) that it’s cost-effective for me. It works out to about $12-$14 a month, a third (or less) of the cost of a land line in my area.They’re upgrading their service to digital in my area, and they just sent me a new phone absolutely free to replace the one that won’t work under the new service. Their service reps were friendly and helpful when I called to activate it, and I was on hold for only a minute or two before they took my call. I was almost shocked at how quickly they picked up. (That’s been my experience every one of the few times I’ve had to call them.)My new phone is a basic no-frills C139 that does everything I need and more. I have only one quibble with it: I can’t find a way to delete a messed-up entry from my phone book.For heavy users, of course Tracfone is going to be ridiculously expensive and otherwise unsuitable. But for folks like me who make or receive maybe 2 or 3 very brief calls a week, it’s great. I’d give them 5 stars overall if it weren’t for that pesky messed-up phone book entry I can’t seem to get rid of!

I have been with Tracfone for many years, first using the Nokia 1100 analog phones (2) and now with the Motorola V170 & a replacement for my wife (free from Tracfone). Tracfone even e-mailed me to tell me that my wife’s old analog phone would not be able to be used much longer, and that they would send a new updated digital phone free. I update both phones with the yearly plan. My wife’s phone usually stays in the glove box of her car for emergency use, and mine gets used daily. Her’s has accumulated about 300+ minutes, but it is still cheaper than paying for one of the major company’s yearly/monthly fee plans. $100 or so yearly is very cheap peace-of-mind to me. From comparing coverage maps of all the cell phone companies, I find that Tracfone has the largest coverage in the US, probably because they contract with many other cell companies for the use of their networks. I also have had to wait on the phone for customer service and talk to someone I have a hard time understanding, but I have had to do the same thing with many other companies’ customer service personnel. So what’s new! I have had no dropped calls other than running out of cell phone coverage which is a normal thing anytime/anywhere with any cell company. I also like the new digital plan of no roaming charges. I plan on doing a lot of vacation traveling in the future, and I’m sure the Tracfone will be with me.

I have had a Tracfone for two years and recently had to be sent a ‘comparible’ replacement phone due to tower changes in my area. The replacement phone was entirely inadequate compared to my old phone. I then purchased a new Tracfone to continue service with the company and was sold downloadable ringtones through their site which would then not be able to be used in my area. Later upon trying to load minutes with my double minutes feature, which I was told would be transferred to my phone by Tracfones employee during activation, I was told that the service would not be transferred because I has purchased a better phone, still with their company, to replace the piece of junk they sent to replace my original phone. This has been a very aggravating, expensive and time consuming ordeal. Never have I had so much trouble trying to use a service that I paid for in good faith. VERY DISAPPOINTING!!!!!

I like my phone pretty well but its embarassing to have prepaid. the camera is good but not so much memory space. i got about 2 dropped calles in the year ive had it. i have web access but no idea how it works!!! never had to use customer service, but minutes are running low and texting is sort of annoying with high unit rates

QUESTION:Why would anyone throw money at a 3rd rate company like TracFone when you can get a pre-paid plan through one of the big 3 (AT&T, T-Mobile or Verizon) ?Wouldn’t you thnik the BIG BOYS would at least provide a much broader network coverage?

I still have the Nokia 1221 and never had problems. I just added 60 units for $19.99 into my phone with 90 days expiration. I have accumulated over 395 units in my phone and the expiration is 2008, just want to keep my phone active. I don’t want a fancy phone, it is hidden in my purse/backpack all the time anyway, I just want to have something I can rely on when it comes to emergency, or just want to make a quick call. …I understand some people have complaints about Tracfone but when it comes to resolving issues patiece and appreciation will make things a little bit easier, for both the customer and the representative.

In attempting to add minutes to an existing but expired phone, I found the website unable to complete the transaction, apparently because it no longer remembered the sim serial number as one belonging to tracfone. But on calling customer service I found that while pretty well hidden on the voice menus (I got a person by selecting ‘tech-support|other’ the call was answered immediately and was processed straightforwardly.

If Tracfone monitors this blog how about responding to some of these peoples concerns and experiences. Customer service sounds about as much fun as pulling out my own fingernails, and buying one of your phones is a crap shoot between heavenly bliss or throwing my money down a sewer hole. So what are you doing Tracfone to improve the service experience? My money is in my hand.

I purchased a phone in my local area, and called to port over my existing cell phone number to the Tracfone. This was on 9/21/07, I called back on 10/9/07 to see why it had not gone through. The lady on the other end told me that my case had been closed, yet no one had notified me. She then told me that the phone I had purchased in my local area could not support the port. The only option I had to port over my number was to purchase a phone that cost twice as much. However, if I wanted to keep the phone I would have to get a new number. She was like a recording going in circles about the options. I have since returned the phone and am considering other companies. A call back to let me know about the results of case would have been appreciated, but that doesn’t seem to be in SOPs.

If you dont have high blood pressure, stay away from TracFone’s tech support,or you most assuredly will!

I purchased a LG3280 6-months ago and paid for a years service and 400 minutes. I have since purchased additional minutes and as of yesterday had a little over 300 minute balance. Today when answering my voice-mail the keyboard on the phone froze and I had to take the battery out to un-freeze the keys and when I did my 300+ minutes vanished. I called support,waited 20-minutes for a live person only to tell me she could not give me back the minutes and offered to give me 30 minutes as a consolation. I also talked to a supervisor who told me the same thing but did not offer me the 30 minute consolation. Needless to say Tracfone is not in my vocabulary anymore.

I signed up with Tracfone in May…picking up my V170 at Walmart. I’ve used it travelling cross country (road trip and air travel) and have never dropped a call or been unable to get a strong signal…and no roaming charges. I love that you can call 411 and only pay for minutes used versus $1.95/call on many plans. With the purchase of a double minutes for life card and either the 200 minute cards or buying minutes in bundles (after signing up for the $4.95 lifeplan), I average 10 cents a minute. I initially purchased when I was tightening my budget belt. But now, even at 400 minutes per month average ($40/month), I’m hardpressed to find a monthly plan that wouldn’t cost as much or more, with worse coverage, and requiring a one or two-year contract. I did have an initial problem with activating my phone, but must have had a good day with customer service, because all was resolved quickly.

I have the Motorola C139 and became an instant fan! A mere $45 got me 130 minutes and service until March ’08!Set-up was a breeze, I get all bars everywhere I go and it’s never dropped a call even inside large buildings where other people’s phones won’t work. To all of the nay-sayers: A: You could have checked the coverage map before you bought and b**ched. It’s posted on the Tracfone site. B: Minutes are best purchased on the cards available at Walgreens for instance rather than with your credit card online, etc. Chances are you have a Walgreens right down the street. Get off your butts! You must be the same SUV-driving dolts who sit in a block-long line at the McDonalds drive-thru burning gas and still b**ch about the price of gas. C: As for outsourcing and the person in Customer Service possibly being from India, news flash, very rarely are you ever speaking to someone working directly for any company. From phones to tech support to credit cards to insurance, few companies have their own call-centers. Wake up!

Please beware when you order off Tracfones web sight. After many calls and email and many lies from them. I was told that they normally have 6 day delay before they ship your order. It took me 10 days to get this from them. I have talked to there normal CS people and there corporate office. No help from any of them that has helped.Before this I was a big supporter of Tracfone. This ordeal has changed my mind.There have been 2 things that they have said to me that sent me over the edge. Number 1 was when I should have known that there was a delay shipping the phone that I order, It was on there web sight. IT WAS ADDED 2 OR 3 DAYS AFTER I ORDER MY PHONE. The other was the. 6 DAY DELAY SHIPPING AN ORDER. They did not delay charging my card.

Brought a Tracfone for my daughter had so many problems trying to get her a local number. That we finally took phone back. Customer service was poor and when we did finally talk to a person they were not of much help. I would not recommed a tracfone to anyone

The discussion of customer service in the main review is overly optomistic if my experience is any example. I just spent over three hours and five phone calls in the last week trying to get the folks at Tracfone’s customer service to do what they said they were gong to do.Specifically, Tracfone upgraded service in my area. I received a new phone and was advised to contact customer service as I could not process the upgrade online. At the same time, I decided to purchase more minutes and extend the service duration. The first call, resulted in a transfer of the units/minutes on my old phone and the extension of my service duration, but I lost my original phone number and did not receive the new units/minutes. My second call required that I demand a supervisor before I could have a meaningful conversation (I don’t know where their customer service is located, but many of the reps seem to have a distinct and somewhat difficult to understand accent), but the supervisor fixed the units/minutes issue and told me to expect a SIM card in the mail, after which I would be able to regain my old phone number. After receiving the SIM card, my third call was supposed to give me back my old phone number. Instead, I lost some of my units/minutes. My fourth call resulted in being disconnected after waiting about twenty minutes. On my fifth call, I tried to short curcuit the process and demand a supervisor. I got the supervisor who first told me I could not get my original phone number back. I wnet through my explanations yet again and then she said I would need a new SIM card. When I told her I had the new SIM card, she said I would need yet another SIM card. At this point, I expressed my dissatisfaction and ended the call. It was not worth another round of annoying phone calls to keep the old phone number.I will admit that I have had few problems getting a call through on my Tracfone and have had even fewer disconnects, but I would suggest that anyone considering this company think twice considering the quality of the customer service.

Tracfone is my first wireless provider and have them for over 3 years now. I only use my phone for emergency, only my husband and my sister know my number and warned them not to give them away.Customer service reps have accent, I don’t care because English is not my first language either. I only called them when I change phone because I want to keep my number. They take good care of me. The units/minutes I had from my old phone were transferred to the new phone plus more. Say I had 75 units left in my old phone, they rounded it up to 100 units and also earned 20 minutes for activating the phone. The waiting period when I called Tracfone, I don’t remember…I just look at the bright side…at the end of my phone call I was satisfied and happy. For now I cannot call my country using my Tracfone cellphone…maybe someday.

I love tracfone! Their coverage is actually BETTER than at&t, not just in my area but all around. Their customer service is very good, they send me two free phones because my one phone was old, but there was no problem with it. The only thing I hate is their phones are very old and it takes them like a year to release a new phone that is already about 2 years old.

I have been attempting to upgrade my phone sense last Tuesday (when I received the new one in the mail) and as of today my account on their website shows the old phone as inactive and the new one active – the new phone is not active. When I tried to reactivate it on their website, I received a message stating that a transaction is pending. I am unable to dial out or receive calls on it or on the old phone.I called 1-800-867-7183 for the third time and was on hold for 45 minutes and no one answered. What needs to be done to get a phone that works?

Jim get a new cell phone and not a Tracfone !I would never have Tracfone there no good !

I have no complaints about the tracfone itself. It’s the perfect cell phone service for me, since I am by a land phone at home and during work and only need a cell for in between times. I actually love having a tracfone.I purchased my first cell and minutes on line and had virtually no problem.However…I purchased a new phone and wanted to get the number of my old phone transferred to my new one. The customer service is absolutely awful. I agree with everyone who’s posted the negative on customer service. It took me at least 4/6 calls, being on the phone over an hour each time (mostly on hold); and even though I pressed the ‘English’ option I could not clearly understand any one person I spoke to.Finally, after a week or more of phone calls, I am connected, however…….even though I was told I could keep my old number (after I agreed to have them send me a new SIM card), I have a brand new cell number. I am not gonna bother to call again. I’m just keeping the new number. It’s not worth spending an entire morning on hold and I have no translator to help me understand who I’m speaking to. If I had to call Customer Service regualrly, I would not use this service, even though I like the phone and the ‘pay as you go’ system.

Btw, is there another site/place to purchase phones/minutes besides this tradfone site? At this point I think ANY competition would drive this company out.Thanks

For me this is the best cell phone service i have found. Have had it for allmost 2 years. in my state ct there making changes to cell phone service so my old phone is not going to work with the new system anymore. Tracfone notified me by email had me call to confirm info and sent me a new phone at no cost. Had to wait on the phone about half an hour once i got the new phone to talk to a service rep.They transferd my old number from the old phone to the new phone and all minutes also, did take some time to put in the codes,the service rep gave good clear instruction .The rep said it might take several hours to be able to use the new phone but it was good to go at the end of the call.Its very good not to lose all your minutes like almostall the outher plans. I use my phone formostly for important things not to just talk so this works out very good for me.

Wish I could give zero stars. Customer service is absolutely awful. However price is right – but in the end, not worth the headache of being on hold for half an hour and then being disconnected. (This happening after calling 4 or 5 times before and not event being able to get on hold because their call center was too busy – please call at a different time). Goodbye Tracfone – I am up late tonight trying to research our next mobile company that is NOT Tracfone.

I got a Tracfone for my middle school aged son. Set up online was very easy….started him out with 60 minutes plus the bonus 20 that came with the phone. Coverage is great, the Moto c261 is working perfect….all for $50 total. No complaints yet.

I have had two trac phones. I returned the first because I could not hear the call ringing and frequently with persons with soft voices I could barely hear them. I was told to return the phone and they would send me a new one. I did this (no phone for two weeks). I now had the same problem with a call I made today. I also frequently get no service in the rural area of Illinois where my family resides. I will not purchase any more trac phone minutes.

Okay…you have read all these reviews, from a long time Tracfone customer let me give you the good/bad and what to expect. First, Good reception, coverage. Minutes could be better, but not bad if you can control your ‘blabbing’ mouth all day and if you ‘god forbid’ use a land line once in a while. Start slow…buy the phone and get a small minutes deal. (I’ve noticed once you have established your phone w/ them, it’s easier to get the extended service packages (double minutes/1 yr plan) to work. This way your not out a ton of money off the bat if the phone was a dud straight from the factory. CUSTOMER SERVICE…yes it’s India, yes they can be a little difficult to understand but I’ve accomplished everything they/I needed to do if you can just show some patience. (I’ve never waited more than 5 minutes for their help and most of my problems were minor)The phones are on the lower end of features but it appears they are getting better. All my friends have been ‘duped’ by the regular Cell Phone Providers, at least you can throw out your Tracfone at any time and it’s over with.

hello i use to be a trac fone customer (pre2003). currently im with verizon wireless 03-current. I had no issue with trac fones reception and trac phone would get a 5 star rateing from me BUT reason i rate it as 1 star is this. i had a nokia phone and the display quite working. i had built up my units too over 1000 units when the display quite working. i called trac fone and thay said thay would send me another cell phone free of charge and also replace my units. i recived my phone with 300 less units and i called and thay stated there was nothing i could do about it. well i had this new phone for a few monthes and the display yet again quite working so i called trac fone again and thay sent me another phone again with less units then what i had when the display died. i played this game one more time and was jipped on my units for the 3rd time and i used the broken phone w/o a display til my remainder units ran out and went to verizon. so as far as im concerned trac phones service is great as in no droped calls and clear reception. CUSTOMER SERVICE IS NOT TO BE TRUSTED and ill NEVER OWN another nokia phone. trac fone left a bad taste in my mouth . ;-(

Bought the phone in May and it took 1-1/2 hours to program it so it would work in my area when it was purchased for my area. 4 months later phone is dead and took me another 35 minutes to find out where to send it. Phone worked good when it was working but I feel it should have lasted more than 4 months and it shouldn’t take that long on the phone for customer service. Now I wonder how long it will be to get it back.

do they give out the same number to more that 1 person??up until now everythink worked pretty okay. added some minutes with one of those cards you buy just fine.but now i just got back home from a 10 day trip to china, and troubles are starting. I’m getting a ton of text messages, phonecalls and spamcalls in, that are not for me. coming from numbers i have never heard of. WTF is going on? literally only 8 people have my number. this is weird and annoying…anyone else had this?just tried to call their CS, but they’re closed. nice… NOTbut reading all this, I guess I shouldn’t even care trying. damn…guess i have to toss this thing soon, but I’m only in the US for a while so dont want to get stuck to a yearly plan. what to do?..

I agree, if there was a Zero for Stars, we would give it.We both have a Tracfone and it is always a hassle to add minutes. Then they send text messages with so called promotions to get you to buy more cards, and then you never get the bonus units they promise. They sent a text message, ‘buy two tracfone cards, receive double minutes for the life of your phone’. I bought two…received no double minutes. I inquired….they told me it was ‘misinformation’, and I would have to buy six cards, well then I complain, and they say you need to buy five cards. ‘we see you have purchased two, but you needed to purchase the other three at the same time’. So…it is a crock of you know what! Don’t go with the TracFone. We are finished with them!

So Far, So Good,…I needed a Cell in a hurry and bought a cheap ($15) phone at WalMart. I knew buying minutes and adding them on line is far cheaper so I bought 4 – 60 minutes cards with 2 free phones on line for $45shipped. Checked ‘Deal’ websites like FatwalletDOTcom for current special codes for adding minutes and as expiration now advances as minutes are added, ie your expiration advances and you just have to keep ahead no longer having toadd minutes every 2 months,…I now have service for 11 months, and have been credited for 440 minutes and still have a 60 minute card to use! all for @$60!adding a 60 minute card on line, if you search out special codes, typically adds 120-150 minutes and 3 months of service!Can’t get any cheaper than that for an emergancy phone!

I SWITCHED TO TRACFONE WHEN THEY FIRST CAME ON THE MARKET,AND I,VE HAD ONE EVER SINCE.I USED TO HAVE PROBLEMS UNDERSTANDING THEIR REPS ON THE PHONE SO NOW I DO EVERYTHING ON LINE.I REALLY GIVE TRACFONE 10 STARS IF I COULD BECAUSE I THINK THEY ARE THAT MUCH BETTER THAN ANY CONTRACT SERVICE I’VE EVER HAD. THANKS TRACFONE FOR THE FINE SERVICE.

I personally don’t use Tracfone anymore, but got one recently for my mother who was on a regular plan and was paying a lot of money for nothing. She couldn’t even make long distance calls. So we went to Wal-Mart and we purchased a very sleek Motorola W370, which is designed similar to a RAZR. My biggest complaint with Tracfone is their customer service. It was very difficult to get the International Long Distance capabilities set up, and it required four calls to customer service with seemingly interminable wait periods. Every single Customer Service rep I spoke to spoke heavily-accented English (I should have opted for Spanish). It was a very frustrating experience. I also don’t like how even when you talk to someone for 20 seconds it deducts 1 unit of airtime from your phone. T-Mobile is a better buy. On the plus side, they use the Cingular and T-Mobile networks.

I had a tracfone for about a year, but when my old phone started to tear up and I bought a new phone thats when the trouble started. I was told I needed a new sim card to keep my old number and minutes. 3 calls and 3 weeks later i still do not have it. If I ever get it working I will use up the 500+ minutes I have on it and switch to a contract phone. There really should be negative stars. Their c/s is so full of BS! They have absolutely no idea what they are doing! Every time I call I confirm my mailing address, yet still they have not shipped it!

December 2006, I bought 2 trackfones — one of each of my children. One was bought at the local Walmart, the other online. Absolutely no problems ever with the one bought at walmart. On Christmas day, we activated online and had service later that day. The first time I added minutes, I had a problem (but it wasd my error), so I called customer service. The rep was extremely helpful and respectful. I admit it took a while to fix the problem, and his English was heavily accented, but it was, nonetheless, very well spoken English. But now that I know how to do it, the minutes show up within seconds. The phone I bought direct from trackfone, doesn’t exactly have problems, per se, but when I activated it, I was informed that starting with the second airtime card purchased, I would get an additional 30 minutes free every time I added a card. However, they never show up automatically and I always have to call customer service to get them. Once I asked if they could fix it so I don’t have to call every time and I was told that there is nothing that can be done.To me, it is a small price to pay for the excellent reception, and to not have to pay a huge monthly fee for minutes that we will never use continually tied to a contract for two years at a time. I call them once every three months, and the rep is always helpful and patient. I think that sometimes, some people are getting awful service because they started treating the rep disrespetfully first. I know that if someone started screaming at me about the awful service or a crappy phone that had absolutely nothing to do with me (as I’d be just an employee), I would be less inclined to be respectful and helpful. I’d want to get rid of the jerk as quickly as possible. And if that person were speaking to someone in India, I find it very difficult to believe that an Indian was disrespectful first because they are an etremely polite culture. As for some of the problems mentioned here, it simply is because you didn’t read the material or the website. The double minutes for life card clearly states that it is for the life the the trackfone that it’s added to. You are also supposed to add the double minutes card and wait for it to go through before adding minutes, or it won’t double the minutes. I did this to both of my phones just yesterday and had no problems (other than having to call to add on the 30 missing bonus minutes). So, just for future note, realize that the customer service rep is also a human being, realize that this person did not cause your problem, treat the person as such, and more often than not, with ANY company, you will get better customer service.

i could not reactivate and could not speak to a real person. customer support: F-

Ugh. They used to be a good service but not anymore. I just recently bought airtime minutes and service for a year and have had nothing but trouble since. First the SIM card was bad. Then after replacing that, virtually all my outgoing calls are dropped at 1-5 seconds. Can’t count on this phone at all. I’ve called, I’ve e-mailed, no resolution. My next step is to try to get a refund from credit card company (about $150). Wish me luck. Any GOOD prepaid service out there?

what to do with trac phone that has 114 units and has been abused by your puppy. the screen says invalid battery. please advise. did not know where else to address the question

I got a TracFone for cross-country driving to avoid coverage and roaming charge issues. I get good-best signal strength all the way from California to Michigan and standard rate charges all the way.I just bought a second reconditioned C139 ($20+140m+6mo) for my friend who’s visiting from Japan. She has trouble with English menus, so I set up quick dial calls for all her family and friends in Japan. Now she can instantly connect with 1-touch dialing and still talk at the single unit per minute rate.Unless you need all the bells and whistles with fancier models, are unable to use the online pages for activation or need a lot of hand-holding from CS, TF us a great way to get cheap, reliable basic cellular service. Don’t pay attention to the whiners.

Okay, before you buy a tracfone, read this review! My very first phone was a motorola c139 tracfone and, like everybody who buys their very first phone, I thought it was the best. Very little did I know that I was getting ripped off sooooo bad. you have to pay $20 for ONLY 60 MINUTES!! what a ripoff! on top of that, if you call the customer services you will be on hold for at least 2 hours. and when they FINALLY pick up the phone, you can barely understand what they are saying. I mean, is this some kind of joke? do they actually think this is how smart we are? Its bad enough that you cant pick up your phone without somebody trying to get you to spend more money but come on. So many people are trying to take advantage of people and are getting away with it. Mainly because people dont shop around to find better deals and thats exactly whats happening when people buy a tracfone. take my honest advice. DONT BUY A TRACFONE if you do, you will regret it. and another thing is dont listen to all those goody-goody people writing 4&5 star reviews because they obviously dont know how bad they are getting ripped off. I have had almost every type of phone from every phone company their is, and I can tell you anything you need to know about a phone and their company from specifications to prices and so on.

I have had tracfones for about 3 years and i love them .I have never had a dropped call and i always have a signal 4 or 5 bars .I have never needed customer service my phone has always worked very very good .I will keep my tracfone its been a great phone .

I’ve had my Tracfone for over 1 year and have never had any problems with it. Always a 4 bar signal (NE CT area), never a dropped call, never a problem adding airtime. I don’t know about the customer service because I’ve never needed it.

I bought 2 Trac Fones for my wife and I because we only use a few minutes a month. I paid for 1 year and 450 minutes per phone. I would rate them 5 negative stars. The following is the email I sent in desperation trying to correct the problem and their answer. In July I purchased 2 Motorola V170 phones. I chose these phones in part because the description said ‘no extra charge for ROAMING’ implyingthey would roam. After activating and using them I became aware they were not roaming when I needed them to. When I contacted customer service I was told they could not roam, that2 LG 3280 phones would be sent to replace the 2 Motorola phones. I received one LG 3280 and yet another (3rd) Motorola V170. I called and was told they would send a second LG 3280 and to hold onto the 3rd Motorola V170 until I received the 2ND LG and completing the change over. No 2nd LG arrived. When I called I was told because I had not sent backthe Motorola V170, sent by mistake, they did not send the 2nd LG. At that time I asked if I could get a Motorola V60i in place of the 2ndLG 3280 and I would pay the difference, if any. I was told the information would be put in the computer but it was up to a different dept. to make the decision. I also asked to have the one LG 3280 I did have, activated to replace one of the V170 I originally purchased. The V170 was deactivated but they could not activate the LG. I then sent back the Motorola V170 sent to me by mistake. Later I received a Nokia phone (that was not requested or even mentioned) that has exposed buttons, instead of either a second LG or a Motorola V60i. I can not use a phone with exposed buttons. I have to have a flip style. As of Aug 24th my only working, original V170 phone has also been deactivated, I called and was told it was because I had received a replacement phone for it. I had not attempted to activate the most recent phone because it was not the correct phone. There is NO EXCUSE to deactivate my only working phone until the replacement phone is activated. I therefore have not been able to use one of my phones for over a month and now I have no cell service at all. All of this has taken place over the last full 2 months. I am not home on a daily basis, sometimes not for weeks at a time. Every time I have called I wait a minimum of 15 minutes, and are then placed on hold repeatedly. I am asked for the same information over and over while talking to the same representative. On occasion it is very hard to understand what is said because of the accent. On one occasion I was on the phone for 2 full hours being jerked around to be told I would have to call back in 45 minutes. I called after an hour and was on the phone for more than another full hour trying to get the one LG 3280 I had activated, only to be told I would have to call back after 24/48 hours. When I did call they could not get it activated. I was told there was anerror message they could not clear up. Clearly, this is no way to run a business. I have never had such poor treatment from any company in my life. I am very unhappy, tired and frustrated by all the run around and excuses. No one seems to be able todo anything right at ‘customer no service’ and worst of all, I HAVE NO CELL PHONE SERVICE. Your most unhappy customer, Dean XXXXX —–Original Message—–From: TracFone Customer Service [mailto:Custsrv@tracfone.com]Sent: Wednesday, August 29, 2007 2:27 PMTo: Maycock Dean S Civ 75 CEG/CEUSSubject: Re: NO customer service (KMM760625I16433L0KM)Dear Maycock,Thank you for your interest in TracFone Wireless. We are responding to your recent inquiry. TracFone Wireless would like to take this opportunity to apologize for any inconvenience you may have experienced with our service. Feedback from our customers is very important to us. We assure you that we will research this issue to prevent it from happening in the future. Upon further review of your account, it appears that we need to to activate the LG3280 and since you receive a Nokia phone instead of LG3280 or Motorola V601 we need to create a case. In order to further assist you with this issue, please contact one of our customer care representatives at 1-800-867-7183. For your convenience, our representatives are available Monday-Saturday from 8:00AM to 9:45 PM EST, and on Sunday from 8:00 AM to 6:45 PM EST. To expedite your call, please have your and serial number available. Thank you for being a TracFone Wireless customer. We appreciate your business. Sincerely, TracFone WirelessMy reply: DID YOU NOT READ MY LETTER??????Asking me to contact your customer service is like asking me to rip out my fingernails!Those people can’t get anything right. They are so polite but unable to rectify this. I know first hand, I have spent hours trying.Surely you must have someone in the company that can resolve my problems without subjecting me to more hours of wasted time on the phone and getting totally frustrated in the process.PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE I was ingnored ater this!

Tracfones SUCK!!!! I went with tracphone because they were said to be one of the best prepaid phones that there every was. Well boy was that misleading. Tracfones have been nothing but trouble for me and my husband ever since we laid our eyes on one. We bought this phone for emergenices thinking that it was really reliable but we and everyone else out there that bought one can tell you different. We have had nothing but problems from this phone. From adding units to getting through to the service reps…it has all been a really bad experience. I would not recommend that you buy one even if you have money to waste!!!! I think that walkie talkies would have a better service than this phones do. Tracfone is one of the worst telephone companies that i have ever worked with. Believe me you don’t want to buy a tracfone, buy a walkie talkie at least you can have some fun with those!!! 🙂

I bought a Tracfone for an emergency phone while I was out of town. An emergency did arise, but when I went to use my phone it said I was not registred in the area. Since it had worked twice before, and this was the only area this phone has ever been activated in I called customer service where they told me the phone was defective, and it would be two weeks before I would recive a new one. God forbid someones life had depended on that phone call, because they would be dead. My phone still does not work, and they refuse to compensate my time, money spent, and trouble with one single minute. If you need a phone for emergencies only, my advice to you is, carry some matches and paper to send a smoke signal. You have a better chance at reaching someone with that. Tracfones suck.

Trafone has absalutely no customer service .you can call or e-mail. I bought a time card and have wasted alot of time trying to down load the minutes just to be told I have an invalid PIN. So Tracfone stole my time and money and the is absalutely no one I can contact about it.

I have been trying to set up my Tracfone for three weeks! I have spent at least 25 hours on the phone with customer service in India. They know no more than what you can find out on the internet site. I cannot get my problem resolved and I cannot get a US customer service technician to help me. I am sooooo angry.

rating is so low no words to describe it. i have been trying for 15 days to get problem solved. same old story. put on hold 30 minutes then cut off. we are being punished for getting service. service sucks. their favorite line is(we value your business)more action is needed not more BS. I still dont have a working phone .

If you want the bells and whistles, like downloadable tones and wallpaper, this is not for you. This is plain old phone service with very bad customer service but a good web site.

just activated my c139 and seem to be working alright.good service

Had to call 4 times and was on phone for 2 hours just to get minutes & # changed to new phone.2 of the 4 cust. service reps diddn’t have a clue.

SWICH NOW!!! c/s: sucksfones:awfulsite:*pukes*coverage:disspiciable.

i will never use tracfone again, their customer service is awful! and to top things off they just ripped me off by the $20 i spent on a 60 minute card, i had attempted to add the minutes to my phone but the phone was ‘no longer supported’ by the network i was happy to find out they had a replacement program that got me a new phone at no charge…but then i attempted to add the minutes i had purchased to the new phone and they tell me that i attempted to add them before and that i waited longer then three days to notify them that the minutes didn’t get added, and i spent over three hours in the last week on the phone on hold and talking to people that i cant understand very well attempting to fix the problem…all to no avail

Tracfones are great. I had mine for 3 years and have not had problems with it.

If you’re lucky enough to never have technical problems with your Tracfone, then I’m sure this is a great deal. However, if you’re like me and end up randomly losing your 450 minutes, then Tracfone will do nothing but eat up your time, money, and patience. Since my minutes disappeared suddenly 23 days ago, I’ve spent over 8 hours on the phone with Tracfone customer service, been sent a new phone which also didn’t work, was promised a new SIM card which was never sent, and was told that a refund would take over 15 days and only on the condition that I still managed to retain the receipt (and the result of that venture has yet to be seen, though I have to say that at this point I’m not at all optimistic). In short, I may very well have wasted over $100 on a phone and minutes that I barely got to use, and not for a lack of patience at trying to get the issue resolved. Thus I implore you. . . please save yourself the trouble and go with a company with better customer service.

Worst company ever…REPS DONT KNOW ANYTHING WHEN YOU CALL…WAS ON HOLD FOR 55 MIN AND COULD NOT HELP ME …COMPANY WONT REFUND MONEY ON ANYTHING SO BEWARE …YOU BUY IT YOUR STUCK WITH IT…

I live in Alaska and Tracfone has been wonderful! No dropped calls and great signal strength everywhere. With all the mountains and low tower coverage it pays to get a service that works on all towers not just the ones that belong to a certain provider. I have had TRACFONE for 5 years now and have not had to deal with the customer service so I cannot comment on it. But I will say that most electronic companies you have to call have thier customer service not in the US. TRACFONE is not the only one using out of country persons who cannot speak English.

I bought a $20.00 card for minutes and 3 days later I have none left, I am 81 years old and I need a phone, where are all my minutes?? Plase help meI HAVE NO PHONE!!

I have had tracfone for about 4 years now and it works great for me .I buy the 250 min card and it last along time and i use my tracfone 3-4 times aweek .The tracfone always works where ever you are it works and thats what i love about it .I have had to let friends use my tracfone when there cell phone would not work inside the mall but my tracfone did work .When you buy the tracfone just take it home and read the book’s that came with it then that way you will know how it work’s .I am 40 years old and i use the tracfone all the time i know some of the kids that buy VM pay as you go phones and they just don’t work that well inside the mall and inside there school but the tracfone works everywhere .Yes customer service could be better but it’s not so just be cool and take your time and be nice and work things out as you go and it will all be ok in the end and you will have a great phone that works and it will not cost you alot or there won’t be a bill in the mail every 4 weeks for a high price cell phone bill .

What a joke! The absolute worst customer service of any company I have ever dealt with. I am going to box up a phone I just received and mail it back. I have spent the past 11 days explaining the same problem to people they pay to put you on hold. They should be ashamed of treating customers like they do. Good riddance losers!

My call center job was outsourced in October of 2004 (to India) and I had to go live at the Eugene Mission while looking for another job. I bought a Motorola bar-style Tracfone to assist in my job search that December. Had NO problems adding minutes. So after getting another job and my finances stabilized, I signed up for a plan that, for $14.99 auto-deducted from my checking account monthly, would add 30 airtime minutes (with double airtime minutes for supplementary cards purchased) and 30 days of service to my account. Again, no problems for a good year and a half. Then things went south.Last March, after I was notified by email the deduction had been acknowledged for my minutes, I found I was unable to load the services I had paid for. By April I was able to find out that Tracfone had obsolesced my bar-phone. I spent about an hour on the phone with their ‘Customer Service’ (India). They sent me a replacement upgrade LG flip phone (impossible to see the color LED outside in sunlight) that had 10 minutes on it. Then I had to spend another hour on the phone with India trying to migrate and redeem the services I had paid for on the previous phone. At the end of the call, I was told that she was forwarding the order to tech support and that I would be able to accomplish the migration on their website in 3-5 business days. Right. The website directed me to ‘call our Customer Service’. I really needed my phone, so I purchased a monthly renewal of a 50 minute bundle for $10.00. I was able to load that. But because of my work schedule, I was only able to call on Saturdays. After 3 more calls (of around an hour each, my issue was still never resolved. The next to the last tedious call the rep told me (after interminably numerous ‘can you hold for approximately 1 minute?’ followed by ‘Thank you for holding. Can you hold for an additional 2 minutes?’ etc, etc, ad infinitum, her computer crashed and I would have to call back and start from the beginning and no, she could not transfer me to another rep. My next call (after a 20 minute cooling off period) I immediately asked to be transferred to a supervisor. After a clearly stated itemization of the 3 issues I was trying to resolve, the ‘supervisor’ repeated them back to me….then proceeded to ask me again, ‘And, Sir, what is the reason for your call?’. I repeated myself, calmly and a slight bit slower. Again, he repeated what I had detailed, almost verbatim, but nailing it with no discrepancies. And yet again he queried,My call center job was outsourced in October of 2004 (to India) and I had to go live at the Eugene Mission while looking for another job. I bought a Motorola bar-style Tracfone to assist in my job search that December. Had NO problems adding minutes. So after getting another job and my finances stabilized, I signed up for a plan that, for $14.99 auto-deducted from my checking account monthly, would add 30 airtime minutes (with double airtime minutes for supplementary cards purchased) and 30 days of service to my account. Again, no problems for a good year and a half. Then things went south.Last March, after I was notified by email the deduction had been acknowledged for my minutes, I found I was unable to load the services I had paid for. By April I was able to find out that Tracfone had obsolesced my bar-phone. I spent about an hour on the phone with their ‘Customer Service’ (India). They sent me a replacement upgrade LG flip phone (impossible to see the color LED outside in sunlight) that had 10 minutes on it. Then I had to spend another hour on the phone with India trying to migrate and redeem the services I had paid for on the previous phone. At the end of the call, I was told that she was forwarding the order to tech support and that I would be able to accomplish the migration on their website in 3-5 business days. Right. The website directed me to ‘call our Customer Service’. I really needed my phone, so I purchased a monthly renewal of a 50 minute bundle for $10.00. I was able to load that. But because of my work schedule, I was only able to call on Saturdays. After 3 more calls (of around an hour each, my issue was still never resolved. The next to the last tedious call the rep told me (after interminably numerous ‘can you hold for approximately 1 minute?’ followed by ‘Thank you for holding. Can you hold for an additional 2 minutes?’ etc, etc, ad infinitum, her computer crashed and I would have to call back and start from the beginning and no, she could not transfer me to another rep. My next call (after a 20 minute cooling off period) I immediately asked to be transferred to a supervisor. After a clearly stated itemization of the 3 issues I was trying to resolve, the ‘supervisor’ repeated them back to me….then proceeded to ask me again, ‘And, Sir, what is the reason for your call?’. He did this 4 times (NO EXAGGERATION). This took a total of about 20 minutes. I should have asked for him to transfer me to HIS supervisor, but he would have probably passed me off to yet another obstructionist flunky who likely isn’t a supervisor at all. I offered him an indelicate suggestion recommending which part of his anatomy into which he could insert his worthless Tracfone and hung up. In the interim I had attempted to reload my exhausted minutes with another 50 minute bundle, but this would not load and, surprise, I was directed to call ‘Our Customer Service’. I tried emailing instead. What a joke. Their allotted space for body of text is limited to 200 or 250 words, a ridiculously impossible (unlike this site) space to detail a complex issue. Fruitless. And when I was finally able to communicate to them that I wanted my money back for the unavailed services, they told me, basically, too bad. Read the fine print. No refunds for transactions placed on the internet.I wrote a very graphic and impolite missive in reply, went out and threw my Tracfone under a bus, watched in nose-severing satisfaction as both front and rear wheels solidly nailed that sucker, then completed what the bus didn’t by ripping the smashed instrument into pieces. I am going to copy and paste this review to Notepad and saturate every cell phone site that Tracfone is offered at. They are a ripoff. And I will also be contacting the Better Business Bureau and Attorney General of Florida’s offices to file complaints. I was robbed of $65.00. Not a felony, but it is criminal the way Tracfone could care less about giving their customers a fair shake and for the services they demand paid up front, obsolesce your phnone and tell you in Hindi, too bad, no refunds, thank you for your patronage.Steven LudwigEugene, Oregon

4th day trying to contact support. always 30 minute wait than you are kicked off.this happens every time i call .if you want to buy soimething they will answer.i am so disgusted i feel like just smashing fone and go el;sewhere.

a once decent company yuo have over the last few years has gone down the toilet. minutes have become almost impossible to redeem when i tried to redeem my minutes my phone was disabledtechinal support is pretty much impossible to get hold of if you cant serve your customers properly you should address the issue i dont care trying for 3 days to contact support and not hearing one human voice online support is a joke . i have no choice but to look elsewhere for someone who appreciates my service

I have owned several Trac Phones over the last 5 years.Most of the time things go well, heaven help you if you have a problem. Their tech support is very poor. You can expect to wait on line in excess of an hour while the customer service person ask question implying you have no valuable knowledge that could help resolve the problem. Questions like is your phone turned on, is your battery charged do you have service in your area?,are asked. Today I started my call with a very polite person by stating my battery was charged, I am familiar with using a cell phone and my phones do work in some areas. However,my issue is, I am experiencing more frequent situations where I recieve an intercept recording requesting a credit card to complete a call. Note, the recording confirms I am in an area where there is service, but apparently not for Tracfone. After an hour on the phone I was still talking with the same customer service rep who had put me on hold four times. She was trying to reach someone in their tech department who might have an answer. I finally thanked her for her effort and told her I will be shopping for a different provider. I suspect Verizon dosent’t have an agreement with Tracfone, thus the intercept message. However, you won’t get any answer from Tracfone confirming or denying this. I purchased my phones for emergency call. Service that dosen’t exsist is of course usless. I gave them 1 start because your system dosen’t allow for a negative number. I would go with a negative because I believe Tracfone should service their customers even if the service is to say Verizon won’t let you use their lines.

I have been a loyal customer for about 10 years. No problems, ever. Then all the sudden the 80 dollar phone I bought about a year ago does not work. Ok, call the company and they will send me a ‘nice/new’ replacement. Not hardly, a reconditioned, 30 dollar piece of crap that shuts off after so long. How is anybody supposed to reach me if my phone shuts off??!! I use these phones so I don’t have another bill, guess it is time to bite the bullet and go with a contract. Thanks Tracfone, thanks for NOTHING. ‘You are very important to us.’ Yeah, as long as your getting my good old American money!!!

Have had tracphone for over a year and am not happy with it at all. Call quality is terrible, when you can connect, which is rare. Roaming costs are outrageous also. Am looking to for a new provider.

c/s is horrible ,when you finnally get through to a rep they sound like a robot. I get a sucky siginal,and the phones are crap.

I have a Motorola C139 nad it does just what itis advertised to do. Provide no frills service. I don’t make a lot of calls, so it is perfect for me. It doesn’t have the coverage of my wife’s Verizon phone. I am usually with her when I am away, so it really doesn’t matter. I have had very good luck with calling the customer service department, compared to Cingular (bad) and Verizon (fair to good). I did need to wait a few minutes each time to get through. I don’t get much response with EMailing the customer service department. The four stars is due to no response from EMailing customer service. Overall, I am very pleased.