Tag: Freedom Pop

New Samsung Galaxy III

On By Michel McDonaldIn Cell PhoneLeave a comment

samsung galaxy s3

My new Samsung Galaxy SIII from FreedomPop finally arrived via FedEx today. I am very happy with it because it actually installs the apps. The Refurbished Samsung Galaxy SIII (white one) that I bought from NoMoreRack now Choxi would allow me to install apps, but it just didn’t install all the files, only 1 file. It also didn’t allow me to tweet pictures. I did have some sound issues, but that cleared up after some tweaking with the settings.

This new phone actually installed Terraria and Minecraft PE and I can actually play the games without any problem. Although, now that I had to start over with the new phone, I have to start new worlds and characters, but that’s ok, I didn’t really have that much time invested in the game on the white one anyway.

What really pisses me off is that I spent $99 on this phone from NoMoreRack, and it turned out to be a piece of dog poop and I lost my money because I broke the phone before I could send it back for a full refund. I should have handled it differently and just sent the phone back and gotten a brand new one from FreedomPop instead. Oh well, it’s a learning experience.

The only issue that I am having with this new phone is the call quality. I mean, it’s a phone, you would think that a phone would be able to make phone calls and the call quality would be excellent since that’s it’s main purpose. They do offer premium voice quality for an extra $3.99 every month with a free trial, which I have activated only because what’s the point of a phone if people can’t hear you? My service was unlimited voice and text for $5 a month and unlimited data for $15 a month, so you get what you pay for with the voice. I’ll gladly pay $4 more so people can actually hear me talk.

I’m sure this phone will last me a long time, just as long as I don’t lose or break it.

Update: Ok so I’m having a bit of an issue with this new phone. First off, it rebooted once, and I started to freak out because that’s what my HTC One V was doing, which is why I had to buy a new phone. Then it just started shutting off on its own. The other night as I was going to bed I went to look at my phone one last time and it was off. I tried to turn it back on but it wouldn’t come on. It showed that the battery was completely drained, which I knew for a fact it wasn’t dead. I kept trying and it would show the battery as being dead, but then it would come on and show that the battery was 3/4 full, then it would show me the Samsung logo, then it shut off again. I was really freaking out. It was a good thing I saved the battery from the other one that I bought from NoMoreRack. I switched the battery and I haven’t had an issue with it turning off or rebooting on its own since. So basically FreedomPop sent me a bad battery.

The other issue I’m having is that when I called my aunt when I first got the phone, she told me that I was breaking up, so I had to call her on the landline. I noticed they have for $3.99 more per month an upgrade called Premium voice, so I bought that, but little did I know it has nothing to do with the issue that I am having. phone bars This is my problem, I have no bars in the house. If I ever want to call someone, I have to go outside and make sure I have enough bars, and when I was talking to my aunt, I WAS outside, and I was breaking up out there. So that means that I have to not only leave the house, but walk to Albertson’s where the cell tower is to be able to talk to her. I mean, I could just call her on the landline, but I have a cell phone for a reason lol. I’d like to be able to call people when my partner is using the landline.

So those are my problems. I solved 1 problem, and I tried to solve the 2nd problem at $4 extra per month, but now my problem is bars. Ugh! I can’t win. The only way I will have good service is if I have Verizon or AT&T. My phone is FreedomPop, but it uses the Sprint network, which apparently doesn’t give me any bars. I can’t afford anything else. My voice and text is $5 a month, now $9 a month with the premium voice. I guess like everything else in my life, I’ll just deal with it.

Why does FreedomPop creates a new account when you order a new phone?

On By Michel McDonaldIn Cell PhoneLeave a comment

freedompopsign-620x330

Before I say one word, I would just like to make a disclaimer that I am in no way shape or form bashing FreedomPop or any of their employees. I just want to make that clear before I get hundreds, oh wait, no one reads my blog, maybe 1 or 2 people. Carry on.

A couple of days ago I bricked my phone. I know, I’m an idiot, I’ll own that. I bought a jig from eBay to unbrick it, but it didn’t work so we went to a cell phone repair place and they told me they don’t do that kind of work. If my phone was run over by a car maybe, but if I did something to the operating system then that’s my problem, not theirs. I probably would’ve been better off if I had just run it over.

Yesterday I called FreedomPop to let them know that I broke my phone and I wanted to buy a new one. The sales girl was really nice and very helpful. She asked for a 2nd email address, which I found a bit odd, but I didn’t question it. After the call was done and she had ordered me a new phone, I verified it with the Bank of America website that my order was in fact placed, I sat patiently waiting for a bunch of emails from FreedomPop to come to me. I waited and waited the whole day until last night when it occurred to me that maybe I should check the 2nd email address that she asked me for. Sure enough 3 emails waiting for me from FreedomPop. Instead of adding a new phone to my current account, she created a new account for me and didn’t even suggest to me that perhaps I should close the other account. I mean, it would stand to reason that I wouldn’t get charged every month for a phone that won’t turn on, right?

Today when we came home from the doctor’s office I decided to call FreedomPop and ask them what the delio is with that new account and what I am going to do with the 2nd account. The girl, who sounded very similar to the girl from yesterday, but from another department was very helpful and she understood what I was telling her, but kind of not really. She said so let me get this straight, you want to close the account for your phone that doesn’t work? Uh yeah… I mean, if you’ve already created a whole new account for me, why would I keep a 2nd account? I also had $30 in that first account that I wouldn’t be getting back if I didn’t close the account.

I just think it’s a bit odd that they would think it was odd that I wanted to continue being charged a monthly fee for an account that I can’t use because the phone won’t turn on. I mean, if I ever decided to build a brick wall, my phone would be in that wall because it’s essentially a brick. It’s a $99 paperweight. Why would I pay a $30 monthly fee for a paperweight? It doesn’t make sense.

Anyway, I am happy to report that she finally understood what I was asking and she refunded me the $30 that was sitting in that account, that should help to pay for my new phone. She also cancelled my old account and I got the verification email. Now I can move on with my life again lol.

FreedomPop Debit Card Issue

On By Michel McDonaldIn Cell Phone, GadgetsLeave a comment

freedompop

Last month I bought a refurbished Samsung Galaxy S3 from Nomorerack (now Choxi) that I thought I could use with Virgin Mobile to upgrade my phone, but unfortunately for me, Virgin Mobile doesn’t allow their customers to buy unlocked phones as upgrades. If you want to upgrade your phone, you have to buy a Virgin Mobile phone or buy it through them.

My new phone is with a company that I’ve never heard of called FreedomPop. I signed up with my debit card as my payment card and everything was fine until the bank decided that my debit card had been compromised and blocked my card and issued me a new one. When my new debit card arrived, I tried changing it on the FreedomPop website so I could be charged for the next month, but unfortunately, it wouldn’t change. I used my phone to try to change it and it didn’t work, so then I went to my Nook HD+ tablet and it didn’t work, so then I went to my computer and again it did not work. I Googled the issue and found nothing that would help me.

Over the last few weeks I’ve been desperately looking for a resolution, I’ve even called them… TWICE! I called them when my account had 7 days left, and they told me they would contact me by email in 48 hours to let me know that it worked, but instead the email I received was a questionnaire on how they did. Yeah, that didn’t work for me, so I called them again and I gave them the ticket number and told them what happened and begged for help since I had 5 days left. They told me to call the bank because it must be my card and I told them that it can’t be because I’ve used my credit card and I’ve also used my PayPal debit card, and neither of them worked. So the person on the other end put me on hold and came back and said that this is an issue on their end because more customers have had to deal with this. Damn Skippy it’s a issue on your end! 24 hours passed and not an email and not a phone call. I decided to just give them another 24 hours, but still nothing.

Today, I checked my account on my phone and it said I had 3 days left, so I opened up Firefox and went to the billing page and added my credit card number, not my debit card number, and it FINALLY worked! YES! So I immediately added $30 to my account.

You know in the movies when the bomb is about to go off and the timer is going and it is 1 minute, then 30 seconds, then 20, then 15, then 10, then 5, then you start counting down 5, 4, 3, 2 and then they cut the correct wire just before it goes to 0 and the bomb doesn’t go off? I feel like that just happened, but I had 3 days left rather than 3 seconds.

The thing about FreedomPop is, if they couldn’t fix this issue, all I had to do was call them and tell them to just put me on their free plan until they could fix it. I mean, it’s not like I really need to pay for my account since I rarely call or text anyone, and I hardly ever use the 4G LTE or even 3G. I’m basically always on the WiFi with this at home. So really, it doesn’t matter, but I just like having the peace of mind knowing that I can have unlimited phone calls and texting just in case I ever come out of my shell and decide that I can’t shut the f up and have to call everyone and their mother. You know, just in case.

Anyway, if you are having an issue like this with FreedomPop, try a new browser and try a new card, if that doesn’t work then call them and keep calling them until they fix it. If they can’t fix it, then just go to their free plan.

New Samsung Galaxy S3 Phone with FreedomPop Service

On By Michel McDonaldIn TechLeave a comment

phones

My new Samsung Galaxy S3 came a couple of days ago. I was going to activate it as a pre-paid phone with Sprint, but the Quick Start card that came with the phone was from FreedomPop. It said FreedomPop on the Nomorerack (now Choxi) website, and I dismissed that since I figured I would activate it with Sprint. Anyway, check out the difference from my old HTC One V (left) from Virgin Mobile compared to the new phone (right). Huge difference!

The sound quality was HORRIFIC when I made my first phone call to our landline lol. Well, first of all there wasn’t any sound at all. My partner could hear me just fine, but with a ton of static, but I couldn’t hear him at all. We hung up and tried again and it was still bad, but I figured out how to turn the mic volume down and suddenly he could hear me just fine, and no static. I called my aunt and it sounded like she picked up the phone, but there wasn’t anyone on the other line, and then the line was dead. I called her the next day and the timer was going, but I couldn’t hear anything. I figured perhaps she could hear me, I just couldn’t hear her, but when I called her on my Virgin Mobile cell phone which is still active for another month, she told me she could barely hear me at all on my new phone. She said it sounded garbled. Ugh!

By the way, my aunt has a Samsung Galaxy S2 and she told me that when she turns her head, no one can hear or understand her. This is supposed to be the crème de la crème of phones, so why do they suck for making phone calls?

Today I went to the FreedomPop website to get help. I found out that this is a common issue. Well shit, why is it that I always seem to get something that has a common issue? I installed Minecraft PE on the new phone and for some odd reason it wasn’t installing specific files, and guess what? It’s a common issue. So here I am with this awesome phone that I can’t make calls with.

Several people on the message boards on the FreedomPop website said that they could not make a phone call without wifi being turned on, so I thought what if that is my problem? What if I turned OFF the wifi on my phone and see what happens, so I called my Virgin mobile cell phone and it was perfect. I could hear myself on both phones. I can call my new cell phone from another phone and it works with WiFi turned on, but I can’t call out with it turned on. Well, that’s still not right that I have to remember to turn the WiFi off just to be able to make a phone call. Oh and by the way, it was garbled. I could hear myself perfectly fine on the Samsung speaker, but on the Virgin speaker, I could hear myself garbled from the Samsung mic. It’s also too low, and now I can’t find where the mic volume is lol. I can’t win!

I have a Bluetooth watch that I just bought last month and it seems to work with my new phone, but the call quality, not so much. I tried calling my Virgin mobile phone with it and I couldn’t hear anything. Ugh! Perhaps a Samsung bluetooth ear piece might work?

When I first activated the phone on my computer, it told me it was sending me a new phone. I can’t even remember what kind of phone it was, but I figured it was probably something they do for customers who want service, but don’t have a phone, but then again I did activate an actual phone, so I don’t know. I thought that perhaps it was a mistake, but then I got this today.

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If they actually do send me a new phone and it works, I would be curious to know if Choxi would give me a refund and allowed me to send their refurbished phone back to them. The point of me buying the Samsung Galaxy S3 was to get a kick ass phone with 16GB, not to get a phone that probably only has 1GB, then I’d be back to where I was before with my Virgin Mobile phone. I can forgive the Minecraft issue because I can just play that on my Nook HD+, but I need to be able to make phone calls, and if the Samsung one will just work as a phone, then I’d like to just use that and not a free phone from FreedomPop. I wonder if I can keep both and just use the new one for calls, but the Samsung one for apps and texting and data. I don’t know if they would allow me to have service on 2 phones though, so that’s a good question. I just don’t want to have to go back to a phone with 1GB lol. I bought this Samsung one for a reason dammit!

Ugh, I’m so beyond frustrated. Why does this always happen to me? Why is it that the thing (technology) I love the most, hates me the most? I will definitely be back if/when a new phone comes and I get to speak with someone over at FreedomPop about my issue.