Kroger I-Wireless Rip Off!

by Yank
(Florence, KY)

The I-wireless policy regarding your expiration date on your prepaid airtime is to subtract any time you have left when you add additional airtime. Any unused minutes will roll over but not expiration time forcing you to either use them or let them pile up.



I contacted I-wireless regarding this and they politely explained to me that this information is on the back of airtime cards. They could not however explain to me why this information is not disclosed before or during the purchase of the phone or the service. An airtime card is not required when the initial purchase is transacted. This information is purposely withheld and you do not find out until you have already purchased their phone, which can't be used with any other service, and activated their service, which lures you in with free minutes to get started.


In my opinion, the act of purposely not disclosing this information prior to the purchase is perpetrating fraud upon the consumer.

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Feb 14, 2023
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Mistaken Billing NEW
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Wow, that super annoying! Their site definitely states that it's $15 effective monthly rate paid every 3 months for at $45.

Unfortunately, as this site is not affiliated with Kroger Wireless, you'll need to call back and request to talk to a supervisor. Ask them to check that your account is in fact on the correct plan, and note the incorrect billing.

Worst case is you can chargeback on your credit card (assuming you paid via credit card). HOWEVER, that likely would mean that they would suspend your account, so this is only a last resort solution to get your money back. Then you'd likely have to open a new account with a different provider. There are lots of providers with that same plan. ex. Mint Mobile has a $15/month plan with 4GB (instead of Korger's 3GB). There are other options as well that you can explore.

THAT SAID, it would be best for you to call them and resolve the error. Please let us know what they say!
Feb 14, 2023
Rating
star 		Beyond Being Ripped Off NEW
by: Anonymous

I signed up for the $15.00 mo plan. The deal was I had to pay $45 every 3 months with auto pay to get the deal. I signed up in Dec. 2021 They took out a payment of $49.78 on Feb. 8th, Feb. 16, May 17, June 17, Aug 15, Sept 13, Nov 13, Dec 12. That is grossly overcharging my account. I can't speak to a supervisor as that is not allowed and the operators don't know shit.
Oct 19, 2020
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Poor Customer Service NEW
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Wow, that sounds super frustrating! I agree, it's super annoying when you call customer service and they don't have any tools that allow them to do anything more than you can do yourself.

Typically they do have access that we wouldn't have; not sure what's going on with your specific situation. What happens when you try to create an account? Maybe it's a system issue and if you try again you'll be good....?
Oct 18, 2020
Rating
star 		They stole my money NEW
by: Anonymous

I bought a phone from QFC and tried to activate it on krogerwireless website. During the "Create Account" process, it says it can't create an account and said to call their customer service. I called them and the woman with a thick hispanic accent who I had trouble understanding tried to create an account manually.

She comes back after a few minutes and says she can't create an account and has NO IDEA what to do. She literally did what I just did online. What's the point of her job then? Why do they even pay those people if all they do is enter info on the website that any functioning human being can do?

She doesn't know what to do and goes silent for a moment. And then? What's the next steps??? Some customer service skill you got you incompetent trash. Then she finally says she'll submit a report to her supervisor and hopefully she contacts me on Monday, as sups don't work on weekends.

After 3 days and $40 spent on phone and $25 spent on minutes/data, I still don't have a phone I can use. And the phone I got loses battery power so fast that I can barely get 7 hours of STANDBY time. I'm not even using it. Just sitting there doing nothing and battery drains. DO NOT BUY KROGER WIRELESS!! THEY WILL STEAL FROM YOU AND BLAME YOU INSTEAD!! I can't believe a well-known company like Kroger SCAMS people like this. ABSOLUTELY DISGUSTING THEIVES!!
May 14, 2020
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Unbelievable! NEW
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Wow, you purchased the phone from their website and they're stating it's incompatible! That's truly outrageous. Could they even explain how that could be the case?

I understand the virus situation has taken a toll on most call centers, and general business operations, so delays can be expected. However, how could they sell you an incompatible phone?!
May 14, 2020
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Refunds & Sales Department
by: Cindy Steele

I bought a Motorola one action phone on April 5th and received it on April 11th. If called on the 13th to get my number and account switched over and they tell me the phone wasn't authorized by I wireless but I bought it off their website!! They told me to call the sales department and I did and I went around with him about being "authorized" and finally he said it should be activated in 24 to 72 hours and if it didn't call back.Well it never worked and I tried calling back EVERY day but no one ever answers the phone!!

Finally they told me I can get a refund and I sent it back on April 29th and they received it May 4th. Still waiting for a refund so I can get a New phone. I keep calling the sales department but no one ever answers the phone. I have been without a phone for over a month now and I still don't have a refund yet!! I have no way to check my email because I don't have a phone or a computer and no one will call me back!!

I've been with this carrier for five years and I've never had this much trouble!! This is the worst customer service I've ever had!! People need to do their jobs and ANSWER the phones!!!!!! I'm so ready to go somewhere else. It's almost been two weeks seen they got my phone and still NOTHING!!!!!
Apr 27, 2020
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Changing Credit Card
by: D

I have a I wireless app on my phone, it doesn’t allow you to change your credit card for automatic payment.
Oct 23, 2019
Rating
star 		Kroger Wireless is A Rip Off
by: Karen

Every since I Wireless changed to Kroger Wireless in May 2019 I have had nothing but trouble. Every month on the day my payment is due my service was turned off at 7:17pm every month I complained but no one could explain why. I have lost 5 hours of service each moth since May. I own my phone I decided to switch companies to day October 7,2019 I went to Cricket Wireless where my phone was checked and verified that I could transfer to them once the rep Lauren did all the steps to set up my phone with Cricket and my phone wouldn't work the rep noticed it said their was a lock on the Sim card and to call so we called Sprint because that was where my service came from they told us Kroger would have to take the lock of so we called them. Those so called customer service reps were so nasty and unprofessional to the Cricket rep it was disgusting they told her they would not unlock the sim card because they did not allow their customers to take their phones to different companies even though I own my phone and am not under any kind of contract they refused to unlock it. I had to buy a new phone from Cricket that I should not have to buy seeing I have not even had my phone for a year. I have prepaid service because I like the freedom to change carriers if I want I was not anticipating being held hostage held by Kroger Wireless! They also stole phone service from me every month by turning my phone off at 7:17 every month on my Due date!! Stay Away from them!!!
Jun 30, 2019
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Simple works for me
by: Anonymous

I'm happy with my Kroger phone I have the LG stylus a nice thin phone with a large screen. Anyway I shop at Kroger and my sister is also added to my card. My life is simple and I do not need a phone service other than a very simple and basic one. I do the 10 dollar plan and for years this has worked well for me with the shopping that me and my sister do it adds enough credit that each month my phone is FREE.
Jun 18, 2019
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Extending the Expiration Date Issue
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

I definitely agree! Even with old pay-as-you-go plans where funds expire after 90 days, if you add money at any point in time prior to the 90 days, the new 90 days starts counting down from that day. So, as you said, it's best to wait until the last possible moment.

Do, however, be careful with respect to when your plan (or minutes) expire. Is it at midnight on the day noted, or at the end of the day noted? If it's at midnight you could be out of service until you pay, and be kicked off of any promotion or bonus you get for maintaining service for a period of time.

This happened to me once when I lost $300 on a prepaid phone that I had accumulated over a period of years when I topped up on the due date, which was actually triggered at midnight!

Now I set a calendar even to topup the day before, even though I don't know if their timer rules have changed.

If you can sign up for automatic payment you can also eliminate this issue with monthly plans.

I agree, though, they should allow you to extend service by 30 days FROM THE DATE of the last 30 day period that you purchased.
Jun 15, 2019
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Stealing days from customers
by: Mary Pierce

Make sure not to put minutes on your phone until the day it’s due because Kroger Wireless will steal your days away from you.
I added money to my account two days ahead of time that was texted to me from Kroger Wireless that my plan would expire. I added funds to purchase a rate plan. I purchased my normal $35 rate plan and that caused me to lose 2 days. In my opinion to me that’s stealing time from a customer who previously paid for those 30 days of full service.
They need new software that will acknowledge when your plan expires and when funds are added they will adjust accordingly to the next 30 days.
May 23, 2019
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Switching to I-Wireless
by: Mimi So

We had I-Wireless before it switched to Kroger I -Wireless and it was terrific. The only issue is with wording. The cards say they are good for 1 month but that is a bald-faced lie. The cards are good for only 30 days. Since there are 31 days in a month 5 times a year, you end up with a new re-start day in those months. Ironically, in February, they don't ADD days to the month like they take them away the other months. I am wondering if I am going to be able to continue using my not Kroger Android phone, though when they complete the takeover.
Sep 25, 2018
Rating
starstarstarstar 		yes rip off
by: Gale

I have bought several phones and on an average they might last 3 month without something going wrong with the phone. They need better phones. Customer service sucks cause it sounds like the person you are talking to are reading from a book and working from home because I have heard a dog barking. Also you better check your account regularly because I have had my phone number to earn my point erased and I shop a lot at Kroger so this cost me points and money I had to pay because of the points I didn't get credit for that I could have used to put minutes on the phone. The web site is confusing and if you have a question you can't get an answer from the site and I hate calling customer service. when I found a way you can activate your phone without calling I was so happy.
May 22, 2018
Rating
starstar 		They used to be OK
by: Anonymous

I used them for years $30/mo and have gone through about 3 Android phones with them but they changed the game. I had about 800 minutes left from rollover, down from a couple thousand. They said I could keep them but the minutes disappeared after a few months without me using it. I didn't mind the new system where you lose whatever you didn't use but one month I ran out of minutes and knew I was missing important calls because they took my rolled over minutes. Goodbye iwireless and hello metropcs with unlimited minutes and 2 gb 4g lte data instead of 200 mins and 500mb 3G data for the same money. Good riddance!
May 22, 2018
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Customer service was a big help
by: Anonymous

I have been a customer for a few years now and it is pretty good.I had to transfer another phone because my old one was dying.The customer service went out of his way to help me.Very surprised.
May 04, 2018
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Happy customer
by: Anonymous

I have had Kroger service for 2 years and I love it. I'm not tied down to a plan. I pay $35 mo for unlimited service. If you compare this to other phone plan, who cares about a few lost minutes. If you think you got ripped off than try Verizon or some other service provider. I love this service.
Apr 26, 2018
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Finally Ported Over my Number
by: Anonymous

Regarding Kroger Iwireless porting my old number over to Consumer Cellular , they finally got it done after TWELVE DAYS. I had to file a complaint with the FTC via their webpage complaint form. Shocker...the FTC actually got involved and solved the problem within 48 hours.
Oct 24, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Porting Problems
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Porting with any carrier can be a huge pain. When you call out from your new phone, does it display the old or new phone number? If you're still getting incoming calls to your old phone, I suspect that the porting hasn't completed.

Make sure to turn your old phone off. It can take 7-10 days when things don't work smoothly. I would describe smoothly as minutes or a couple of hours at most.

It could be issues on the i-wireless end not releasing the account, or with your new carrier not submitting the correct porting data for the porting request. It's hard for any outsider to really conclude where the problem lies.

I hope it works out for you soon!
Oct 23, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Hard to Port from i-wireless
by: Anonymous

Yes, I was an i-wireless customer since the days when they gave you a free phone for signing up, and they had an inventory of phones in the store.
I liked the unlimited everything, plus the Kroger Points paid for my cell service monthly fee.

Yet, the customer service went downhill fast, and presently I'm in the process of porting to a new carrier. Problem is getting i-wireless to release the number. I can call out on the new carrier, but if called it goes to the old carrier.

So, i-wireless is still being a pain in the ass.
Last straw was I bought a new phone, GSM, wideband CDMA and LTE. They only do plain CDMA. Not the wideband. So, time to seek better service.
Oct 10, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Run From Them!
by: Gregory Hix

They are also too dumb to figure out what automatic means. I have auto reload, and they turn it off every month when they should refill it. But no more dumping them; stay away!
Aug 17, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Losing Your Phone Number
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

I hate the fact that there's so much risk when you want to port your number out to a new carrier. Especially when issues arise like the one below where they accidentally cancel your account, and it's virtually impossible to get the number back.

Regarding the situation below, I'm actually surprised they weren't able to reinstate the account with the previous phone number. Even when accounts expire due to lack of funds, there's a period of time where you can pay and easily reactivate the account.

That said, perhaps if the phone was for emergencies only, too much time passed before discovering the problem, and the account went past expiration into cancellation.

Anyway, for about a decade now I've been using Google Voice. I can't recall if it was $10 or $20 to port my number to Google Voice, however, it was well worth it. Especially with smartphones, in conjunction with the Google Voice app, I can receive calls, and make calls from my normal number without anyone ever getting confused by seeing the underlying carrier phone number.

What I mean by this is that in the early days, I could easily receive calls (obviously), however, when I called out, people would see my carrier phone number, and not know it's me. Now, with the app, that issue is gone completely.

Note that you can use Google Voice without porting in your number, however, you don't get this level of seamless experience.

Sure, there's a risk that Google Voice goes away, however, I'm very confident that there would be sufficient notice for me to port the number out to my carrier. I feel the risk of the carrier screwing up my number/account is far greater. This way I have full control, including much better voicemail and other features.

I actually never even launch the Google Voice app on my phone; it's all seamless. You can set it up to automatically always call from your Google Voice number, or prompt you on each call, or only use it for international calls.

Anyway, for people concerned about the issue described by the poster below, I recommend considering Google Voice. It provides another level of freedom to switch carriers without the risk of losing your number!

Lastly, in case anyone is wondering, I'm not compensated for recommending Google Voice; this is simply my personal experience over the past decade.
Aug 17, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		You need to call the Rip Off for what it really is KROGER
by: Anonymous

I got my i-wireless phone back in 2010 while working for the Census. Boost crapped out right during an important time. Bought the Samsung slider phone and service was great. Earned min with my shopping and they had great plans.

About 2012 things began to go south. They dropped some plans and the shopping bonus cut in half. Then around 2013-14 they began making it difficult to get to a customer service rep and cut the service hours way back. Every time you figure out a back door they'd board it up.

I will say though that once you got there the reps were very helpful. Then in 2015 as Sprint was taking over Clearwater and selling themselves to Softbank, phone service too began to suffer.

Seeing the inevitable 4G LTE, and not sure how the relationship with SB was going to be, they quit selling phones in the stores. I think at that point Kroger pretty much want us paying customers to go elsewhere for our phone but keep shopping at the stores.

This past 8 months have gotten to be the worst. In March my phone couldn't connect. I managed to get to a customer rep who couldn't get it to work, so he gave me a big credit to my account. He also told me they were going to outsource CS, but thought they had talked them out of it. A few hours later the phone was working fine again.

I concluded they were testing 4G LTE in our area. I thought I'd better upgrade the phone. Kroger wanted ridiculous money for their refurb phones. I went out and bought a Sprint comp Galaxy S5. When I called to set it up, domestic customer service was gone. Kroger really wants us paying customers to go away unless you get the big $ plans, but keep the government hand outs. DS
Aug 08, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		18 Days Now!
by: Anonymous

"Have you considered applying with a different lifeline provider". Ha Ha. Guess what? I am not a Lifeline customer, I actually PAY for this kind of treatment!

Recap:
1. Kroger I-Wireless changed my plan without notifying me, and started charging 25c per incoming text. My account drained of $50 in 10 days.

2. Customer Service tells me I let my account balance expire, therefore I no longer have an account. Back & forth with this for days.

3. A supervisor finally figures out that they made an error and will call me back when my phone is working. My phone never starts working so he can't call me back on it. Customer Service replies "well he's been trying to call you on your cellphone but you have it off". I give them my home phone but nobody ever calls.

4. Several calls to this supervisor but I never reach him again. He is on vacation. He is back from vacation but today & tomorrow are his regular days off. Yes he was back today but he went home already. On and on and on.

5. Decide to buy a new phone/ new carrier. New carrier needs my old phone number & account number. I call i-wireless "you have no account so I can't give you your account number".

6. Call to speak to supervisor and find out my account was reinstated and my $50 balance renewed! Yay

7. Phone still isn't working. New customer agent says I don't have an account. Back & forth and a new supervisor says my account was re-instated, but I need to buy a new phone; they cannot turn mine back on.

8. I tell them thanks but no thanks as I have found a new carrier.

9. My new carrier Consumer Cellular cannot get me my old phone number because Kroger i-wireless is apparently holding it hostage. They estimate 72 business hours to transfer my number and say that Sat & Sun don't count and they only work 12 hour days, so 72 hours means 6 days. I explain to them that 72 business hours is not 6 days but, whatever. Agent offers me some halo-halo and some ube cake.

10. Waiting....Waiting....Waiting.....18 days with no emergency phone.
Aug 01, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Wow Again!
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

It's really unbelievable that your phone still isn't re-activated again! Have you considered applying with a different Lifeline provider?

That's super interesting regarding Access and Assurance parting ways. I hadn't heard that. I'll definitely keep my eyes out for any official news.

I hope you find a resolution soon!
Jul 31, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		11 Days..........Still No Phone
by: Anonymous

I reached out to Assurance Wireless via facebook and apparently that "merger" did not go through. So we are stuck with the non-existent Access Wireless/Kroger I-Wireless customer service. Today they told me that all supervisors are on vacation. When I laughed the guy said "are you calling me a liar?" I said yes, I am.

From Assurance Wireless FYI: "Sprint and i-wireless made the mutual decision to terminate the joint venture agreement, and will instead continue to operate as stand-alone service providers. We really hope they can assist you."
Jul 26, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Oh Man...
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Thanks for the update. Wow, they're really lost it over there! I hope they get your situation resolved ASAP. I can only imagine how frustrated you are.
Jul 26, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		6 Days In, Still No Service
by: Anonymous

Update! Day 6. Reached a new customer service agent who at least knew how to research my case...stated that "escalation" is noted and the process of re-instating my cellphone service has been approved. But the process is "ongoing" and someone will contact me with an update. SIX DAYS!!! One of the problems is that they keep trying to contact me VIA CELLPHONE, but my cellphone was mistakenly DE-ACTIVATED. Duh! They told me to go online for a status update, but you guessed it....when I log on to i-wireless there is no record of my account anymore.
Jul 25, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		De-Activating Phones
by: Anonymous

Not only are they de-activating service without warning, but if you're lucky enough to reach a supervisor, they'll tell you that it's going to take 5 days to re-activate.

This is my emergency car phone, I'm not happy since I travel at night. And who knows if my phone will actually be working in 5 days. I imagine I will have to phone them back and start this frustration of customer service non-service all over again.
Jul 24, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Clarification
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Hmm...I'm not sure what's going on that they would be deactivating phones without notice or transition. There may be some kind of transition due to Assurance Wireless and Access Wireless being combined. If so, they're clearly experiencing problems!

Note that i-wireless and Access Wireless are the same company, and always have been. i-wireless is the prepaid brand, while Access is the Lifeline free cell phone service brand. Sprint divested its Lifeline brand, Assurance Wireless, which is being taken over by i-wireless under the Access brand.

The advice below to address your problem is certainly wise. I hope you get your phone reactivated!
Jul 24, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		In Reply to PATRICK
by: Anonymous

Hey Patrick - To contact their insane customer service you must select "I am calling to activate a new phone". That's the only way to get a real person. This person will give you the runaround about why your service was lost. Three of them ended up hanging up on me when I asked for a supervisor.

Finally on my 4th try I was connected to a supervisor named "Ben" who said that all the I-wireless phones are deactivating, and they are now owned by Access Wireless. Only a supervisor can re-activate your phone and it takes 5 days.
I will check back here in 5 days to let you know if they really did re-activate my phone. After 72 hours it is still not working, this is my phone for emergencies so this is very frustrating.

Bottom Line you MUST demand to speak to a supervisor, because the regular phone agents don't know a thing about this problem and just tell you to buy a new phone & open a new account.
Jul 24, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		kroger i-wireless
by: Patrick

This is the worst company ever. Went to use my phone, received message "your account can not be verified" WTH! have had this account for 10 years. Trying to call customer service is a joke, there is not one live person to talk to.
Jul 24, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		They've been pretty good for me
by: Shielah

I've used the, the past 4 years, never have to put any money on my Kroger points pay for the phone every month...free is the best...how can you complain about that. You can Boyd or buy theirs, any sprint phone will work, yea, I'd be nice if they still sold.them in krogers, but u can get them on Craigslist or Ebay cheap enough..u want better than free then you need to pay for it, go somewhere else then, idk..I think they are awesome.
Jul 21, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		They are de-activating accounts!
by: Anonymous

I had iwireless/Kroger service for 8 years. Every 3 months they sent an sms text telling me it was time to add money to my account. In March of this year this stopped. And, they changed my plan without any notice whatsoever. Previously I paid only for outgoing texts, nothing for incoming texts. Suddenly without notice they charged me 25c per incoming text and this drained my account. They did not send any sms message telling me to add funds to my account. Getting through to customer service has been a nightmare, with 3 different agents hanging up on me after I demanded to speak to a supervisor. The agents had told me there was nothing I could do, I must start a new account with a new phone number (after 8 years with the same number) and that my balance was zero which is why my account deactivated.
Additional info: This has all happened since "IWireless" became part of "AccessWireless" this year and it is a complete mess.
Jun 21, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Replacement Denied?
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Thank you for sharing your experience. Did they say why a replacement was denied? It makes not sense!

Assuming you used a credit card to make the online purchase, have you tried make a claim with them? Most cards have some degree of purchase protection.

Anyway, I hope you get a good, reliable phone back on your account!
Jun 21, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Good service if you bring your own phone
by: Anonymous

I have been Kroger I Wireless for over three years now. My rewards have paid for all but three months of my service. However, Sprint made updates to the system, causing my Sanyo flip phone to not work properly. I was told that buying a new phone would fix the issue. I spent $90.00 on a refurbished LG Stylo and received it with the screen not properly working. I dealt with it a couple of weeks and then was denied a replacement from QUALITY 1 wireless, who the phones are actually from. I am currently trying to buy a phone from another carrier to bring to Kroger I Wireless. I had to reactivate my old flip phone in the meantime. Again, Kroger I Wireless is great if you shop Kroger's a lot, and build a lot of fuel and Wireless rewards, just DO NOT BUY A PHONE FROM THEIR WEBSITE!
Jun 06, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		No Explanation?!
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Wow, that's frustrating! Did they give you an explanation as to why it was deactivated without notice? Had you not topped up in a long time, and the funds and account expired? Did they give you an explanation as to why that phone can't be reactivated? Is it an old 3G phone, and they only activate 4G LTE phones now?

That's why I like Google Voice. Keeping your phone number there gives you full control. It doesn't matter what your carrier does to screw up your account and phone number. However, this really only applies to people who use smartphones as they can be setup to always dial out from your Google Voice number, so there's no extra work for you, or confusion from others ever seeing the underlying phone number.
Jun 06, 2017
Rating
star 		They deeactivated my phone without warning
by: Anonymous

Had my Sanyo Flip-phone from I-wireless for maybe 10 years now and I go to use it today to find out it has been deactivated. When I FINALLY was able to talk to someone, they said that my number was gone and they could not reactivate. Customer service rep could not understand why this was such a problem and told me to go get another phone on their website and get a new number. Will be a cold day in hell, first.
May 25, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i-wireless Feedback
by: Anonymous

I enjoy using i-wireless. It's very inexpensive and simple. I buy minutes when I want. I don't care about anything else. Mainstream phone service will rob you ten times as much.
Jan 23, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Not A Good Sign
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

If they're no longer selling their phones in their own stores, that's definitely not a good sign that the program is profitable and being supported!
Jan 20, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i-Wireless Went Downhill & Probably Will Go Away Soon
by: Anonymous

Be aware that your phone number is NOT your account number. You have to call them to get it because it is nowhere to be found even if you login to manage your account.

I had been an i-wireless subscriber since 2009, switching to them from an 11 year old Verizon account to save money after the economy crashed. In 2014 they changed the rollover minutes policy, and I lost ~800 minutes of inconveniently accumulated rollover minutes, despite them telling me I would not lose them, just that they would not accumulate any further.

A couple of days before my month reset in Sept 2016, I accidentally ran out of minutes, but needed the phone desperately for new jobs. Luckily, I'd had a Freedom phone @ ~$20 month with a random number (pretty useless for calls) the past year as a backup. So I texted important contacts to use that number for a couple of days.

I decided to say goodbye to i-wireless as they were useless when I really needed my phone. Fortunately, I called them for my account number to discover it was NOT my phone number and *only* they knew what it was. I dumped both them and Freedom @ ~$50 a month for kludgy and unreliable service (i-wireless was only 3G since they could not get my 4G WiMax phone to ever pass data even when connected. And Freedom at 4G was slower than i-wireless 3G tied to Sprint).

I switched to MetroPCS for unlimited everything except for 1Gb data at 4G; what a relief. I even qualified for a free phone switching from a Sprint MVNO, but opted to get a better phone for $40 more. What a relief!

Guys, you are better off switching to MetroPCS for $30/mo all inclusive. I was paying i-wireless $30 a month for 200 min and 200 MB. Thus my Freedom phone backup, $20 a month for 1GB of slow 4G, unusable VoIP, and most of my data used up by ads.

I-wireless does not have the clout of a large subscriber base to provide competitive minutes and data from Sprint, and Sprint themselves are a crooked company, just like the defunct MCI communications of the '80s-'90s. I think they are the same company with a different name, but the same crooked way of doing business, but that's another story.

Other than that, my experience with i-wireless was decent, but I think they themselves are victims of not getting any flexibility from the crooked Sprint. As they say, $#!T rolls downhill, in this case, from Sprint to us.
Jan 12, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Wow...
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

...that sounds super frustrating! Is the phone no longer under warranty so you can resolve the turning off and on issue?

In terms of data usage, is it possible that you have some apps on your phone (it's a smartphone, right?) that is consuming data? For example, Facebook or other social media that is updating in the background even though you're not proactively using these apps? Or perhaps Google Play is updating apps automatically, which is the default setting?
Jan 12, 2017
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		No Help
by: Anonymous

I have had issues with my LG phone for a few months (after I have used it without any problem for at least 5 years). It started with the phone turning itself on and off. So I reached their customer support and they went through a few things to fix some default settings that were screwed up. We did not reprogram the whole phone because I have pics on it, and I would have to first send those off that I want to keep.

Then, last month, I would lose the assigned Megabytes very quickly and, when I was out and about, couldn't get on the Internet to check my email, which I need to do for my business. I hardly use the Internet on the phone for anything else but have done so in the past, watched some videos or visited some websites, and never had a problem using up all my assigned Megabytes, even though I usually went with the monthly prepaid $10.00 all-in plan.

So last month, a few days into my new month, I got the message "You have run out of balance" with a link to buy more megabytes. I called and the rep said that it doesn't take long to lose all those Bytes, and wouldn't budge when I told him that that seems very strange since I never had that problem in the past.

Anyway, I renewed right there and then for the prepaid $25 all-in-plan and had no problem (except the phone still arbitrarily turns itself on and off (it can happen during a conversation on the phone) until Jan. 8 when the one month plan expired.

This time I renewed again with the $10.00 plan, and today, only 4 days later, I don't have enough Megabytes left to use the Internet when I am in my car. Same message: You ran out of balance.

I called them again, told them I only checked my email and visited a few websites (no videos!!) but all I got, after the rep checked with her supervisor, was that I supposedly used all those Megabytes, and that there is nothing they can do for me. The fact that my phone still turns itself off and on whenever didn't seem to bother them and I was done wasting my time. I'll be looking for a different provider and phone.

And, I also find it ridiculous that you can't buy their phones at Kroger anymore. Well, I guess, Kroger doesn't want to be bothered. It's all very inconvenient.
Jan 08, 2017
Rating
star 		Do NOT buy Kroger i-Wireless "Q1 sales"
by: Anonymous

Yikes, Kroger has totally gone downhill this past year--used to be fine wireless, until they started outsourcing?

I ordered a $130+ phone on Kroger.com and was sent one that's defective--totally did not work right from the first second & shut off nonstop.

I regret I fought via phone & email to get a replacement, wasted my time & energy, & a pitiful 6 weeks later they finally sent one. But guess what, it's used & grimy! I paid for a new phone.

This company is DISHONEST to say the least. Spread the word. Do not use them. You'll kiss your $ goodbye. Theft is punishable by jail time. Why are these people being allowed to do this?
Dec 28, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Kroger iwireless
by: Sharon Needles

I've had i-wireless for 6yrs and the same phone. My phone has stopped working and I need a new one. I am pissed kroger doesn't sell them anymore, but still sell cards for adding min. Guess I have to buy one online and wait for it...so dumb.
Nov 28, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Account Number
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Yes, for i-wireless your account number is your phone number. You'll also need your PIN.
Nov 26, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Account Number
by: Anonymous

Is my Kroger i-wireless account number still my phone number? I want to go with a different company, but getting access to a real person is nearly impossible.
Oct 26, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Assurance Wireless Becoming Access Wireless
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

I actually just posted the following last night on another thread regarding this topic:

I was able to get in contact with someone at Assurance wireless, and they provided the following feedback. The website is pretty comprehensive.

"The Assurance Wireless customers don't need to take any action to stay with Access Wireless. They will continue to use the same phone with the same telephone number. And, they will receive as many or more free minutes, texts and data. Please review our FAQ's at:"

Access - Provider Change

One important point for Assurance customers to keep in mind is the following:

"Assurance Wireless customers who have Virgin Mobile Top-Up cards must add them to their accounts by November 30, 2016. Virgin Mobile cards will not work at Access Wireless."

I hope this helps answer everyone's questions!
Oct 26, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Can someone explain: Virgin Mobile, Assurance Wireless, Access Wireless (Kroger Wireless) switch over?
by: Anonymous

It may sound like something is not right, but here's the deal. Virgin Mobile's Assurance Wireless is now becoming Access Wireless and upon learning about the Kroger Wireless connection, I thought something is wrong here. Now, I live in Florida. Quite interesting to know there is no Kroger or Fred Meyer store here. (I lived in WA and knew Fred Meyer) but I have Virgin Mobile and I'm considering an Assurance Wireless, as the cost for a phone service is quite expensive. They offer a $20 monthly plan, but not what I could afford when food is needed most. Reading some of the reviews here is giving me second thoughts on the Assurance Wireless switch. But, how many in Florida knows about this wireless takeover and do they know what's in store for them if it happens?
Sep 20, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Ripped By Kroger
by: Anonymous

Most stores have stopped selling their own phones, and yes you loose your minutes and everything else each month, will not replace a dead phone, and generally terrible service. And, their app doesn't come close to working. A failed attempt to get into the phone business.
Sep 06, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		A Little Confused
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Regarding your old cell phone not working, how old are we talking? If you had WiMAX phone, that makes sense (though I don't think iwireless ever had WiMAX phone), however, if it's 3G vs. 4G LTE, your old 3G phone will work fine. What exactly did they tell you about which network was upgraded and why your phone wouldn't work?

You should be able able to add $100 to your account. If your plan is $50, it will take $50 out on the due date and provide you with 30 days of service. Then on the next month it will deduct the next $50. How did they explain that it works? Your funds won't expire at the end of 30 days.

Note, however, that even with classic pay as you go plans, your money DOES expire eventually; usually after 90 days. I think it's important to understand the specifics of your plan, and what the expected vs. actual behavior of the plan is. Please let me know if you can share what plan you're on, and I can take a look at their website to see what might be going on.
Sep 06, 2016
Rating
star 		Worst Prepaid Cell
by: prepaid hell

I have been with I wireless for 6 plus yes, and have 2 cells. I have had soo many problems. I was told recently that I needed to upgrade my cell phone because Sprint was upgrading their towers. After talking to one of the I Wireless customer care personnel they told me that Sprint has already done most of the upgrades, and there's a possibility that my phone will still work.

Sprint has like 10 sister companies. How many people went out and bought new cell phones that did not need to? My phone still works on their new upgrade. But I did go out and buy the LG Stylo 2. Because I was told that I could go out and buy any Sprint phone and it would work on their system.

Well that was not true. Luckily I was able to return that cell phone and get reimbursed. The next problem is you can put $100 on your account and let's say you only use half of that so you still have $50 on your account. That $50 will not cover your next month's bill. You have to add more money.

I thought this was a prepaid cell service. I used to put like $100 on my account, because sometimes I didn't have the time to put money on monthly. Why can you put cash in your account and then that cash is no longer good. I Wireless is the worst prepaid cell company.
Aug 15, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Complaing About Service
by: james

I've had i-wireless for 6 years, and have had 0 problems, and they have excellent techs that help and get you up and talking.
Jul 23, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Great Deal
by: Michelle

I don't know why these PPL are complaining, but I know they are just as good as any other company and a lot cheaper!!!!!!!!
Jul 23, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		They Are Great
by: Michelle

I have had I-wireless for 10 plus yrs an never had a problem with anything!!!!!!!! I guess some PPL are just impossible to please...SMDH
Jul 22, 2016
Rating
star 		BEWARE
by: Anonymous

Do NOT go with this company. So many many many excuses as to why people that use their services are left without service after a disaster hits. I've been without service for 6 days and they still give the run around as to when service will be restored. Upon asking how they will compensate the answer is vague.

Never had a company that doesn't know how to run a business on a good day, but has no problem leaving a customer "I don't know" when you will get service again. Run fast and far from this company.
Jul 11, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Wow!
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Thank you for sharing your experience. That's really disturbing! It would be great if you could talk with someone there to find out what happened. When they re-instated service the first time, what did they say happened?

I wonder if that $5 plan you were on was a legacy plan that they couldn't re-activate. It's not uncommon for carriers to change plans, and grandfather users into the old plans, however, customers can never add these old plans again. So even if they accidentally removed you, their system may not allow them to add it back.

Obviously, that's not an excuse for your situation of course. They really should have a mechanism to make you whole, and hopefully they didn't intentionally kick you off the old plan without any kind of notice that that plan was ending.

FYI - I have a Boost Mobile feature phone that I use as an emergency phone in the house for the kids, and for out of country visitors. It costs me $5 (+tax) every 90 days! And the cash accumulates if it's not spent. I haven't come across a better deal than that!
Jul 09, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		They Stopped My Service
by: Anonymous

I have had my phone and service for years. I only make a couple of calls a month, and don't text. I need it for emergencies. I had a $5 per month plan, and got free minutes for shopping at Kroger. It was automatically billed to my debit card. I was stranded one day and tried to call my husband. I had no service. They had apparently dropped my service. It was supposedly fixed and taken care of and my service was reinstated. However, it went from $5 a month to $45. I have been dropped again and I can't get anybody on the phone to find out why. I'm going to Consumer Cellular. I need a phone for emergencies.
May 18, 2016
Rating
star 		awful coverage
by: Grampaw

Used Wireless for 3-4 yrs and sprint network promised better service in central Virginia area. So far can't get online with iPhone and 3G service the best we get. Awful sprint coverage choose someone else in this area!
May 13, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		PRL Update
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

That really is odd. A PRL (Preferred Roaming List) simply defines what towers you can connect to. Updates typically expand coverage, though it's conceivable that if they've lost agreements, they could decrease coverage.

Notwithstanding, it shouldn't have any impact to your hotspot service. It sounds like this was a service that was included for you? Perhaps it's a coincidence that they changed that to be an add-on?

I suggest that you call them to find out what happened. Even if they changed what's bundled into the plan, you should be grandfathered in, and be able to keep that feature.

Please let us know what you find out!
May 13, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		I actually liked them
by: Tim

I have had issues mind you, those include updating my plan ($35) and 15 minutes later had no service and was told zero minutes left. After having customer service look into it, and agreeing that there is no way I could have used those minutes, they reset the account, it did however expire 28 days later, another call and they gave me a $10 account to clear the pay period.

However this morning I have a notice on my phone that I got a "PRL" update...I then noticed that later that morning I went to turn on my mobile hotspot to set my "Drone" maps on it's Ipad that I didn't have access to the service..WTH? It worked fine before. I bought a phone that had wifi calling and such, I understand the reason for the wifi calling not working with them like it did for sprint, but what happened to my hotspot?

I never use internet on my phone for any other purpose so the little they gave me about 5% was used for the reason above. I get conflicting reports that I can "add" the service and have yet to call, but I mean...why the big change?
May 10, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Suggestion
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Try going into a Kroger store and requesting access to a customer service agent. They're more likely to help you, and I believe they have a different phone number to directly access Customer Care agents.
May 07, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		I Need Help
by: Anonymous

So I do not have the free phone or free mins. I bought my phone and mins from the kroger store. I work for my phone, worked grear for 4 months, and since then I have had nothing but problems. First I only have two small apps on my phone, and yet I have no space on my phone.

I can not look anything up online unless I'm on wifi. My Internet is outdated, and can't be updated. I can not access the iwireless website or app. I've called all hours of the day, and customer service is always closed. Any suggestions???
Apr 07, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Disappointed
by: Caryn

I have used I wireless for the last 3 years with no problems until this past December. My teenager was wanting an iPhone for Christmas. After doing my research I decided they had the best deal for the refurbished unit. It arrived and was I had a very happy daughter for about 2 weeks at that time it stopped charging.

I emailed through the web site and was answered and a replacement charger sent. It worked for another week and stopped charging again. Again I sent them an email and they advised me to send it back they would check it. The turn around time was going to be about a month so I decided to take it by a repair shop have it looked and repaired so she would not be without her phone.

Long story short, the repair shop refused to work on it stating that once the you opened the back it was clear that parts were missing and that we needed to contact whoever we purchased it from. I did go on and send it back and waited 21 days for a response that they would not warranty it as there was a crack on the screen (not there when I sent it).

I then waited another 30 days for them to mail the defective one back which never happened. So again I emailed and was told we will go on and replace it as they could not find the unit I sent. I have since received 2 replacements and neither of them will work. After activating there is a SIM card failure and the phone will not work.

Wish me luck as I'm requesting a refund to go elsewhere.
Apr 05, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Coverage & Technology
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

I agree that their coverage can be spotty. Note that Sprint was CDMA, while Nextel was iDEN; two completely incompatible technologies. So they certainly didn't gain any coverage benefits, not to mention that that merger was a long time ago, and iDEN has since be decommissioned, and Sprint has moved to 4G LTE.

Sprint really just needs to continue to build out its coverage, and enhance overall performance to really compete on coverage and reliable speed.
Apr 04, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstar 		Spotty iwireless/Sprint Service
by: AlG

The main problem I've had is the HUGE gaps in coverage. I get a good strong signal, try to make a call and Verizon breaks in. I have it set on "home" and still Verizon, or a company I've never heard of, breaks in and wants my credit card info.
Even with Nextel buying Sprint the coverage is poor compared to Verizon and AT&T. I'm not sure, but as Sprint is PCS if Nextel is CDMA or GSM I can understand why Nextel didn't help.
Mar 07, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Horrible Customer Service
by: Susan P

My phone won't make calls so I tried to TALK to someone. Nope no way to talk to anybody. OK, I wrote five paragraphs explaining my problem and got a nice note saying a customer rep will be with you shortly.

After more than a hour, I gave up. This phone is going in the trash and I will NEVER have anything to do with Kroger iwireless again.
Feb 29, 2016
Rating
star 		Kroger i-wireless is BS
by: Pissed Off

This is BS; I've been on hold over 48 minutes today, 73 last week, and well over 30 before the worst customer service ever. They can truly suck on my...
Feb 22, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		You Get What You Pay For
by: Anonymous

For people claiming that you cannot talk to a rep; you can. Easily. For starters, like many businesses, the live service has hours, and no, it is not sensible, nor reasonable, to bend those hours around the schedule of a single person.

True, their site is a mess, but the number can be easily google searched if you cannot dial 611 from your phone, and there is an option in the automated menu to speak to a real person. The menu says "speak to a customer service rep about minutes"? Doesn't matter if that's not your issue. Select it anyway, and they can always redirect you. It's a short menu. If you cannot navigate that on your own, perhaps you need to find someone else to do it for you.

Be patient, and be courteous, even if you want to smash your phone to pieces. As someone in a customer service position, I am not familiar with your situation the very second you walk in the door. Yelling and cursing at me before I've had a chance to help you is only going to shoot yourself in the foot, and it's downright abusive. Manners will (usually) get you pretty far.

If the rep cannot help you, you can usually request to have your ticket escalated. They are only there for basic service and asking for an escalation is not unreasonable.

I've had my own share of headaches- I've been late in renewing my plan and as a result, the 4G data failed to "turn back on." It took an escalation to fix it as my issue wasn't a typical one the bottom level reps had an answer to. I didn't get that escalation by being rude. In fact, most reps I've had to speak to were very polite and patient. The price of the service and the US-based reps far outweigh whatever problems I've had.

If someone feels offended that I might be calling people rude, please remember. There's always two sides to a story. If you had a truly shitty experience unsolicited, then I really do feel for you. And it's true, only the bad experiences will drive someone to leave any review at all. But in my experience, it's the truly polarizing, scathing reviews of a customer scorned that tend to conveniently leave out information.

I'm a moron myself, I make mistakes. It's shitty I have to have my data "turned back on" but I shouldn't have let my service lapse to begin with. I could have just as easily left a comment full of capslock and empty of grammar complaining about how my data was randomly turned off when I was totally on time with my payment.

They're the cheapest non-welfare service available in many places, for the amount of talk and data you get (twice as much data as Verizon, for the same price). If you have a cheap plan and have the rewards program hooked up, you could easily be paying exactly $0 a month. It's a miracle their customer service is actually home grown.

At the end of the day, you get what you pay for.
Jan 25, 2016
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		iwireless
by: Anonymous

Sorry for everyone's negative experiences. I personally have never had a problem with them.
Jan 19, 2016
Rating
star 		Kroger iwireless is very bad. Don't purchase
by: Bhakti desai

Kroger iwireless is a rip off. I did not purchase the plan or add money to my account. They charged 49 dollars to my account. Their customer service is so bad. We could not talk to the representative. Always automated service and they rip off their customers. We can not hear clearly.
Nov 14, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Beware Field reps Trying to Upgrade Your Phone
by: Anonymous

I had to re-apply for my food benefits at the Nevada welfare office on Nellis blvd in Las Vegas, and was approached by a group of field reps being rather aggressive, but friendly in their approach wanting me to upgrade my phone.

I wasn't interested and had business inside. While I wasn't totally satisfied with my Access Wireless/Kroger/Sprint service. It was at least functional and every month my minutes were there.

As I exited the office the same reps were outside doing their song and dance with everyone that went in or out of the office. I find it rather odd that the Feds and other government agencies require you to pull out everything in your past or present: income records, show everything but your birthmark just to get some help as in food, yet they will go out of their bleeping way to try and give you a free phone with 250 minutes every month, and go so far as to stop you upon entering or exiting the office or a business. Something is funny about that.

I was again approached by this crew. I said I have service. They said no problem; they were there to both enroll in the program or update my existing phone to a newer type. Well, my phone was a bit of a brick but it worked. I agreed. As the field rep was trying to acquire my account info, I must have had to repeat my personal info out loud to him multiple times all the while people were crowded around within earshot. He was having trouble and got his supervisors attention for some assistance. Again I had to repeat my personal info out loud, except now I was getting fed up and started whispering it to him as he fumbled around on his phone to someone somewhere. I said forget it and give me back my phone I was ready to leave. He said he had gotten my account info but was having difficulty getting things approved> He apologized and handed me my phone. When I got home and tried to use my phone all I got was an Access Wireless recording. Nothing I tried would work. I couldn't even get a Sprint operator. I got a recording saying that person was unavailable at this time. I tried off and on for days, and finally I went online and found a contact email and told the support by email exactly what had happened and I had no service. The reply back was that I had tried to change my account and upon doing so I was no longer eligible for my service, and it would be 90 days before I could reapply.

I again emailed them back saying I had done no such thing and to please re-read my 1st email as I stated everything that had happened at the welfare office, and it was of no doings by me that I ever tried to apply for any other service. In fact I didn't even want a newer model phone, and only gave in after much aggravating pestering by field reps supposedly representing the very agency that gave the service in the first place. That I was disabled and needed the phone for obvious reasons.

A day or two went by and suddenly my phone was working again. I opened my email and there was an email from Access Wireless asking me "how'd we do" I was polite enough to answer back and gracious enough to state how pleased I was at the prompt attention I thought I had been given. Later that day I called my brother who lives out of state and midway through our conversation we were abruptly disconnected. I could not reconnect or make a call of any kind. I only got the Access Wireless recording saying that I needed to purchase minutes etc.

Long story longer, it seemed that Access Wireless only supplied me with emergency minutes not reinstating the minutes I already had prior to my experience at the welfare office. I was never told that these were just emergency minutes to be used only for ...the obvious. Now I never did try dialing 911 because to do so and not have an actual emergency is just wrong if not illegal, so I don't know if my dead phone would have even made a 911 connection, but I thought all cell phones allowed a person to at least make a 911 call no matter any account discrepancies.

I have tried to email the same support contact email two times since to inquire about that, and to ask why they obviously had never even read my explanation of what had happened at the welfare office, and that obviously was the cause of the account foul up. And it was never anything I had done and should be easily verified thru their office. It has been two weeks now and I still have yet to get any reply from the same support email I had been in touch with before. Figuring I'm beating a dead horse and have given up.

I truly doubt if anyone even read my full explanation of what happened at the welfare office, and if they did it didn't matter. In their mind they thought I had tried to change my account and I never did anything like that. I didn't even want an upgraded phone.

Beware of any field reps trying to get you to upgrade your present phone to a newer model saying it will not effect your current account, because that's BS. Don't do it and think about that government giving it away. Nothing positive to say about Access Wireless, but for the years I had service. At least I had service.
Nov 03, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Wow...
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

That's a truly remarkable experience. Failing a credit card payment, automatic or otherwise, should not be tied whatsoever to the remaining balance on your wireless account.

When you talked to them on the phone did they explain why these are related, or explain how it could "accidentally" occur?
Nov 03, 2015
Rating
star 		Be Careful To Update Your Credit Card
by: Passionfruital

I've been on the i-wireless auto-payment plan. $20 is added to my account every three months or when the balance falls below $5.

As most banks are doing these days I received a new credit card with a new expiration date. A few days later i-wireless tried to withdraw money on my old card. The transaction didn't go through because the expiration date changed. i-wireless zeroed the balance. I had to complain to customer service to get my $50 balance re-instated.

The same thing happened to me two years ago, so clearly zeroing balances when their customers credit cards expire is a way for them to make more money.

The fact that there's no place on the website to see all your transaction history including a running balance is deceitful and makes it harder to detect that your balance has been zeroed out. Practically every credit card company, bank, or utility provides full access to your account history. I'm pretty sure i-wireless had this at one time. There's no excuse not to have this information available to customers.

When you get a new credit or debit card, make sure to update the info on your i-wireless account or you could lose whatever amount is in your account.
Oct 25, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i-wireless Kroger and Gov't Lifeline>>Field Agents Using Fraudulent SS,etc. to Sign People for Kroger Phones & Gov't Lifeline!
by: Carlton Oneal

12/2014 - I had no cellphone service at all, because problems with AT&T, T-Mobile, Straight Talk, and Boost Mobile (subsidiary company owned by Sprint/Nextel),therefore, I was desparate for cellphone/smartphone service. Kroger i-wireless associates asked for, and were given my ID, SSN, Kroger card, etc. The young female Kroger i-wireless field agent stated that the company had messed up my account (after the check), but I was authorized to have a smartphone because I was on food stamps. This was outside the Kroger in Macon, Georgia, Presidential Parkway shopping center.

03/2015 - My Kroger smartphone was cut off, with after 1 or possibly 2 text warnings for me to pay, which meant that I had lost my U.S. gov't lifeline subsidized help, for unknown reason. I called 611 from the phone several times, but only was able to contact Kroger i-wireless once. Kroger i-wireless told me that "this young female i-wireless U.S. gov't lifeline subsidized" really wanted me to have this needed phone! I asked the Kroger i-wireless agent why he stated this to me, then he asked me to identify myself, which gave him my full identification. Kroger i-wireless agent told me that my name was right, but my address and social security number was totally different, and I discovered that since I had a U.S. government Lifeline subsidized home phone, then I couldn't have a lifeline gov't subsidized wireless phone, which was another reason why after 4 or 5 months I lost my U.S. government Lifeline subsidized assistance. The young female Kroger i-wireless agent knew that I already had a home phone U.S. government Lifeline subsidized assistance, which meant that she knew that I was ineligible for the Kroger i-wireless phone, at least with U.S. government Lifeline subsidized assistance program. All I knew is that I had a smartphone or even a cellphone, for calling when i needed outside the home. I asked the Kroger I wireless agent, why no one from Kroger i-wireless or U.S. government contacted, through mail, call, or e-mail, but he had no answer for why. I told him to file a complaint with his Kroger i-wireless company, which he said he would do, but I can't be sure about whether he sent a complaint to Kroger i-wireless or not sent a complaint to corporate! I earned Kroger money back on my 1~2~3 Kroger plus card, but Kroger sent me a check, but the "un cash back", but really coupon for free groceries or really discounted coupon had no cash value, and wasn't a check which was designed to look like a check. I discovered this fact after my bank told me that they couldn't cash the "Kroger cash back check"! I took the check to the Kroger on presidential parkway, in Macon, Georgia, but found out that Kroger couldn't cash the check. Then a Kroger management told me that this Kroger credit card cash back wasn't a check, but a free groceries cash value coupon. So I am not only assaulted by evil, brutal Macon, Georgia area Kroger management, staff, security, and law enforcement, for years, but the Kroger i-wireless phone with U.S. government lifeline commits fraudulent activities.
Oct 22, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Wow!
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

That's quite a horrendous porting experience! I've heard of people (on numerous different carriers) having awful experiences like this. However, these are super edge cases usually.

Porting usually takes places within a short number of hours, and often even faster. The fact that they canceled your new account is even worse! If that new account was canceled, I don't understand how they could even port the number over, as an active account needs to be available to complete the process.

Anyway, I hope your next carrier gives you some happiness! Thank you very much for sharing your experience.
Oct 21, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i-wireless Experience (bad)
by: Anonymous

i-wireless....Where to start...This is one of the worst cell phone companies I have ever dealt with.

My memorable experience with I wireless began in June 2015. I lost an AT&T phone and decided to go with a prepaid phone. The local Smiths (Kroger) had a nice display of prepaid phones and cards at the counter. I decided on a Motorola Photon (Android smartphone), and a $50/month unlimited text, talk, and 4G Internet.

I looked around at various options like Net10, Cricket, T-Mobile, and i-wireless. i-wireless had the most attractive deal with unlimited text, talk, and 4G/3G Internet. $50 month on a pretty decent phone.

The phone and the card worked fine for the first few days. I decided to port my old phone number to the new phone, and called i-wireless customer service and asked what the procedure was. I gave them my AT&T info, and was told i-wireless would handle the rest. Expect 72hrs (3 days) for the change to take place.

Immediately my i-wireless phone was disconnected.
Long story short, it took them 11 days to port my number while the phone that I am paying for service was disconnected. Many phone calls later and a lot of waiting on hold, being told some of the problems were my fault (they weren't ), I FINALLY got my phone working on my old number.

They sent me a text requesting me sign up at i-wireless and use my account to get/redeem rewards, pay my bill, change rate plans and a few other features.

The "rewards" program is tied to Kroger stores and your shoppers card. It gives you $1.00 credit for every $100 spent towards your next bill. EXCEPT there is no way to redeem your credits.

On September 3 I received a text informing me that my service would expire in 5 days. I bought a new airtime card and followed the directions to complete the transaction. All went well EXCEPT my 30 days of service began on the day you pay. Any remaining days are GONE. A call to customer service got a credit applied to my rewards program... whoopie...you can't use the rewards program!!!

The final "slap" was when I used the phone as a hotspot for about a week and used more than 2 gigs of data. The Internet shuts off. Actually you get 67Kb service; about the same as a fax machine. You can get SLOW Internet service on the phone only, but no hot spot.

So to summarize:

Crappy customer service.
Penalized for paying early.
An unusable rewards program.
Poor/ misleading description of Internet service.

I am no longer a customer of i-wireless, and hope you don't make the same mistake I did.
Oct 20, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		That's Really Disturbing
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

It certainly is frustrating to not be able to easily see your balance information. I honestly don't believe they're trying to hide it or deceive you. Having worked for wireless carriers, I know that these types of account management and user interface designs are surprisingly poorly done. I've worked on projects to improve these types of elements, and it's amazing how the simplest things are either overlooked, ignored, or get complex to implement.

That said, it doesn't help your situation. Unfortunately, I can't guide you specifically as I don't have an i-wireless account to explore. Maybe if you call back you'll luck out and get a rep who knows more, or you can ask to speak with a supervisor who is likely more knowledgeable!
Oct 17, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Texts
by: Anonymous

No they are not charging for me for incoming texts, but they are adding them to outgoing. I have called i-wireless, and they can not tell me where to find my balance left on the website.

When you call your phone all it says is how many minutes used, which is what is on your computer. It says 114 minutes used, which is including your incoming texts. Now you are supposed to know how many incoming texts to subtract.

If you know how to check what really is left please let me know, because the i-wireless representatives cannot tell me how to find it. VERY MISLEADING!!!!!!! Why are they hiding it?
Oct 15, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Balance
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

So just to clarify, they're not deducting from your available balance for incoming texts (b/c they are free), however, when you look at the number of texts sent, you "think" that you're out/low and topup when you really don't need to?

In your account you can't see your remaining balance anywhere? It only shows texts used? Are you sure there's not a place in your account to view your balance, and what you're looking at is simply your text message history (incoming and outgoing)?
Oct 15, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Misleading Texts Used
by: Anonymous

I-wireless now add all text messages together, including incoming and outgoing. Yes, this is what you have used, but incoming are free! You renew your plan thinking you have used all your plan time. This is misleading. Unless you scroll through all texts used and subtract incoming texts you can be renewing before necessary and guess who is making money off of you. This is ridiculous, but I caught on and do scroll and subtract now. Will be changing wireless companies soon. (This is fraud in my book.)
Oct 15, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		"YOU PEOPLE ARE CRAZY" NOT
by: Anonymous

"Unlimited talk, text, and web for $35! Who has that for $35!?! I'm sorry, but that's not a rip-off, that's the best deal I found out there. So obviously I pay $35 a month, right?

YADA YADA
I just paid 35$ for this plan 3 days ago. ALREADY IT SAYS MY DATA IS USED UP..0 balance BULLHOCKY. I shouldn't HAVE TO CALL CUSTOMER SERVICE PERIOD.
GRRRR!
Oct 13, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		It Seems All Real To Me
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

That's an interesting perspective. I don't get that impression when I read through the comments. Are you inferring that no one could be having a good experience with them, and any positive comments must be false? That wouldn't make any sense. Even the best companies with the greatest reputation (think Apple) will still have people who have had extremely negative experiences, and vice versa. The positive comments read pretty authentic in my opinion. Anyway, everyone is entitled to their own opinion; thank you for sharing yours!
Oct 13, 2015
Rating
starstar 		Curious...
by: Metal★Saya

Funny how the negative reviews seem as though written by actual people, while the positive ones seem so generic and... unrealistic...
Oct 13, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		I'm sorry to...
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

...hear about your obviously frustrating experience! It's really amazing how one person can have a fantastic experience, while someone else can have such an awful experience!

At some point it's inevitable that wireless coverage will be as ubiquitous as running water across every city in the country, and gone will be the days of spotty coverage. That day cannot come soon enough!
Oct 12, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		$35 All in Data Plan?
by: Anonymous

Nope. I do not need help with my account balance, or help with having my phone reset. I called the number below, was told the same automated message 5 times, and then it hung up on me.

The automated system told me that I have 99,999 GB of data left. It forgot to tell me that I have to use it in 5 second chunks, because I keep losing my connection to the 3G network.

My wife has been having problems with her phone too. I set it for auto re-new, and that has not worked correctly in the past 4 months. I bought this to get rid of stress. That did not happen, and I am constantly being given new things to be stressed about from this company.

I wish there was a better option, but I haven't found one yet. I currently have 16 days left on my unlimited plan, that has been limited to a useless data connection. If this is a system wide error, a notification would be nice, and I could even understand.

I started out being disappointed. Now I just want a different company. Maybe I'll get screwed over in a different way, but I think Kroger i-wireless has found every way there is to abuse their customers.

If there is one they have missed, I'm sure they will get around to it eventually. It is a great business model to automate everything, and just ignore problems, but it probably won't last forever. I look forward to the day that anyone from this company uses their own service.

How fitting, the captcha for this message is treble, a misspelling of the type of service that they provide. How appropriate. I know I will never hear from them, helping a customer once you have their money is just not the way they do business.
Oct 11, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Kroger i-Wireless Phone Number
by: Sandra in Ohio

In reply to Mr47:

1-866-594-3644

Press 1 for English

listen to your account information, once done then
Press 3

It'll give a list of menu options when it starts to do that, Press 9 to speak to a representative

They are closed on Sundays.

I wouldn't suggest going to a store's Customer Service desk, a friend of mine called them to get a phone number and information and they gave her Western Union's number. I've asked for help from the stores before and could never get anywhere, but I guess it all depends on the store and store employees knowledge or lack there of. Good luck!
Sep 23, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Re: Mr47
by: Debra

Hi - If you go to www.krogeriwireless.com, the 800# is listed there in several places. If you can't get through on that number, go to a Kroger stores Customer Service and tell them you need to talk to someone about your cellphone minutes, and ask them to call for you.

Tell them you can't get through on the phone. They have an emergency back line that always gets answered. Because I have had so many problems getting the minutes, I buy them to get put on my phone correctly. I now just buy the card then go immediately over to Customer Service and have them call so that I can have the representative do it for me. This way I KNOW it's set up properly and I don't have any further problems. I do this every month now, to the point that when the people at Customer Service see me coming, they pick up the phone and call a representative.

Oh yes, don't bother asking for the back line number, they won't give it to you. Hope this helps; good luck.
Sep 15, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Customer Service?
by: Mr47

How do you call them? What number are you using to get a live person? I purchased the unlimited plan on 9/3/15 and now I have a $0 balance and no minutes, as well as no one to speak to regarding the issue. I'm beyond furious.
Sep 10, 2015
Rating
starstarstar 		Great Service!
by: Sandra in Ohio

I have had this phone service since June 2015 and I am able to add money to my account balance at anytime. I have the $35 All in one plan and I have yet to pay $35. With my rewards so far, the most I've paid is $19 not counting tax. Every single time I phoned customer service, they have been nice and polite and shown me respect.

With any provider, there will be human mistakes and also there will always be someone who is having a bad day and take it out on the customer. It's ethically and morally wrong to do that, but instead of getting nasty back, have you tried asking them how their day is going? And would they like to talk about it. Turning the tables and showing them you are respectful, you just might get what you originally asked for and more.

As my mother and grandmother always said, "You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar." Give it a try and see what happens.
Sep 08, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		It's All About Customer Service!
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

In this commodity business, customer service really is one of the best ways to differentiate one company over another. People should also keep in mind that even the most stellar companies with best in class customer service will never be 100% perfect.

Moreover, unhappy people are more prone to seek out forums and other places to post about their experience. This is simply human nature, not necessarily malicious. Thus, when reading any review, about any topic, in any industry, you're more likely to get a more negatively skewed perspective.

So, it makes sense to read reviews to get a perspective, however, for every one negative comment, there are probably 10 or more people who have had a great experience that never posted a review...Just some food for thought!
Sep 03, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		I am sorry to hear this.
by: Aaron

Being the owner of a couple of metroPCS stores, I hear this all the time about many different carriers. You can have the best carrier in the world, but if the customer service and staff aren't knowledgeable you will not have a good experience. We go out of our way to hire great reps and spend a lot of time and money training them so that our customer can have a great experience.

Have a great day and I hope that everyone is able to find great service that fits their needs.
Sep 01, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Kroger I-Wireless Rip Off
by: Jessica Summers

I think this is one of the most vital information for me. And i am glad reading your article. But should remark on few general things, The web site style is ideal, the articles is really excellent : D. Good job, cheers
Aug 25, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Great !
by: Anonymous

They're great service still have my phone .
Aug 14, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Stumped how do they stay in business?
by: Anonymous

This company is criminal.
I have waited up to 3 hours wait time to address Federal laws they are breaking. Never have I dealt with a group of people who do not know what there doing. Who do not care about their customers at all.
Yet this company has no desire to follow the law.
Both iwireless and kroger.
Kroger rep asked so you want to add time. No I want to order a phone. Rep. You don't have a phone. No I don't have a phone. Rep then why do you want to add time if you don't have a phone. I dont want to add time.

Really? Then the rep gets rude with me. Ask me a question and while I'm answering tells me to shut up. Really. Don't know how they stay in business.
I am humiliated and angry at how I have been treated.
I will post more later, oh yes there is a lot more to reveal but I need time to share it all that I do not have right now after giving 9 hours on the phone with no resolve.
But it may be time for a class action suit or to boy cott this company.
The title of this page is right on kroger iwireless rip off.c
Aug 04, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		sometimes they are messed up
by: Anonymous

i love my service i give about 10-$25 a month for a $35 because of my rewards some months are better then others but it gets on my nerves when i have $21 worth of credits but i still have to buy a $25 card because you cant just add money to your account its either 10-25 or 35 which sucks. now i have gone though 5 phones and the cool pad aries is a good phone but i upgraded to the other one and it was cracked when i bought it they still havent given me my money back or replaced the phone thats $80 down the drain
Aug 01, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		KROGER = NO SERVICE
by: Anonymous

Tried to switch my number to a new phone...NO CUSTOMER SERVICE.

KROGER=NO SERVICE

KROGER=NO SERVICE

KROGER=NO SERVICE

DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME OR MONEY WITH THESE CRIMINALS.
Jun 20, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		attn: Michael Maersch
by: Anonymous

I was finally able to speak to someone about the problems with my phone. To do this though, I had to go to Frys, which is where I bought the phones and airtime cards.

No one tells you this, but the stores have an "emergency customer service backline" that they can get through when there is no other way to get through to them. From what I was told, once the manager at Frys gets through to someone on their backline, was that the number they use is a dedicated first priority line. These calls are ALWAYS ANSWERED FIRST, NO EXCEPTIONS!!"

Of course we the customer are not allowed to have this number. Since I have found this out, anytime I need assistance with my phones, I stop at the customer service desk first thing when I go in to do my grocery shopping. They see me coming and pick up the phone to connect me through.

I also have discovered that if you do things this way, you get to talk to someone higher up in the company and get better service. I have even gotten them to call me back at home on 2 occasions. Also, when they finally realized that the problem was with the phone and how it was programmed at the factory, they actually sent me a new phone. WILL WONDERS NEVER CEASE!!!!!!!

I don't even try calling from home anymore, but I was also told that the best day to get through is pm a Sunday. They get very few calls on Sundays, so lines are almost always open. I hope you can get some help this way.

Good luck,
Debra
Jun 20, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		From an i-wireless Employee
by: Anonymous

First of all, sorry to all who have complaints about the service, and lack of answers. With that being said, I have been employed by iWireless for some time now, and I have to say that generally people are rather pleasant, and happy about the service, and support we provide.

We strive to provide the best service we can, but we can only address the issues if people actually reach out and try to contact us. Generally, all issues and concerns can be handled in less than 10 minutes. At times, there are issues that need to be handled a little more delicately, but those are overall a rarity.

The terms and conditions regarding the plans, and options we provide are clearly listed on the website under the terms and conditions, and of course the printed advertisements and literature in stores clearly state aspects of the plans, and direct a person to view the full terms online.

Since we are a prepaid company, when you purchase either our phones, or airtime, you are agreeing to the terms as they are presented. It is always the duty of the consumer to read terms in any service before agreeing to use the products. Associates in stores are simply selling the products, and do not deserve the ill treatment that some disgruntled consumers may lump upon them, nor do the customer support representatives that are answering the calls for support.

We offer support as best as we can, and we can only help if the consumer is willing to listen to the tips and advice we give. Please, try and respect everyone the way you would expect to be respected, and allow us to do our jobs in helping you, the consumer. We are extremely knowledgeable about our products, and our offers. Although each individual case is different, there is always a solution for it. We are listening, and we are here to help you in anyway possible.

From my own experience in dealing with other providers of cellular products, I have to say we try and make it as stress free as possible, and do offer respect to all of those who reach out to us for support.
Jun 02, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i-wireless Kroger Changed - No Customer Service
by: Cat

I have had Kroger i-wireless for years, and have been satisfied. My plan was cheap; add $20 airtime every three months, and roll over minutes, 20 free minutes after spending a total of $100 at Smith's.

Alas, no more; something has changed. Before I could always speak to a live operator, get help with activating my cell phone. No more. I bought a reconditioned smartphone off the i-wireless Kroger site--a Sprint Kyrocera Milano. I put the battery in wrong and could not immediately activate it (a store mgr. fixed it later for me). This was before Christmas 2014. I could not speak to anyone. When we went to Smith's they told us it was because it was the holiday season and was busy. So I continued using my old phone until the battery went dead (about 5 days ago, end of May 2015).

Since then I have tried repeatedly to speak to someone but to no avail. I spoke to several Smith's store managers who told me they only sell the phones, and know nothing more. I finally got a Sprint customer service agent to speak to me. She told me Sprint has nothing to do now with i-wireless. Worse, the reconditioned Sprint cell phone I bought from i-wireless online is locked and still in the Sprint system. The number is registered to an I*** G****. She still has the number, I cannot use it.

None of the i-wireless 1-800, 866 numbers connect to a live person. Supposedly 611 might but the battery is dead in my old cell, so cannot call with it. Try to get thru with the new Kyrocera on 611 and receive the message "We do not recognize this number." I still have 145 minutes of airtime left with i-wireless, which will expire in August. I have sent e-mails from the i-wireless Kroger site and get a response like sorry, etc. No help, no refund for selling me a locked phone, no one to talk to about how to get my minutes.

The new brochures in the store do not list any 800 numbers. Strangely, the store and site say they will only accept Sprint phones to use or buy on Kroger/i-wireless system, but Sprint says no affiliation. I would not buy a phone right now at a Kroger store for i-wireless, because it looks as if there have been some financial issues and things might be changing.

I would not want to buy a new phone, pay more money into a plan and NEVER be able to speak to a live person. Right now I suggest buying a phone from a different company, and only using a prepaid phone card.
Jun 02, 2015
Rating
star 		Not Able to Add Airtime
by: Debra

I have been trying to add airtime via Internet and cell phone for almost 2 months. Both the phone and the website tells me my credit and debit cards are not valid. I bought airtime cards. It's also telling me they're not valid.

I have spent over 12 HOURS ON HOLD WITH NO ONE ANSWERING AND THEIR CALL-BACK SYSTEM IS NOT WORKING!!!! Anyone else having similar problems? I am about to call the FCC to file fraud charges and talk to an attorney!!!!!!! This is so ridiculous, I can't even begin to explain how I feel.
Jun 01, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		TRULY 'A Rip'!
by: Michael Maersch

The reception is next to non-existent. (I live in the 6th largest city in the nation/central-city.)

The Customer "Service" folks are working out of their homes; really have no answers per se. except for *a very few* they tend to be no help whatsoever.

Go to their Facebook page... Nowhere to comment. You can only 'like' them or any of the mindless pap their Kroger youngsters cook up to post. ("Everyone's a winner! Check out my bedroom with a wall FILLED with red and green and white and yellow ribbons... Just for Showing Up!" "I'm Special! YOU're Special" KROGER IS SPECIAL!!!") La dee dah, la dee dah... THIS is social media for business?! (*No customer interaction*?) What in the world is "social" about their fb page? A farce... Truly.

No Tech Support. No refunds for horrendous "service". Not worth the price of admission whatever "program" you select here. Think this could be an indication of 'Kroger Quality' overall?!
May 24, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Totally free
by: Anonymous

Since fuel points double as money toward iwireless, I literally get free phone service. I just can't complain about that. All you have to do is buy some gift cards each month, and those fuel points add up.
I have a nice smartphone, and I get to use everything on it for free every month. I haven't found anything that beats this so far.
Apr 20, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i-wireless Terms & Conditions of Service
by: Lindsay P.

i-wireless Terms & Conditions are disclosed and available anytime at https://krogeriwireless.com/terms-conditions. Rules for rollover, balance expiration and general service are detailed in full and specific to the subscriber's unique plan.
Apr 07, 2015
Rating
star 		Site Is Not Secure
by: Anonymous

Their site has many problems with security
https://www.ssllabs.com/ssltest/analyze.html?d=krogeriwireless.com

This server supports SSL 2, which is obsolete and insecure. Grade set to F.

This server supports insecure Diffie-Hellman (DH) key exchange parameters. Grade set to F.

This server supports 512-bit export suites and might be vulnerable to the FREAK attack. Grade set to F.

This server is vulnerable to the POODLE attack. If possible, disable SSL 3 to mitigate. Grade capped to C.
Mar 27, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		To PM
by: Kelly

Hey PM - It's great to hear about your experience with Access Wireless. We love to collect stories from our customers about the importance of their Lifeline service, and I would love to hear yours.

Would you mind going to www.accesswireless.com and clicking Submit My Story at the bottom of the homepage, and sending us some details around your experience? It helps us continue to offer quality service and a quality experience. Thank you!

Kelly R
Access Wireless Marketing Manager
Mar 27, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Kroger i-Wireless Best Deal
by: Anonymous

So far I've found i-wireless to be the best cellular deal going. Yes, I've had issues from time to time, however, once you understand how the rollover works it's the best deal.

I do the monthly autopay, and my minutes roll over. That way while I normally don't need them, I can save for when I do!
Jan 14, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Customer Since 2007 & 6 Phones Later
by: David Walthall

It started out great! $20 per month by dialing 611 and talking to a customer rep. Then it went to a free upgrade smartphone. I had $26 of minutes that were wiped out in less than a week. Reason - I'm an old guy with very little knowledge of mobile web, and with a slight hand shake, hitting buttons by accident. So, I went back to the same phone. Later switched to a Brio Kycera with email.

Middle of 2013, I suddenly lost 400 emails. They were still on Yahoo, but not my phone. I-wireless said lack of memory? Strangely, I got the express phone (similar), but keeping the same phone and Yahoo, I could no longer sign in with my username or password.

But I could still access Yahoo at work, and read my email. I bought 2 more phones...still no access.
Jan 12, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Happy Customer :):):)
by: PM

I have 2 lines of service. 1st line I got Oct. 2013. I started out with the Lifeline phone w/250 free mins. I needed more so switched to $35.00 unlimited, which is a great deal by itself, but also I get a $15.00 credit each month, and get $$ for shopping at Kroger. I have not paid more than $15.00 any month since starting service.
Jan 11, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Awesome In My Area
by: Anonymous

My i-wireless phone and service is top notch. I don't pay any tax for cards, and I get unlimited everything for 35$ a month. I don't lose any minutes or run out of data.

You can tie your phone with several shoppers cards and earn money on your account constantly. For example, I pay 35$, but I use the 50$ unlimited plan by adding my rewards to the 35$.
Jan 10, 2015
Rating
star 		i-Clueless
by: POed

My phone has shut off and their voice message says I have 1 meg. Their site says I have an $11 balance, 50 Meg and no usage. I started with a $10 50 meg card. I only used WiFi to setup some apps yesterday as shown by the account activity on their site.

They say WiFi doesn't count, but it does. They even count when the phone pings the tower. I had 2 calls of about 15 seconds each to test the phone. I now have no service. I have only used 9305.8 out of the 10000 initial credit as shown on this site.

I restored the phone and the phone even says I only use 8 megs out of 50. No correlation between the phone and the site. Can't dial a number and no browsing. No support, no response. I bought a brick. The very worst phone program on the planet. I ignored the bad reviews, and now I pay for it. Beware.
Jan 09, 2015
Rating
star 		Disappointed!!!
by: Anonymous

I've purchased 3 of the coolpad quatro phones in order to get my data working with the PLAN that I've already paid for. After that, it then stops working completely after talking to a service representative that couldn't help me.

They still have not fixed it after 10hrs and can only tell me that someone will call me within 24hrs or so! When you pay for something, you expect to get what you've paid for!!! Tomorrow, I'll be going to get my money back. I wish they had a no Star button because the phone is useless if I can't use it.
Jan 06, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Where else can you pay only $10 a month?!!
by: Rita from OH

When my daughter had Kroger 4 years ago, the 10 cents/minute or text cost $5 / month extra. So basically $15 /month. Now Kroger took off the $5 monthly fee, so now it is dirt cheap. Me, I'm a dinosaur of the cell phone world (I had my old phone for - HOLY COW!- 6 years) My MO is "don't bother me unless it's an emergency," and this is my 1st smartphone.

Since I only use the phone when necessary, I always had a minute plan. T-Mobile jacked up their rate to 3 minutes/$1 so I dropped them. Cincinnati Bell lost their minute plan of 10 cents/min or 20/text incoming and outgoing (the next best) to Verizon, so I am pleased as punch with Kroger.

I'm not sure what your complaint is about rollover, but at Kroger's prices, WHO CARES!? It's just a monthly rate, use it or lose it. Also, I've never seen Kroger put their name to something that's junk. My phone seems very high quality. And I love that you speak to someone local. My last rep had a KY drawl. We got to talking and he was from Falmouth KY. Lois who I talked to was from Newport KY. I love it!!
Jan 06, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		REAL Customer Service
by: Anonymous

I've been an iwireless customer for 5 years. Had two phones, and lots of customer service calls. Some good, some not so good...but guess what?...ALL WERE BASED FROM AMERICA. My daughter has used several pre-paid companies, verizon, virgin mobile, boost...and ALL our calls dealing with their customer service were abroad-- farmed out to India, etc...all people obviously reading off a script and with little to NO help on the other end. Yes, I've had frustrations with my service, as almost anyone does--but eventually it was dealt with--and by someone that I was certain was living and working in America.
Jan 05, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		I-Wireless No problems
by: Christie

My wife uses I-Wireless as her personal cell phone. We have been on the service for almost a year and absolutely love it.

All of our married kids use different cell phone carriers. Our old 700 minute Verizon plan just wasn't cutting it. The only draw back is as everyone knows Sprint's coverage is not as good as Verizon's, and that is not Kroger's fault.

The $35 dollar plan is great, and by using our Kroger shoppers credits costs us next to nothing. Who could ask for more. Come on, what other prepaid service's minutes roll over from month to month? I-Wireless is a great deal for us.
Jan 03, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		I Love Kroger's i-wireless
by: sdai

I've been with Kroger i-wireless for about 6 months now. Prior service was with a Verizon MVNO. Though the coverage is better with Verizon in the area where I live, I decided to make the change so I could take advantage of the wireless rewards.

I purchased a used Sprint branded Note 3 off eBay, and had no problem getting it set up on Kroger i-wireless. With the rewards, I have had phone service and data for around $25 a month for several months now.

The only way they could make me happier is if they offered a good family plan. Thanks Kroger!
Dec 31, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Increased Costs
by: kcapo.47

I've been using iwireless for 4+ yrs, and I'm very disappointed in being forced to use their all-in plan. The minutes/MBs don't roll over and it costs $10 a month more. More money less product. I used to
recommend iwireless to other people. Now im looking for another company.
Dec 30, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		I Wireless IS NOT A Rip-Off!!!
by: Michael Lee

I have been an i-wireless customer now for 6 and 1/2 years and have NEVER, EVER had a problem with my Kroger i-wireless account! I just ordered a new i-wireless phone, and I received it in 3 days!

Being that I shop at Kroger almost every day in the last 6 and 1/2 years, I have wracked up $100.00's of $Dollars$ in FREE minutes!!

Plus there NEVER is a contract. I therefore would recommend i-wireless to ANYONE!!!
Dec 20, 2014
Rating
starstarstar 		Rip-Off To Make CC Payment
by: Tex

I find it highly unusual that the i-wireless set up does *not* allow someone, other than the account holder, to make a credit card payment to the account. So, you are forced to "buy" an i-wireless card, and pay tax on the purchase of the card. I've said just what I mean. Leave it to you all to misunderstand what my complaint is.
Nov 09, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Android Sprint Force
by: Frustrated!

I bought the Kroger Sprint Force because I spend a lot of money at Kroger, and I’m tired of using TracFone. With the move to a retirement home, I don't have a land line. I had it less that 2 weeks and it broke in the middle of conversation with a friend. I tried to take it back to Kroger for a refund. Since it was 1 day past the return deadline, they gave me another phone number to call.

I tried 2 times to get a return call due to high volume, and being on hold with TracFone. No return call for service. I need my money back. Also, this is the 3rd phone I bought from Kroger. I should have known to never buy a phone at a grocery store; never again Kroger. I am so mad I think I am going to not shop there or use my 123 Kroger credit card. I am done.

Can somebody on this website tell me something positive about this Sprint Force, or did I get a lemon and wasted $129 plus insurance on this phone, and they won't fix it! Do I have a case?
Oct 28, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Tethering
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Are you paying for tethering? It sounds like an registration error code, which means that either it's not part of your plan, you haven't paid for an add-on, or there's a problem with how they provisioned it on your account. Have you called Customer Care yet?
Oct 20, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Like It
by: Anonymous

Best value; but error code 67 does not allow me to tether anymore. I have only been doing it for about a month. I do college work on the city bus... please hurry and fix it.
Oct 08, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Port Number Guy Is An Idiot
by: Anonymous

I used to work in the phone industry, which is why I chose i-wireless over my old company. They're cheap, use Sprint towers, and have the cheapest service.

It's not i-wireless that's taking so long, it's Verizon.

Verizon has to release the number to i-wireless and some carriers are a$$' about it. Usually, they release that number in a matter of a day or two. UNLESS they are Verizon. You're pissed at the wrong company. Verizon is taking long releasing your number.
Oct 07, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		2 Weeks Is...
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

...definitely unusual; don't get me wrong. Issues do unfortunately occur, and some subset of customers have a horrible experience.

I also understand that some numbers can't be ported depending on what market they're in. That said, I know many people who have ported numbers across the country, so honestly, I don't know what those underlying rules are. It may be related more to landline numbers.

Thank you again for sharing your experience so others can ensure they fully understand what the expected process and timeline will be by asking the right questions of their new carrier before proceeding. For most people it does go smoothly, however, that's not always the case.
Oct 06, 2014
Rating
star 		Prepaid Wireless Guy is obviously fake.
by: Anonymous

Prepaid Wireless Guy is obviously a fake, and speaks as a woman does, not a "Guy." "He" also obviously did not read all the problems associated with the comment "he" is replying to. Other, companies do not take half a month and several employees just to port a number and activate service, and never attempt to call the person back when they say. Lol Plus, there was no calling out or receiving calls. You fake liar! If you are going to get paid by a fake lying Internet service, you should at least learn how to lie well. Maybe some acting classes would help. I, personally, have ported other numbers before w/o any issues. However, I've heard others say iwireless told them they couldn't port their numbers. As far as the temp. numbers go, if they don't call out or receive calls, they really are of no use to the cell phone owner, at all. Right? Right.
Oct 03, 2014
Rating
star 		Horrible Customer Service!!!!
by: Anonymous

I purchased this service for my fiance and myself because due to our jobs and having a family we both needed affordable phone service at a budget price. The phones were cheap and service was as well. The issue is, however, they do not allow you to buy cards for every plan amount. So you have to either call in every month and deal with an hour or so adding minutes with the minute cards, or give them your info for auto bill pay.

Ok not a big deal right? Wrong. Even though I had auto pay set up and it shows pending in my account, and they didn't renew my service. I called asking about this and was rewarded with RUDE representatives and even supervisors. And when I asked if I could be contacted by someone higher up the supervisor was again rude. They said set the card back up but not before suspending my service.

Tell me how that is proper customer service? BBB report has been filed. ONE OF THE WORST PROVIDERS AROUND. 4 months service 4 months of bad customer service!!!
Sep 26, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Porting Woes
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Thank you for sharing your experience. Unfortunately, I've heard of many cases across almost every carrier. While it's not super common, it happens enough to not be considered a rare circumstance (unfortunately!). The smaller carriers tend to have a more difficult time, likely due to the way their systems are integrated in the porting platforms, and manual processes that they need to do.

The fact that it's no longer on your Verizon account is good news b/c that means that all of the required account info you provided was accurate. Sometimes getting the account number or passcode can be tricky.

Usually a new account will have a new temporary phone number on it prior to your old number being ported. That would enable you to use your phone until the porting is completed. It sounds like that wasn't the case here.

I understand your frustration. I can only recommend that you keep calling them. Escalate to ensure that a manager/supervisor is actively looking into the problem. It's not lost; just hang in there, and please let us know what happens!
Sep 26, 2014
Rating
star 		Over a week, and number still not ported
by: Angry & Ripped-off!

They said THEY'D call ME, to "finish" porting my #, after I finally reached someone on the phone. She said it would take 24 hours, "72 at the most." It's been much longer than that and I haven't received any replies from submitting several inquiries online, either. My # is gone from Verizon and somewhere in Kroger iwireless cyberspace, or I'd just keep Verizon and send my Kroger iwireless phone back. They only give you 14 days to return phones, and I don't have much time left. I'd return it in a second (despite liking the actual phone), except now they have my phone # I've had for years, which I do not want to change. I would NOT EVER recommend this company to anyone, and am considering going to another company ASAP, once I find where my # is. TERRIBLE! UNBELIEVABLE! Had to borrow a phone for emergencies. Just ridiculous service.
Sep 18, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		You people are crazy
by: Anonymous

You people are crazy!!

By people, I mean these negative commenters. I have i-wireless and will never switch to another carrier. You people are complaining about stuff that can get fixed with a simple call! I had an issue with my account and got it fixed in about 5min when i called their customer service. Go to ANY other carrier and you'll run into the same problems these people are talking about, and pay 3X AS MUCH!

Why do I like i-wireless?

Unlimited talk, text, and web for $35! Who has that for $35!?! I'm sorry, but that's not a rip-off, that's the best deal I found out there. So obviously I pay $35 a month, right?

NO! I HAVE FREE SERVICE!! At least 2 months a year, I don't pay for service. They have wireless point (or rewards, idk). They're just like fuel points. Shop and Kroger and you get free money.

If you want to save money and get THE EXACT SAME SERVICE as the major carriers, then get i-wireless.

I bet ALL the people complaining on this site STILL have i-wireless.
Sep 04, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		One Screw Up After Another
by: Anonymous

That's not the end of it. When they updated to unlimited data my phone lost all data usage. After spending several hours trying to re-program my 6 week old phone. I was told it must be my phone and to call the company. Luckily the phone manufacturer was very kind to replace the phone although I am pretty sure it was not a phone issue.

I received the new phone and took 2 hours on the phone to get it programmed. My son's i-wireless phone quit working so I gave him my old one. When trying to program his i-wireless number, the person removed my number from my newly programmed phone.

I was told it would take up up to 3 days to get it back. WHAT?????? They lost my number and now I am left again without a working phone. I asked to speak to a supervisor. She was very rude and told me that it takes time to "find" my number. I'm getting upset at this point, and said it was their error and it needed to get corrected immediately.

I made the statement that if I make an error at work I am expected to correct it immediately. The response I received from the supervisor was "well honey this is not as easy as wiping mayo off a burger." That was the last straw. Even I did work in fast food (I work in the medical field) that was down right rude to say. I hung up since I had to go to work.

I tried at work to fix the problem, but was put on hold for my entire break. Called this morning and the person tried to walk me through setup with of course no luck due to my number being released. She said she would put in an request to get my number back ASAP. I told her that should have been done last night. She said she made no such request. REALLY, thanks. Now it is on for the wait. Let's see how long it will take to find my number.
Aug 06, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Love Saving Money
by: Glenda

I love it. I get a dollar off for every 100 points earned on my Kroger plus card. 35 dollars for unlimited talk and text, and 500MB of Web. I saved ten dollars last month, so unlimited phone for 25 dollars!
Jul 30, 2014
Rating
star 		Don't Buy The Sanyo 2700!
by: J.T.

After 35 minutes on the phone with i-wireless trying to reset my phone, the guy finally tells me that I can't send photos because they have "decommissioned" the Sanyo 2700. Of course they never told that to users. Apparently there was a 1 month period where they'd send us a new phone? THANKS FOR NEVER TELLING ME THIS, YOU CLOWNS!
Then I trekked to Kroger to buy another phone and they still have the 2700 for sale. WHAT?
Jul 29, 2014
Rating
star 		iWireless Customer "Service" Smoke and Mirrors
by: MM

DO NOT expect to "fix" a problem with one call (or two or three) has been my experience. If you are in circumstances where you need to avail yourself of an "access" line w/ them good luck.

Standard wireless service is "ok"(3, 4, sometimes 5 bars, even in a large metro area like PHX which has a robust Sprint system iW piggy-back's off of). The other, 'sister'-"service" utilizes towers that haven't been repaired/updated in years(?) – 1 bar, 2 bars at best for reception "quality".

And DO NOT expect to speak to anyone for close to an hour, perhaps longer. (I guess "poor" people have 'all the time in the world' in between sitting on the couch with their feet up, eating chocolates while scoring 'Judge Judy' contestants each day.)

A fraud on all taxpayers paying into the FCC fund providing for this minimum service plan for those unfortunate to find themselves qualifying for it. But then hey, can you say "Medicare fraud"?

Skype instead: Call ANY PHONE in US for $1.50/month (long as you want)!
Jun 26, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Used It For Years - LOVE It - Save a Ton of $$
by: Anonymous

I have had Kroger's i-wireless for over 3 years... $29/month service. I use my cell phone EVERY day for data, text and talk... EVERY day. My original cell just died 2 months ago - an old LG Rumor 2.

I upgraded to a new smart phone, which was bought for $40 from the i-wireless website - had it in 2 days, and activated it within 5 minutes through Customer Service myself.

Vacation from NY to South Carolina...only loose service in West Virginia, and in some areas of mountainous Virginia. I have saved 1000s of dollars in the 3+ years. Thank you i-wireless... thank you!
Jun 15, 2014
Rating
starstarstar 		HTC EVO 4G LTE
by: Anonymous

4G works just fine with an HTC 4G LTE
Jun 10, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstar 		Dropped Calls
by: cc

My phone reception is HORRIBLE. 95% of my calls get dropped, sometimes numerous times during one call. Also, 100% of my calls break up and are difficult to hear the other person.

I upgraded my phone to the ZTE Flash. I don't think it is my location to blame. I live in a major metropolitan area, and up on a hill. I have to say that my previous carrier Verizon did not have this problem. In fact I never had a problem with dropped calls with them....ever.

When I call the "customer service" line, and there is no option to talk to a person about this. I went to the King Soopers where I purchased the phone, and of course they could not help me. I use this phone for some important business calls, and this poor reception and dropped calls is a huge problem.
Jun 05, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Voyager Mobile!!!
by: CardinalMac

Thank me later!

I used Kroger I-Wireless for a few months and the prices were outstanding, but when it came time to upgrade my phone they were unable to, and their customer service team of, I'm guessing about 3 people in some small apartment somewhere, could not help me with my problem. I was so used to I wireless prices I didn't want to go to Cricket or Metro PCS and spend $40-50 a month + activation fees + flashing fees. So I found voyager mobile! $25 a month unlimited talk and text! I use my home internet so I don't care that I don't get unlimited data. Cheapest most reliable cellphone service in America.
May 04, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Theft or Fraud?
by: Anonymous

I-Wireless cancelled both my parents service when they claim they attempted to charge their credit card and the charges were refused on two separate occasions. Both lines had a balance of almost $300 each and they took it. I contacted I-Wireless and they told me they were going to turn this in to the "Fraud Department" and get back to me. 24 hours later I called them again and again had to explain the situation and they stated I would have to buy an airtime card to reactivate the two phones and the money would be returned to the accounts when I did so. Since all this sounded fishy, I then contacted the credit card company and they said no activity was on the card for the days I-Wireless claims the charges were refused. They also explained that NO CHARGES were attempted by I-Wireless since January. It's been three days since then and no money has been returned. I get the impression they lie, they cheat, and they steal. The sad part, my parents are in their 80's so apparently I-Wireless is ripping off the elderly.
Mar 19, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Response to Mel
by: Kelly

Mel,

To re-activate your phone, you will need to call Customer Care from a different handset. They can be reached at 1-866-594-3644. You will need the ESN number from the back of your i-wireless handset and a new number will be assigned to you.

Thanks!

Kelly
Mar 19, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		How do I re-activate my phone?
by: Mel

I bought a Kyocera/Milano Android phone from Krogers a few months ago. I activated it and used it for awhile, lost it within my house, and just found it yesterday. I bought a Krogers i-wireless $50 card. I tried to add minutes to my phone online and it did not go through. A message came up that said my phone number is no longer valid. I called 1-866-594-3644, and the recorded voice told me that my phone number is not current. My question is how do I re-activate my phone?
Feb 22, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Galaxy S2 (Sprint Epic 4G Touch) Works
by: stray_cat

Yes, the Galaxy S2 (Sprint Epic 4G Touch) works just fine on kroger's iWireless. Within the past 3 weeks, I've activated 2 different E4GTs on it under their BYOD program. HOWEVER, while their BYOD pages state that 4G/LTE is not supported and 4G/WiMAX is, WiMAX will connect just fine, but you will not get any data with 4G turned on. A bogus IP is assigned to your phone which incidentally ALWAYS belongs to a pool of internet addresses belonging to the Department of Defense (6.6.xxx.xxx). My phone has been assigned various addresses like this, always beginning with 6.6 ie:(6.6.2.142; 6.6.101.19)

I have been round and round with their "care" customer care support, and they are always polite, but unable to help. In spite of the BYOD claim 4G/WiMAX works with them, I get differing stories from them. I don't think they have the skills to understand network protocols, nor do they have access to any *network* tech support for
their customers.

Over 2 years ago, I purchased an Optimus S from them (Fred Meyer) and had my phone number ported over from VzW and activated by their customer care department, speaking with them on another line. It was an oversight I'm sure, but I was not able to receive MMS picture messaging for over 2 years because I was not instructed to edit the
Multimedia settings on the phone to change
Http://mms.sprintpcs.com to http://mms.plspictures.com.
I only found this out when I activated the Galaxy S2s recently via the web and they had instructions to do that.

On the Galaxy S2, I'm sure that WiMAX actually works with them, because I remember them offering those phones for sale awhile ago. The problem you will find is that their technical support
does not know how.

Anyone else here on Kroger iWireless with a
4G/WiMAX phone and working 4G, please post what your "WIMAX REALM" is so I can get 4G working. The MVNO "Ting" is great about that, and advises their customers to change theirs to mvno102.sprintpcs.com, or something like that, but it seems that this is just over the heads of the iWireless "care" people, no offense intended to them.
Jan 31, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Samsung Galaxy S2 Compatibility
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

They've got the GS3 and GS4 listed on their site. The lack of GS2 may simply be due to the fact that it's an old phone that they're no longer offering. If you find a Kroger GS2 online, it's likely that they support it. Note that i-wireless phones aren't branded on the phone itself; they typically say un-branded or even Sprint branded.

They also have a Bring Your Own Device program that allows you to activate used, inactive Sprint phones. Not all phones are eligible, so you'll have to enter your ESN and zip code on their site to verify. Here's a link to their BYOD program:

https://krogeriwireless.com/byosd
Jan 31, 2014
Rating
starstarstar 		Got The Galaxy S2?
by: JB

I've had good experiences with Kroger i-wireless, and everyone has been very polite. I had to send back my Galaxy S3 because they could not get it to work for me. Now I'm wondering about getting an S2 instead. Does i-wireless support an S2? Does anyone know? Thanks.
Jan 20, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Very Odd
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

It's so odd that they told you they can't reverse the taxes charged for those erroneous transactions. While I understand that it takes several days to reverse charges (unfortunately), they should be refunding the full amount.

I recommend calling back and asking them again. If they say the same thing, ask to speak with a supervisor....And please report back here to let us know what they say!
Jan 19, 2014
Rating
starstarstar 		I-Wireless is a RIP OFF
by: Darcie

I bought my 11 year old son an i-wireless phone last April. It was stolen soon afterwards and I reported it stolen in July (per my recent conversation w/their customer service dept). Now, today, JANUARY 19, six months later, I see that they charged me $27.01 yesterday. I looked back on my statements and see another charge on December 19 for $26.75.

I immediately called their customer service, waited on hold for 20 minutes, and then another 20 minutes with 'Alicia' trying to figure out why I was charged. Finally, Alicia tells me I DID cancel in July & they are going to credit my account for the Dec & Jan charges, which SHOULD total $53.76.

When I confirm her name & the amount that I should be credited, she says "No, we can only credit back $50 because we cannot give back the taxes charged." WHAT?!?! YOU charged MY bank account fraudulently!!! So I wonder how often they do this to unsuspecting customers - telling them they are going to credit them back-but keep $3-$4 (of the sales tax) every time??

If they do it to 100 people a day, that's $300/day x 7 days=$2100 per WEEK!!! I am BEYOND upset about this! It might only be $3.76, but it's MY KIDS $3.76, and we already live paycheck to paycheck. Now I have to wait 3-5 business days to get my money back - and tomorrow is MLK Jr day, so 4-6 days, we have to go without. THANKS I-WIRELESS
Jan 13, 2014
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		5 Star Rating
by: Michelle

You are so right Richard. I have had nothing but excellent service from my I-wireless phone. Great rewards when you link your Kroger card to your account. I only spend $25 a month on my bill, and the free 20 minutes with each 100pts makes it more than enough minutes for the month. Thank you I-wireless.
Dec 02, 2013
Rating
star 		Stand Up
by: E

If you guys have a customer service line, why isn't there a single person to answer the phones? You have the money; hire some help. Please answer the phones!
Oct 17, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstar 		What's Everyone's Problem??
by: Anonymous

I've used iwireless Kroger for 5+yrs and never had issues, no billing problems, nothing. When my first phone got weird I upgraded to a smartphone ZTE warp. It was difficult to activate only because of where I was at McDonalds during lunch time. I was talking on a cell while activating another one was near impossible. However, anytime

I've called customer service they have been very nice and never got aggravated. They statyed on the line with me no matter how long it took to fix my issues. I have a tendency to be loyal, and they've never given me a reason to doubt myself.
Oct 04, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Sharing On Free Websites
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Thank you for sharing your thoughts Richard. I just wanted to add a comment regarding the value of sharing on sites like this one. Where there is confusion over how services actually work, discussions like this help people understand whether or not there is an actually a problem that needs to be reported to the BBB.

Whether or not it's misunderstanding, lack of reading the terms, or an actual problem, other visitors are able to learn from the discussion, which enables them to either understand how things work, or take action to support complaints on the BBB. In this case, I agree that it's confusion over how the product/service actually functions.

Lastly, this thread happened to have received the attention of employees at i-wireless, so getting direct feedback from them is helpful, and can actually help improve customer communications should they decide to make changes to marketing materials to help avoid confusion in the future.
Oct 04, 2013
Rating
star 		Not a Rip Off
by: Richard

How uneducated must people be complaining about something that is stated, yet not fed into their lazy mouths right away? Very.

You want things for free or cheap, yet are too lazy to read all the terms and conditions. But you are sure not too lazy to place your lazy butts on a free website to whine and complain about things.

Spend this time, effort and energy, and try to be productive. Would help the Internet (not being crowded by useless traffic), environment (wasted electricity and oxygen for you blowing hot air).

Oh, and in case someone wants to get real smart: You don't post complaints about disclosures on free websites, you report it to the BBB. If you are legitimate.
Jul 26, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Close The Loop
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

@lindams If you can please circle back here after you contact Lindsay and leave another comment to let us know that you were taken care of, that would be great; thank you!
Jul 26, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Modem Return Help
by: Anonymous

@lindams - please send a message with contact information to lindsay.pedersen@iwirelesshome.com. I can assure you that our Customer Care team will help to resolve the issue you've described.
Thank you.
Jul 25, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Worst Customer Service Ever
by: lindams

I purchased a USB modem online, and as soon as it was received, the nightmare began! I have never experienced a more frustrating attempt with customer service as I have the past 2 weeks with their representatives.

The modem was shipped to my daughter's address and I received the modem on July 12th. I called the number provided as I could not get the item to load onto my computer on July 13th. I was told someone would call me back within 24 hours. I did not receive a call back so I called again on the 16th and was told the same thing; again no call back. I called on the 18th, 19, and the 20th. All 3 times I was promised a call back and was told how sorry they were that I was not getting help.

I was told on the 20th to please allow 24 to 48 hours after the weekend. It's now the 25th and I still have not received a call back. I called again and stated that I wanted a refund as I am now set up with another provider that actually was able to help me with great service.

I told the rep that I realized there was a 14 day timeline, however, I spent 14 days waiting for help. She said she couldn't give me a return auth#, but she could have someone call me back!!! What choice did I have but to once again give her my phone number. Then she asked for the phone # I was using for the modem. When I told her I never set it up because I couldn't get help, her response amazed me; she stated "Well that's why you probably never got a call back, and without that information, I can't request a callback, and I can't help you."

How do you reply to that? So I attempted to respond to the customer service email address on the shipping confirmation I received in my email, and the address was invalid. So they have my $53 and I have a worthless modem. I am angry and feel cheated, but will pursue all options to get my money back.

Next step, the better business bureau!
Jul 23, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Ratings confusion
by: Anonymous

Add a rating for the product being reviewed and clarify them both.
Jul 23, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Ratings
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

I can see where you're coming from. Yes, you need to read the review and rate that. If someone says something negative and it gets 5 stars, that means people agree with what was written in the review. If you disagree with a review, you would rate it low. If someone gave a great review and you completely disagree, you would rate that review with a low number of stars.

I don't manipulate the ratings; visitors are free to provide whatever rating you want. Moreover, I'm not affiliated with i-wireless, and they don't pay me. I provide forum for visitors to provide their feedback, and my comments are an unbiased attempt to help clarify where people might have questions or where there is confusion.

I think if you read the review or any of the comments, there won't be any confusion regarding whether people generally like/dislike the service.

I can remove the ratings altogether if people find this approach to be confusing, however, that would impact all review pages. That hasn't been the feedback to this point, though I can definitely understand your perspective; thank you for sharing.
Jul 22, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Hmmmmmm
by: Anonymous

Makes ya wonder who's who doesn't it? Who pays you PWG?
Jul 22, 2013
Rating
star 		Rating System
by: Anonymous

The rating system makes it look like I-wireless is getting a good rating.

The stars are actually for rating this page. Who rates a page and not the product? Anyway...kinda misleading.
Jul 19, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Horrible service, okay phone
by: Anonymous

I've never dealt with such a lousy service in my life. It has literally taken 3 weeks just to get the phone activated. Many, many calls...back and forth just to get the phone ported. Something every other company I've dealt with can do in about 10 minutes. After that...the voicemail wouldn't work. More time on the phone getting that fixed. Regret this purchase! Oh and the phone...LG Optimus...okay, but a very, very low-end smartphone.
May 29, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Customer Reps!!!!
by: Anonymous

It took me a few hours and a few calls to different numbers, but if you dial 1.866.594.3644, you can get through to a LIVE customer Rep!

Press 1 for English
Press 4 Wait for "other services options"
Finally you will press 9 for a customer rep!


GOOD LUCK!
May 21, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstar 		Galaxy S II Is Back
by: Anonymous

I just bought mine online after purchasing an HTC Hero (returning!). Hopefully this is better than the ZTE!! HORRIBLE!! The phone is, not the service. I have been with Kroger for about 3-4years and I have never had issues with the company. Just the ZTE phone....DON'T Buy It!
May 15, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		No More Live Operator
by: Amy

I have been with i-wireless for four years, and just now I cannot reach a LIVE customer service agent. My phone says unlimited text, but won't let me, and I have no help with this. I have many minutes on there and can't do anything about it. sux
Apr 30, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i-wireless Contact Number
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

I found this number on their contact page:

1.866.594.3644

Though I haven't tried calling to see if I can get through to a live agent without being an existing customer.
Apr 29, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Phone Number
by: Anonymous

I'm not yet an i-wireless user, but seriously considering them. The main thing holding me back is the lack of a published phone number where I can talk to a people to get questions answered, primarily about the plans.
Apr 23, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Changed My Mind
by: Cindy

Geeze, after reading all this, I guess I've changed my mind. I was so excited as I live out in the country and Sprint is the only cell that works well for me. I was so excited to find a pre-paid wireless that was Sprint! But, after reading all these posts, I guess I'll bite the bullet and either pay the higher price, or just stay in my 'no text/no data' dinosaur way. :( So sad! (but thanks for all the 'heads up'!).
Apr 15, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Happy Customer
by: rip

I am happy w/ my phone and service. I just wish that replacement insurance was offered to iwireless customers, just like the major carriers offer.
Feb 24, 2013
Rating
starstarstar 		Net 10 Thiefs
by: LOBO

Kroger Stores provide services for the Net 10 company. Their customer service is the worst I have ever encountered. Located in the Phillipines, it is operated by lying, cheating, scum bags who will rob you of your minutes and disable your phone before you have a chance to use it. It happened to me when I tried to reactivate a phone I had purchased in the past. DO NOT do business with this group of ignorant, useless, stealing, oxen wasted chunks of cow manure. Just a warning from the LOBO.
Feb 20, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Account Limits
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Hi Yank - Although I'm sure there are exceptions, my understanding is that as a general rule prepaid carriers limit the maximum allowable account balance. This relates to limiting liability. As carriers can't recognize revenue until funds are used to purchase something (i.e. make a call, use data, pay for a game, etc.), unused balances have an accounting treatment as a liability, which can have a drag on overall reported net profitability.

Also, depending on a given state's laws regarding unused funds, sometimes the carrier can claim those funds as revenue when they expire, while others must submit these to the appropriate authorities as escheatment. I've seen this law change in CA a number of years ago, though I don't know the status in other states at this point.

I do, however, generally see customers reaching these limits (typically in the $300-$400 range for single line accounts) as edge cases, meaning that the risk is low, and they should just allow customers to accumulate balances, there are legal and accounting considerations, which is why this is generally accepted practice in the industry.

Please note that I'm not on the side of the carrier, nor customer for that matter. I simply try to help people untangle the confusion by presenting facts, or thoughtful opinions based on experience, as well as a forum for people (with both positive and negative experiences) to be heard. I hope this clarification at least provides some context, even though your point (and frustration) certainly makes a lot of sense!
Feb 20, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Response to Yank
by: Kelly

Yank,

I'm sorry you feel this was not disclosed. The terms of service are stated in the Terms and Conditions on our website, http://krogeriwireless.com/terms-conditions, as well as in our FAQs. Also, if you are adding airtime using an airtime card, the expiry terms are stated on the backside of the card.

As PWG has stated most, if not all, prepaid carriers have this type of rule in place. Please let me know if you have any questions.
Feb 20, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Funds Expiration NEWER
by: Yank

PWG, I think you missed the main point in my last post. You've made it clear to everyone how points and account money expires when additional funds / minutes are not added within the time limits imposed, but the issue of having a "cap" on your banked money and the threat of losing the bank because you don't purchase their products or use you phone more that you need just to waste money or minutes is wrong by any standard. Why would ANY carrier be concerned with a customer having excess funds available when they continue to purchase more minutes as required? The "cap" issue alone should be illegal. Maybe I'm too cynical, but if it looks like a RIP OFF, acts like a RIP OFF, well.... you know.
Feb 20, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Funds Expiration
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

I understand people's frustration regarding expiring funds/minutes/earned rewards. However, I want to ensure that prepaid customers understand that minutes/dollars always expire. Every carrier has different rules, and it largely depends on the plan type you have. However, at the end of the day, they expire if additional funds aren't added (for traditional pay-as-you-go).

Bonus/earned rewards also usually expire. Even Ralphs, Vons, etc. that have rewards dollars expire after a certain period of time.

Anyway, not that I don't empathize with this frustration, but I want visitors to this site to be aware that expiration rules apply to all prepaid wireless carriers. I think it's a more of a matter of full disclosure and setting expectations that best serves customers; no one likes surprises!
Feb 19, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Another Rip Off
by: Yank

This too, was not disclosed when I purchased my iwireless phone from Kroger. Forcing customers to purchase minutes to keep their previously purchased minutes from expiring is bad enough. Now, if you don't use your phone enough, you're penalized by losing your bank. (Seems to me the less you use your phone, the more money they make.) This is especially true for the elderly who rarely use a cell phone and keep one for an emergency (like my parents).

Is Kroger targeting the elderly? Way to go Kroger iwireless; keep looking for ways to rip off the consumer, like your phony "price cuts" you advertise. You knock $1 off an item and more than make up for it on higher prices on other products. Quit acting like you're doing the consumer a favor.

Practically every watchdog group and news outlet in this area has called you out on this. The Kroger in my neighborhood has the rudest employees I've ever seen in a grocery store. Someday Kroger, this will all bite you in the ass and you'll hear someone say, "Do you remember when Kroger stores were everywhere? Now you can't find one."
Feb 18, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		How To Avoid Losing Minutes
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Once you get to the maximum allowable balance, try performing a billable action, like calling internationally, downloading a game, or anything else that will take your balance below $400. Then topup with the lowest amount available, which will extend your time. That said, if you're rarely using your phone, as you noted, you can simply let them expire and start accumulating minutes again.
Feb 18, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Unused Time
by: Roscoe Brown

I went along with the need to buy more time even though you have ample time left. What I did not know was when you get say $400.00 of saved up time, you can not buy any more time. If time isn't bought before the expiration date, you lose ALL your accumulated time. The only other recourse is to use all the saved time until you can add more. I only use my phone for emergencies so minutes add up. It is still the cheapest rate for emergencies.
Feb 18, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Bait & Switch
by: David

Having uploaded all my photos for 2 years, I find they have all been deleted and they no longer support sending photos??!!! I have not changed plans and have received no notice that they were going to destroy all my photos and remove picture messaging.

FRED MEYER ARE DISHONEST CROOKS! THIEVES!
Feb 15, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Request
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Please keep this thread on topic. If you either like or dislike their service, please share why with supporting detail that will be helpful to visitors of this page, or post a new review submission. Any further one line comments like the last two will be deleted in order to preserve the integrity and usefulness of this site. Thank you for your understanding!
Feb 15, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Well...
by: Anonymous

Good for you! Aren't you special? Did you get 10 free minutes for this post?
Feb 15, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		KROGER
by: Anonymous

I LOVE KROGER I-WIRELESS!
Feb 11, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Like I said
by: Anonymous

Yuuuup!
Feb 11, 2013
Rating
star 		Beware
by: Anonymous

I have been attempting to set-up an account for over a week because of their pricing. Multiple emails nor multiple phone calls with managers have solved the issue on I-Wireless's end. What is even worse, is that they have already charged my credit card for the service that I cannot use because of I-Wireless' difficulties. Buyer beware.
Jan 28, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		No more Samsung S2's?
by: Anonymous

It does not seem like they are going to get the Samsung galaxy S2 phone back, they told me in a few weeks and that was after Christmas and now it's almost Feb 2013...
Jan 22, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Getting a New Number
by: Kelly

Hello,

I apologize that you were unable to get your number changed. If you send an email to iwireless@iwirelesshome.com, I'll make sure to forward to a supervisor and get your son's number changed right away.

Thank you,

Kelly
Jan 22, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Won't work
by: Anonymous

Tried that. All I got was an apology.
Jan 22, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Unwanted Calls & Texts
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

I recommend that you call them and request a new phone number. I assume that you didn't port in a previous number that you had, but rather got a new number. If you explain what's happening, they may also refund you your minutes as a one-time courtesy.
Jan 22, 2013
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		A Waste
by: Anonymous

I bought my son an i-wireless Android phone for his bday, and all the amount in the prepaid card including free minutes were all wasted because there are too many calls and text messages from unknown people that eats up his prepaid money loaded on the phone. This is the worst prepaid phone in the market!
Dec 11, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Response to Anonymous
by: Kelly

Hello there - please send an email to iwireless@iwirelesshome.com with your i-wireless phone number and I will look into the account for you. Please reference that you are emailing from this board, that way I can make sure I flag it as top importance.

Thanks!

Kelly
Dec 10, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Minutes And Data Disappearing - Poof It's Gone
by: Anonymous

I just spent an hour and a half on the phone with customer service. All my talk and data time, plus my excess cash has just disappeared. All I got from customer service was to go online, and I was hung up on twice when asked for supervisors. They're rude and unhelpful. Thieves; they robbed me.
Dec 07, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Love My Phone
by: wes

I have nothing but good things to say about kroger i wireless. Their customer service is always helpful and responsive compared to other prepaid carriers I have dealt with in the past. Using Sprint's network you cannot go wrong.
Dec 07, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		What a surprise!
by: YANK

Does anyone see a pattern here? STOP supporting businesses that repeatedly show it's not the consumer that matters, it's just their money.If consumers fight back, eventually companies like Kroger and their affiliate i-wireless, will have no choice but to change their policies and practices. Stop buying their products and / or services until they change. After all, they are only interested in your money. Make them work for it and earn it like you do.
Dec 07, 2012
Rating
star 		Terrible Company
by: Anonymous

I just received 2 HTC Evo cell phones today. One didn't work. It just kept restarting. So I called i-wireless support. Three different techs said they couldn't help because they were not trained on the phone and I had to ship it back at my expense. So I ask to speak to a supervisor. I asked why I had to pay for shipping back a cell phone that NEVER worked. He said that's their policy and hung-up on me. Terrible customer service. The only thing I can do at this point is to dispute the charges with my credit card company. I would strongly suggest using a different cell phone company to anyone thinking about i-wireless.
Nov 26, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		I Understand Your Pain!
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Page Plus Cellular, MetroPCS, and Cricket are known to accept flashing over of many Sprint phones. As a very popular phone, you may have luck with the HTC Evo. You can call them to check, or go to a wireless dealer (call before to save time) to have them flash it. Be sure that you understand what services will NOT work. Sometimes MMS or even data won't work, while sometimes they work just fine. I wouldn't mind going without MMS (i.e. the ability to send a picture message), however, a phone like that without data is pretty useless.

You may be too exhausted at this point to consider these options, but maybe something to look into in the future.
Nov 24, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Prepaid Wireless
by: Frustration

I have 14 calendar days to return the two phones and I will have to wait 10-15 days after they receive them back to see a credit on the card I used. I really hope the return process goes smoothly.

For now, guess my husband and I will stay with Sprint. We've been with them for several years now. If things get real tight, maybe we'll just go down to one phone.

I have looked into several of the companies and some of the issues I run into is there's not much of a savings from what I currently pay or the phones they offer aren't very good or the better ones are sort of pricey. It would be nice to find a company that would allow us to bring our own devices rather than make us buy new ones. We have two HTC Evo 4g phones. We have extra batteries, a couple different cases, protective screens on each of them, car chargers and a car mount. We even have an extra Evo that has a couple of black marks on the screen as a parts phone. To have to purchase new phones with a prepaid company means that it will take a year or possibly longer before I actually start saving money.

I was hoping things would work with iwireless as the plan we were going to use was going to be a difference of $70 a month. If the two new phones would have been decent (refurbished) phones, it would not have taken long to start seeing that savings. Oh well.



Nov 24, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Now That's Horrible!
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Thank you for circling back to share your latest experience! Wow, how frustrating! When a phone is within a certain number of days (30 days is not uncommon), carriers usually deal with manufacturer warranty issues directly instead of sending brand new customers to them like you experienced. I have, however, seen that happen as well for certain OEMs and wireless providers, though carriers typically work on processes to avoid it due to the obvious customer experience issues.

Manufacturers will also usually not require you to pay to ship the phone(s) to them for repair when within the warranty period; that's odd.

I hate to state the obvious, but even if they required you to go to a store to validate that the issue was a defect, they should then have sent you a new phone immediately.

As the port is tied to the account, swapping out to a new phone and programming it with your number isn't difficult.

Anyway, it's a shame that it didn't work out for you, and I have to say that most people would not have put in the effort you did to get to this point, so losing you as a customers is almost tragic at this point!

I can assure you that activating on prepaid wireless isn't usually this problematic. Working in the prepaid industry, I'm embarrassed for the experience you had even though it's not my company. I'm interested to know where you're going to head next for your wireless service!
Nov 24, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		On Going Frustration - HTC Evo 4g
by: Frustration

Received those two HTC Evo 4g phones I worked so hard to get at the special Kroger price last weekend. I will state that they were ordered on Monday and I did receive them today, Saturday. Shipping time was good.

The problems began after I called iwireless to set them up. I had to pull the backs off each phone to provide the ESN numbers to the representative. I was porting the numbers over from Sprint so it was going to take a few days. Got off the phone and my husband went to put the backings on our phones. We were unable to get his to secure on all sides. Tried several different ways and it was not happening. I called customer service and spoke with Dwayne. He told me to take them to my Kroger Store and they would put the back on for me. I did try to explain to him that I knew what I was doing (as I already have this phone on the Sprint carrier) but he insisted this what I had to do. Actually made the comment "I am on a phone, what do you expect me to do?" At this point my husband got on the phone asking for his supervisor. We did not get one and Dwayne hung up. My husband called back and got Dwayne. He was told that the porting could not be stopped and again, not much help. We went down to our local Krogers with the phones. The manager and other customer service people attempted to put the back on the phone and were unsuccessful. The Kroger manager even called iwireless. She was told to contact the manufacturer and so she did. The manufacturer told her we would have to ship it into them to be fixed. Kroger manager told them this was not an acceptable solution as we just received the phones and had not actually used either of them yet. She apologized for how this was working out and advised us to contact Kroger Customer Service on Monday and explain what was happening.

We came home, contacted iwireless and got Dwayne again. I explained that we had gone down to the store and no one could get the back on the phone. Told him I wanted to stop the numbers from being ported and to return both the phones. He took info, states he stopped the porting of phones and gave me RMA numbers to return phones. I guess on Monday I will have to go to a Fedex place and pay to return these two phones. Dwayne was reasonable to work with this time. It's a shame that this is the type of problems and initial customer service we are receiving. I will be returning those phones for a refund. While I would like to save money monthly, this does not look like a wise decision to go to iwireless. I have wasted two Saturdays now trying to work out a snag with the Kroger iwireless program.
Nov 20, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Stand up and push back
by: Anonymous

It's all about pushing back. Quit letting corporate greed dictate what you get for your money. Push back and usually you'll get what's fair.
Nov 19, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Great News!
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Thank you for all of the follow up; that's great that you're finally getting some positive resolution.

Carriers often have weird rules, know and unknown issues, and even crappy policies. However, generally speaking, they're not in business to be cruel, evil, or unfair to customers. In fact, now that prepaid wireless is saturated, which means that growth is less from new to wireless customers, and more stealing customers from other carriers, the customer experience is at the top of their priority list.

Unfortunately, they almost all have a LOT of work to do around this factor. Usually if you get to the right people, you can come up with a good resolution to most problems.

It's great when customers can come to sites this this, and get some good advice, and even get through to good people at carriers to help get their problem through the right channel for resolution.

Anyway, I hope you have a good experience with the service after all of the frustration and effort you went through to get it started!
Nov 19, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Happier Now
by: Frustration

I wanted to share a positive experience from iwireless. I just received a call from their customer service stating they would help me in ordering the phones at the Kroger Customer Rewards price. They stated that there's a problem with the website. Thank you iwireless, I appreciate the help.
Nov 19, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		My Experience in trying to get Assistance
by: Frustration

I'm not sure who is dropping the ball where but this has been the experience in trying to go to Kroger i wireless and save money on two phones.

On Saturday I spoke with Rep for iwireless to ask some questions. Told I was unable to bring my "Sprint" HTC EVO 4g over to their network as I had to have an iwireless phone to set up. Told that Kroger Rewards Customers could get one for $99 and was given the website to do so. Went to the website provided, put my Kroger Customer Rewards number in and it did not work. Sent emails to Kroger Customer Care asking for assistance on getting promotion. (Still have not heard anything on my email.) My husband sent an email to iwireless customer care asking for assistance.
(Went to Krogers to see if they had a HTC Evo 4g. They did not. Noticed that their phones for iwireless all said SPRINT on them. (Find it very interesting that I have to buy an iwireless phone because it has to be one of "their" phones and yet it will say Sprint)On Sunday my husband received an email response from iwireless and we gave our Kroger Care numbers to them. This morning, my husband received another email stating that our numbers had been added and we could go to website and use promotion. Excited! Went to website, put number in and it confirmed we are eligible. Pressed continue and filled out info to create account and provide requested info. Pressed continued and received "creating account" and clock at top of screen. Screen stayed this way and never proceeded any further. Screen froze. Started over and filled all the info in again. This time screen stated an account was already setup with that info and I could not do anything else. Started over again, put account info in under my husband, pressed continue and screen froze at "creating account." Tried calling the iwireless rep that had emailed my husband, went to voicemail. Sent an email to her and left VM. Still waiting for response. Called Kroger Customer Care asking for assistance. 1st care customer tried the website had difficulties, tried logging in as me and picking plans, put me on hold and after waiting over 5 minutes for her to return I heard click and call was gone. ERRRRRRRR! That call was over 1/2 an hour. Called Kroger Customer Care again, now I'm crying because I am so frustrated and have wasted so much time. I was on the phone with her for another 1/2 hour and she finally suggested I call the iwireless 866-594-3644 and ask that they assist me in getting this done. Now what's very scary is I am not a customer yet with iwireless but I have not been able to get anywhere with this coupon offer thru Krogers or iwireless. Krogers says that they sell the iwireless products thru their store but it is not their company. Guess that website www.krogeriwireless.com is deceiving. On Saturday I was told by iwireless that this was a Kroger coupon.
Nov 19, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		It's Marketing People!
by: Jerry

I understand what you're saying. I get upset when I can't get a promo that I know others are getting; it's highly annoying!

However, this isn't anything new to the world. Companies do targeting marketing promotions all the time. Those Target, Walmart, Best Buy, etc. coupons that you get in the mail are customized for you! Sometimes, it's by city, sometimes by zip code, and even sometimes by each individual based on what you've purchased at their store in the past.

And yes, each customer is worth something different to a company. The more you spend, the more you're worth! It's just a simple fact of business.

That doesn't mean we have to be happy with it, but it's not a scam; it just is what it is! What you can always try is bringing the promo to the store and requesting to get it. Many companies will honor it to ensure they don't lose you as a customer. Their initial intention is for only the targeted people to get the promo, however, they'll often honor it for others as well if we happen to learn about it!
Nov 19, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Hey Frustrated
by: Anonymous

Did you read between the lines? Why only a certain group? Why were you, a consumer paying for the same service, left out of a promotion? Demand the same deals available to the "groups" they advertise and promote. Are you or your money of less value than a "selected group"? If you, and others, permit this type of behavior then it will get worse.
Nov 19, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Read ALL the posts
by: Yank

Most of these posts have been advertisements for products or services. Read ALL the posts and you'll see a pattern of neglect and irresponsibility on the part of Kroger while at the same time you'll see an abundance of corporate rhetoric from their i-wireless affiliate.

It should be illegal for a service provider to determine what functions of a phone will be operational. Start demanding the phone manufacturers not supply the phones to these companies that dictate what they will allow you, the consumer, to use. After all, that's the main reason the phones are purchased. It doesn't matter if you pay $50 or $500 for a phone. It's the abilities and functions of the product that persuade you to buy them. If enough people complain and refuse to buy these "limited function" phones, changes will be made. Pass this on, blog it, email it, whatever it takes for the consumer to have a say in what they get for their hard earned dollars.
Nov 19, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Response to Frustration
by: Kelly

Thank you for your response. There is a special promotion available, however, it was to a specific group of Kroger Plus Card holders. If you feel that you should have received this promotion, you can email us at iwireless@iwirelesshome.com and request that we look up your card to see if it was selected in the promotion.
Nov 19, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Kroger Coupon for EVO
by: Frustration

Thank you Kelly for commenting on my post. I did see that the Evo is on sale at the website for $149. The original part of my post stated that I knew there was a special for Kroger Reward Customers. (I've had one of their cards for several years.) In fact, it was one of the operators for iwireless that told me Kroger had this special. Unfortunately, neither my husband's or my card will give us that $50 savings so that we can buy those phones. I did place an email on the Kroger customer website Saturday morning asking about this but have not heard anything. I tried contacting a couple of the Kroger stores in my area and their customer service did not know much about the iwireless plans/phones. They also did not have this phone in the store. (One store said they would honor it if I printed the ad I was talking about and they had the phone. No phone, no go.)

It's tough enough that I have to purchase phones to come over to try and save money. Even tougher to swallow when I know there's a way to bring this cost down but it's not available to me. :(.
Nov 18, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Response to Frustration
by: Kelly

Hello,

The HTC Evo 4G is available on our website, www.krogeriwireless.com for $149.99. You can purchase it there at any time with free shipping.

I apologize for the inconvenience, but every carrier has handsets that are set up to work uniquely with their own systems. While there are ways around it in some cases, we currently do not have the option available to bring another carrier's phone on our network, or release an i-wireless phone to another network.
Nov 18, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		No $$ for Kroger
by: Anonymous

'Cause Kroger doesn't make money that way. IT'S ALL ABOUT THE $$$$!!!
Nov 17, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Kroger Coupon for EVO
by: Frustration

Found out that Kroger is offering the EVO at a special sale price provided you have a customer card or a 123 rewards account. Unfortunately, every time I try entering the 11 digit customer number it says I'm uneligable for the promotion. I have two Kroger cards and neither one works. Wanted to order phones today so they'd get sent out and I could switch over from Sprint.

Also frustrated that your phones say "Sprint" on them however I can not bring my current HTC EVO 4g over to your network. I have to purchase another one. What's the difference? They both are from Sprint? I'm trying to save money, that's why I'm coming over to your plan. How am I saving money when I have to buy a new phone?
Oct 31, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Response to Marcelo
by: Kelly

Marcelo,

We offer two $25 rate plans - one that includes taxes and fees but does not offer carry forward minutes and one that you pay taxes and fees on, but get carry forward minutes.

The easiest way to switch to a new rate plan is to call 611 and have a customer care agent walk you through the options, as well as look to see what rate plan is recommended for your use.

Thanks!

Kelly
Oct 31, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		How To Make A Plan Change
by: Marcelo

I am using my I-wireless phone as pay as you go and I want to select a 25 dollars plan, but I do not know how to do it, I tried a lot but it looks a little bit complicated,can someone help me with that issue? Thanks a lot.
Oct 30, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Reply to Anonymous
by: Kelly

Hello - please send an email to iwireless@iwirelesshome.com or PM us on Facebook with your i-wireless phone number and we can look into your account. Loss of service is dealt with on a case-by-case basis and we try not to have those conversations in public forums since they deal with proprietary information.

Kelly
Oct 30, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Iwireless?
by: Anonymous

I have the 25 dollar plan, each month. I just started this plan last month and i was specifically told to add more minutes the 28th of this month. Which i did, yesterday my phone cut off, not being able to call, or reply to my text. I've added a hefty amount to my phone this past weekend for it to just shut off. What happend.
Oct 30, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Reply to William
by: Kelly

William,

We run off of Sprint towers, so when there is weather and a Sprint tower is affected, your i-wireless service will be as well. Once Sprint repairs or fixes any error, your service should return to full capacity.

If you have further questions, you can PM us on Facebook - www.facebook.com/krogeriwireless or email us at iwireless@iwirelesshome.com

Thanks!

Kelly
Oct 30, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Used to be a good service, but now.
by: William

It's just a joke. Every time there's a storm in my area my iWireless phone can't get a tower signal for several hours to several DAYS. I made the mistake of going with their iWireless broadband setup - severely disappointed with it. When it works, it works great - but I've been using it less than a year and it's steadily getting worse. At least once a week I have to deal with their 'customer service' - often on hold for 20+ minutes, on several occasions more than an hour. They usually do fix the problem, but it only goes another week before some other problem pops up. It's way too much hassle for such unreliable service. Screw it, I'm gonna go look for something better.
Oct 17, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Prepaid Account Balance Confusion
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Any extra money that you add to cover the sales tax (which is the extra dollars you reference) should remain on the prepaid account balance, which means that next month you'll need to add less dollars to cover that month's payment.

That said, you should be able to buy a $25 card (for example). The taxes will be applied on top of that, which will be the total you pay on your credit/debit card. Then you apply the $25 PIN to your account to cover your $25 plan.

I have a feeling there's a misunderstanding around how the plans and taxes work. If you want a $25 plan, you can pay $25 plus tax and be good to go. This is not specific to i-wireless, but rather a general prepaid wireless principle.

Oct 16, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		online airtime
by: Anonymous

Another scammy thing about Kroger, is on their website you can only buy airtime in weird increments. But it's not so weird when you understand that to buy a 25 dollar plan, the total is 27 and some change. Well, gee 25 is an increment, but that doesn't buy you enough airtime to switch to the 25 dollar plan, right? So the next increment is - 35 dollars, with taxes and fees equals 38 and change total. So now you're paying 18 bucks more for a 25 dollar plan. You can't get the money back either. Sure you can buy junk online, like some stupid ringtone, but then you lose the money for minutes. It's just a way to get your money and it's unethical and disgusting. Business in America sucks.
Oct 15, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Some Ideas
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Hmm...Given that you can connect at work, it doesn't sound like a phone issue. It's not a cellular issue, as you don't need cellular access to use WiFi. I'm wondering if your router security settings are such that it's limiting the number of connections allowed, and your other home computers are using those connections.

So your phone sees your WiFi network, you connect, you enter the password, and you get an error? Or it connects, but you get an error when trying to get when trying to use data?

I don't think your phone settings are an issue as you're able to use it at work, so it's gotta be a home network setting issue.

I'm sorry, I'm not a WiFi network expert. If you describe your issue in more details, I can try to research a bit more for you.
Oct 15, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Response to PrepaidWirelessGuy
by: Tracey

Thanks for your response! The wifi I'm connected to is our own home wireless network. I am converting to an Android phone from a Blackberry. I've had no trouble getting online with the Blackberry and still don't. I don't know if this is an issue or not but where I live I have a poor mobile phone signal. It doesn't seem to matter which carrier. It's just a bad area for a phone signal. When I took my new phone to work today I had an excellent mobile phone signal and connected to our wireless network at work and had no issues with anything! As soon as I get home I can't seem to get on the web no matter how strong the wifi signal is. Could the poor phone signal be an issue? Or could it just be a problem with the LG Optimus and my wireless router at home? Is it something to do with the prepaid service? It's frustrating that I can't use my high feature phone to it's potential!
Oct 15, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Reply to Christina
by: Kelly

Christina,

If you please send me an email with your i-wireless phone number, I'll look into this for you. It's kelly.rodamer@iwirelesshome.com.

Thanks!
Oct 15, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		WiFi Network Logon
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Many free WiFi networks require that you accept terms and conditions using your Internet connection before letting you on the network. So even if the signal is strong, you may need to launch a browser session before you're Android apps can connect.

That said, if you're able to get on this site, and still not use Google Play, Facebook, etc., it's a little bizarre. Do you have another phone with WiFi that you can test with nearby?

It's hard to say at this point whether it's an issue with your particular phone.
Oct 14, 2012
Rating
starstarstar 		Help
by: Tracey

I just became an iWireless customer and so far I'm pleased with service and my LG Optimus S. However, even though I enabled wifi on the phone to cut down on data use, I find that I'm getting unable to connect to network errors. Not all web use but examples of things I'm having issues with are: can't connect to facebook mobile (says page cannot be displayed) nor am I able to download the app from the android market (says unable to download at this time). When trying to access the youtube app it says can't connect to network. Even some of the updates that need to be Installed won't download. I have an excellent wifi signal so I don't understand why this is happening. I'm on this site now on my phone so what the heck? Any suggestions?
Oct 10, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Clarification Needed
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Thank you for your comment Christina. I'm not sure I understand exactly what happened though. If you don't pay by the date of your monthly recurring charge, you'll lose your service. Even if you did pay on time, if you're on a monthly plan, you can't carry over minutes; your bucket of minutes/data simply refreshes with the monthly allotment in the plan you're subscribed to. If you're on a pay as you go per minute plan, your dollars WILL rollover so long as you add money to the account before the expiration date.

Please let us know more details about what happened. And no, I don't work for i-wireless; I'm simply interested in ensuring that visitors to the site understand what happened so they can learn from it in order to avoid similar issues. Also, if someone from i-wireless sees your post, they'll be in a better position to help you with your specific concern.
Oct 10, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		honestly yes.
by: Christina

I was one day late on my payment for my usual 1k min unlimited txt and then a handful of web, and they took my remaining 800 min and reduced them to 100 plus charged txts on the minutes!

When I called and paid they never returned a dime or minute, and I was forced to basically have way less minutes than planned.

It should be illegal due to the fact that it's digital fruitless data they can just take away at any time as if you never paid for it to begin with.

I agree! Scam!
Sep 19, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Actually Ron...
by: Anonymous

You are partially right. Some of these posts are nothing more than ads. Kinda like your post. READ the first complaint to understand the problem as it existed then. I-wireless has made changes to notify the consumer about what they do to them now, but they did not then. It's still a rip off in my opinion, but that's my opinion. I won't waste readers time posting ads.
Sep 18, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Iwirelesshome
by: Wendy

I have had no issues with Iwirelesshome.com. I have been with them for more then five yrs. I am now on my third phone(nothing is wrong with the first two). I just wanted to keep updating phones. I also have had no problems with customer service and they have always been more then accommodating.
Sep 14, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		My mileage varied (not ripoff)
by: Ron

I'm a little like Scott... after reading all the posts, I couldn't quite see the fuss implied in the complaints in this series of posts. But even if there is truth in some of the complaints, I find Kelly's (iwireless rep) responsiveness to be refreshing. And now since I'm getting off of vzw, I can afford a smartphone for both my wife and I. We both have smartphones (LG Optimus S) for about 1/3 the cost of Verizon. This may not be true for others who use a *lot* of minutes or data, but for us, the $25/month plan is perfect. Go i-wireless. Goodbye VZW!
Sep 12, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		To Rip Off!! Anonymous
by: Kelly

Hi there - if you will send me an email at iwireless@iwirelesshome.com, I'll look into why a charge appeared. The only time we charge a customer's card without them initiating a charge is if you are enrolled in Auto Refill, which allows you to pay your bill automatically.

Thanks, Kelly
Sep 12, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Never going with Iwireless.
by: Anonymous

After reading this .... I bought an LG Optimus off ebay not realizing it was for iwireless. I had no idea what it was anyway. After reading all this, there's no way in hell I am going with it. I'm not putting my debit information on there just for them to randomly charge me.

Thank u for everyone who posted; you saved me money.
Sep 11, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		RIP OFF !!!
by: Anonymous

Charge from them for over 30 dollars on my debit card.
If you look you will see this same sort of thing all over the internet.
When I called the person told me that a message would have to be left for the department that handles that and they would have to call me back. Still no return call

SCAM!!! or is it SCUM!!!
Sep 06, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Your mileage (I mean experience) may vary
by: Xander

I've been an I-Wireless customer for three or four years. Before that I had a Verizon phone on a contract. It was supposed to be $60 per month, but the bills for the first 3 months were over $200 because the Verizon rep tacked on a bunch of features I did not request, want, or use. If I feel a business is screwing me over, I take my business elsewhere.

After the Verizon debacle, I decided that the only phone I would use would be a no contract phone. That way I would have more control over my money than some phone company rep.

The first phone I bought (Sanyo Katana) from I-Wireless quit working two days after purchase, and Kroger replaced it. After several months, that phone (another Katana) developed problems so I changed to the 2700, which, after more than 2 years, is starting to wear out. The USB charger port is worn and sometimes the phone will not charge without considerable futzing with the plug. So I decided to go for an Android phone.

I was somewhat alarmed by the Kroger employees who seemed to think the service is a joke. At the checkout, another customer sounded like an ad for Verizon.

I went with the LG Optimus smart phone, because, in addition to needing a new phone, I also needed to replace an aging PDA and this works for me.

I don't make a lot of calls, and most of the calling features are not useful to me. Keeping this in mind, I can understand that getting less for slightly more is what economists call a 'dis-satisfier'. The only real problem I've seen with I-Wireless is in customer service, and it seems to me that possibly CS is understaffed.
Aug 27, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Reply to Scott
by: Kelly

Scott,

Thank you for your comments. We value feedback, both negative and positive from all of our customers.
Aug 26, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Nice ad Scott!
by: Yank

Nice ad Scott! The gnats you speak of were in (or not in) the disclosure at the POS. They weren't there, then they were there...and all along they couldn't be seen. I've long since dropped Kroger's I-wireless plan. And since Kroger turned a blind eye to all this, claiming they had nothing to do with it, even though this I-wireless service states it's a "Kroger" company, I've found myself shopping at stores a little further away from home. I have been a Kroger customer for a lot of years but I've come to realize it's no longer about the consumer, it's about corporate greed. My money spends anywhere!
Aug 25, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Rip off - Anything but!
by: Scott

I happend upon this page when looking for something else but was sucked by all the drama and read every post. I've been an i-wireless customer for over a year now and have to say I find it anything but a rip off. I had to read the the original post a few times to understand what the complaint was. I think what Kelly was getting at is that just because you didn't need to buy minutes with the phone (due to free minutes) you had to be aware you would need to buy minutes in the future. Am I the only one who would check out the prepaid card I would have to buy in the future? Seems you are picking at gnats.

Anyway, as for my experience, I find I use too many minutes and run out all of the time. I ended up chosing a monthly plan ($25 - 200 min, 200 data, unlimited text). This is a great deal for unlimited text. Plus I get minutes added to my phone for shopping at Kroger stores in addition to gas discounts. Talk about a win win for me. I have no complaints. Well maybe a plan between the $25 - 200 min and the $40 - 1000 min would be right up my alley. Thanks i-wireless and Kroger!
Aug 08, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		My optimus i-wireless phone's texting has not worked in a month!
by: ANNOYED

It comes up with error 97 every time i try to send a text message. Then I get error 67 telling me to update my profile ALL THE TIME. I contacted i-wireless today about this (probably the 5th time I've called them). After being on hold for an hour, the guy answers and I gave him the house number to call. He said he would call me back on that number. Now another hour has gone by, no phone call. i'm fed up. Should not be paying this 43$ a month when my texting has never worked! The free texting app I've been using is getting pretty annoying.
Jul 29, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Good Follow-up
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Hi Mike - I just wanted to thank you for taking the time to follow up. And to think that they could have kept you as a customer for $20! I have no doubt that visitors to this site will appreciate and learn from your experience and comments. All the best with Straight Talk.
Jul 28, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i'm done
by: Mike

It's me again.

In case you don't remember me. I complained about my LG Remarq trying to do a wireless backup over and over and over. I sent my phone to LG. They said nothing was wrong. I wireless sent me a new phone. It does the same exact thing so I wasted 2-3 weeks chasing a ghost.

Apparently this is a feature of the Sprint network that's not removed from the LG phones sold to i wireless. I'm sure i wireless knows about this annoyance but they feign ignorance.

I asked the kid last night to credit me $20 for my wasted time. He said he couldn't but he would add time to my anniversary. He added 2 days. TWO DAYS!

Look, it's not the end of the world. I hit DONE and the message goes away. It's the damn principal of it. They know about it, I'm sure, but they act like they don't. Then they are too cheap to give you a $20 credit for wasting your time.

After this month I'm cancelling the account and going to Wal Mart to get a Straight Talk phone. At least those phones use Verizon, not crappy Sprint.

To potential customers, DO NOT buy the LG Remarq and check the Sprint coverage in my area. Apparently it sucks in my area but I didn't know that at the time.
Jul 28, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		What?
by: Yank

If it "expires on the 15th you need to add minutes on the 14th." Yuuup!! More double talk from i-wireless. Why don't you just end all the runaround corporate bull and say "your account expires on the 14th, add money by the end of the day or else." What's so hard about being honest and forthright with consumers? Oh, I know... $$$$$$.
Jul 27, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Expiration and LG Remarq
by: Kelly

Prepaid Wireless Guy - our expiration is midnight of the date your plan renews. So, as for your example, if you have a plan that expires on the 15th, you will need to add airtime by 11:59pm on the 14th so your account does not default.

In response to the Remarq issue - we are aware of it and working on it.
Jul 27, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Sprint Wireless Backup error message W1001
by: Kamante

I would like I-Wireless and Sprint to figure out how to stop the annoying message each time I turn on my LG-Remarq.

This certainly can't be rocket science. Someone at I-Wireless or Sprint has made a programming error and they ought to fix it.
Jul 23, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Expiration Rule
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Kelly - Can you comment on whether i-wireless' expiration is at the end of the day noted for expiration, or at midnight of the day noted? As in the example below, is it at the end of the day on the 15th (where the 15th is noted as the expiration day), or is it at midnight on the night of the 14th (i.e. a payment needs to be made by 11:59pm on the 14th to avoid the funds from expiring)? Thank you!
Jul 23, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Tax Comment Is Not True
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Actually, when you buy the card you're charged sales tax. When you use the funds to buy a monthly plan, you're charged telecom taxes. Some carriers eat the telco tax, some don't and pass it along to customers.


It's illegal to double charge customers for the same tax. This is a general misunderstanding. It's not an uncommon misunderstanding, however, and even employees within wireless carriers don't understand how this works unless they work closely in tax, accounting, or payment product departments.
Jul 23, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Re: Adding Airtime Reminders
by: Kelly

Hello everyone,

We completely agree with PrepaidWirelessGuy that reminders should be sent to wireless users on when their airtime will expire. We sent out a series of messages beginning 3 days prior to expiry reminding our customers of the expiration of current airtime/balance and remind them not to lose their balance. Up to 3 messages are sent prior to the expiration date.

We value our customers and know that their airtime and balance are important to them.

Kelly
Jul 23, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Rip off-Yes.
by: Anonymous

When you but a card they tax you. When you use the card to use a monthly plan they tax you again.

Neat deal if you can get it.
Jul 23, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Prepaid Wireless Expiration Dates
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

This last comment is a good reminder that ALL prepaid wireless programs have expiration dates for funds. Classic pay as you go plans have had this function since they launched decades ago.


Every topup has expiration rules associated with them. The responsibility that carriers have is to ensure that communication of the expiration value is clear.


If you're accumulating that much money that you're not using, in my opinion you're on the wrong plan. For example, for those using a phone very infrequently, the best/cheapest approach is to go with a carrier that allows a low topup (ex. $10), which lasts 90 days. This would translate into $3.33/month. If you need more for a particular period of time, just add more.


The actual expiration time can be confusing, and carriers need to be clear about the specifics. If the expiration is the 15th, do I need to add money by the end of the day on the 15th, or by midnight the day before on the 14th? I've seen carriers treat this both ways, and I've worked for a carrier that changed the rule after a number of years to make it a better customer experience (i.e. by the end of the day on the 15th in this example). Note that this approaches actually causes carriers to lose money (the details of why is a separate discussion!).


Ideally, messaging would also be sent to customers approaching the deadline. I personally don't mess with this, but rather ensure that I add money at least one day before the expiration date noted on the account (i.e. the 14th in this example). I also add it to my personal calendar to ensure I don't forget.


So the conclusion here is that us customers have a responsibility to understand how this important basic function works for the carrier(s) we choose to use, and carriers have a responsibility to clearly communicate the rules, make it easy to find and understand the details, and ideally message customers before expiration.


While I've noted this on other pages of this site, I'm considering creating a dedicated page specifically for this topic given how important it is!
Jul 23, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Rip off
by: Anonymous

I agree that this is a rip off. I have 187.00 minutes on my phone and I still have to add airtime or lose it. What in the world is wrong with this contract. One time I went to add airtime and found out that my balance was gone. I called and I found out that you have to really do it the day before by midnight. The date to renew is misleading. Rip off.
Jul 21, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Update
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Thank you for the update Mike; much appreciated. Hopefully the new phone works. I'm looking forward to hearing about that!

PRL = Preferred Roaming List, and helps to ensure that you have access to all of the latest roaming partners that i-wireless is authorized to use. It's not related to your wireless backup issue from what I can tell.

Good luck with the new phone!
Jul 21, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Mike
by: Anonymous

PrepaidWirelessGuy,

Another update. Sorry.

I talked to a Dwayne @ i-wireless. We reset the phone to see if we could bypass that Sprint Wireless Backup thing upon activation. It didn't stop the phone from automatically trying to do the Wire Backup feature. There was no way we could cancel it or bypass it. It just popped up on the screen very quickly that it was doing a back up. So fast I couldn't even read the full message. Dwayne concluded the phone was fubar. He is sending me a new phone in the mail.

If this works then shame on LG. I sent this same phone in but they sent it back saying it was OK nothing wrong with it.

Props to Dwayne. He's a great guy at i-wireless. He's someone that actually knows what he's doing.

Jul 21, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Mike
by: Anonymous

It's me the LG Remarq/i-wireless guy who was getting the wireless backup error message on my phone and no one could help me with it. LG said send it in and they would look at it. I just got the phone back today and sure as **** it still does the same thing every time I turn the phone on.

The first time I turned the phone on when I got it back it did two things: It did a PRL check and upgrade and a fireware upgrade. I have no idea what PRL is but with L in it maybe it has something to do with license. It did not ask me if I wanted to do a wireless backup. It just popped up for literally 1/2 second saying it was going to do it. I could not say yes or no either way so I had no control over that.

I have two options. I will try to reset the phone and start over again (can't quite figure it out and the hold on i-wireless is almost an hour) and when it tries to update the PRL I am going to cancel that. Yes it does give you the option to cancel that.

If that doesn't work I will buy a stinking data plan for one month to see if that makes a difference.

None of this would happen if carriers would realize that not everyone wants or needs a stinking contract or data plan on a phone. I bought this phone because I just wanted a phone for when I'm out in my car, in case of an emergency. I don't need a $25 200 or 300 min/month phone. I just need a phone for emergencies without having to pay for crap I won't use. I'm sure I turn on their $25 a month data plan this will go away.
Jul 17, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Wireless Back Up
by: Kelly

Hello! When activating a new phone, a customer will be asked if they would like wireless back up on their device. This is an embedded activation question that comes from Sprint and is currently not available on i-wireless service. Selecting no will prevent further messages from appearing. Selecting yes will not opt the customer in for wireless back up, but may result in additional asks.
Jul 17, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i-wireless Phone on Sprint
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Sprint has a list of phone serial numbers (MEIDs) that are able to be activated on their network/plans. MVNOs like i-wireless can't be activated on Sprint. Similarly, even Virgin and Boost phones (brands they own; i.e. not MVNOs) also can't be activated on Sprint plans, even when they're the identical phones Sprint offers.


Also, while I don't know where you got your i-wireless promotional phone, consider that i-wireless paid for, and likely subsidized that phone, so if you activate it on another carrier, they lose money. In other words, carriers have safeguards to prevent loss of assets by subsidizing phones that people ultimately never use on their plans.


All that said, you may be able to flash the phone to a Sprint ROM at a third party dealer, however, ultimately, Sprint would likely block the MEID from activating with them. Sometimes there are loopholes, however, those are constantly being closed.


Let's see if Kelly comes back with something different.
Jul 17, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Back Up on Remarq
by: Kelly

Hello everyone,

I've sent the information to our Operations Department and asked for their input on the back up for the LG Remarq. As soon as I hear back, I'll be sure to post here.

Kelly
Jul 17, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Sprint
by: Irishgirl

I just received a promotional LG Optimus S through Kroger i-wireless. Being that I already have a plan I like through Sprint, I would like to use this phone on my current Sprint plan. Is this in anyway possible? What do I have to do? I turn the phone on and it automatically prompts me to set up Kroger i-wireless, which I do not want to do. I called Sprint and they said they do not recognize the phone. Can someone please help me?
Jul 09, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Wireless Backup
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Thanks Kelly. Can you possibly reply here regarding the wireless backup issue so that others can learn from this, which would possibly help others to solve the same issue? Thank you!
Jul 09, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		To Mike
by: Kelly

Mike,

I am sorry to hear about all of the trouble you had. I try to monitor this site daily so that I can jump in and help resolve any problems I can. Unfortunately I was away while all of your issues came about.

Please don't hesitate to contact me directly at iwireless@iwirelesshome.com whenever you have a question.

We work diligently to do our best to solve any customer issues.

Thanks,

Kelly
Marketing Communications Manager at i-wireless
Jul 09, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Refurbished Phones
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Hi Mike - I understand your frustration! The fact that you stuck with it and found a resolution (likely) is great!

I just wanted to let you know that I wouldn't worry too much about getting a refurbished phone. That policy is pretty standard across all carriers (prepaid and postpaid), and, I agree, it is extremely infuriating.

Fortunately, my experience with refurbs has been great. The fact that a human has looked at its quality is actually a good thing. I've usually found them to be in better working condition than even a new phone. And they virtually never have scratches or physical issues.

If you do get one that has problems that you're not happy with, immediately let them know and demand a new one. I've never had to do that.

Looking forward to hearing your update!
Jul 08, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		potential customer
by: Jay

I was interested in purchasing the family plan w/ iwireless and i was curious if these complaints are regarding any particular plan?
Jul 07, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Wireless Backup not working
by: Mike

First of all I want to thank PrepaidWirelessGuy for his help.

The Wireless backup feature on my I Wireless LG Remarq does not work. I didn't know anything about this because the stupid phone did not come with a manual, and because the I Wireless people had no clue about this other than one lady there and her solution was to put an SD card it which didn't work.

I searched online and found the manual. When I went to the menu system to check View Status it's not even there. When I click on Wireless Backup the only option is the Subscribe Now. I do that and the phone goes back to the menu.

I talked to LG yesterday. They had me reset the phone and start from scratch. As soon as the phone booted up a message flashed on the screen about Wireless Backup then it disappeared so I have no idea what it said it went by so fast. From what I read in the manual it was going to get the license but I assume it failed.

When I call Sprint they have you input your number. When I do that Sprint doesn't even recognize my phone number. Entering my number into the wireless backup page PrepaidWirelessGuy posted has the same result, can't find that number.

Apparently the phone is just FUBAR. Luckily the lady at LG gave me an RMA and I will send the phone back. Unfortunately though, they said I would more than likely get a refurbished phone! That makes me MADDER than I already am.

Oh, this really sent me over the edge. The one lady at i wireless that would only tell me to call LG told me I could not take my phone back to the store for a replacement because their policy is you have 14 days or 10 mins of use. After than you're stuck with it. Now think about that, you can't use the phone more than 10 mins. Hell, I checked my account and I spent 5 mins in voicemail that THEY sent me! They actually charge you airtime for voicemail. OK, maybe that's normal but I thought it was ridiculous since they sent me two voicemails.

Anyway, once I get the phone back I'll update this blog. Wish me luck. Thanks, and fogive my typing, it's probably all over the place.
Jul 06, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		The Complaints Keep Coming
by: Anonymous

The complaints keep coming and consumers keep buying. I learned to check BEFORE you buy. Every complaint means something is wrong. RESEARCH is the answer. If you believe I-Wireless or Kroger cheated or misled you in any way, write, call, email, or personally visit a store and voice your concerns. Complain online. Take out an ad in a local paper. (Just make sure you tell the absolute truth.) Sooner or later they'll get it.
Jul 06, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Wireless Backup
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Try going to: Menu - Settings - Other - Wireless Backup

Select "View Status" to see if you're subscribed. If you are, and you don't have data service on your phone, that's the likely issue.

Go back to the menu above, but this time select "Unsubscribe"; hopefully that will cure your problem.

That said, if you don't have data access, and somehow you're subscribed, I don't know how the unsubscribe process could work. Potentially the phone is initiating a backup request based on the fact that the setting is set to subscribed on the phone, so unsubscribing may not require data access, or potentially access to that part of the WAP deck on the phone doesn't require a data subscription.

You could also try going to:
www.wirelessbackup.sprint.com

Enter your phone number and select "I don't know my password"; you will enter your phone number again and it will send you a text message with your password. Once you receive the password, try logging in and unsubscribing from there.

I-Wireless really should be able to help you with this issue (not LG); it's not a hardware issue, but a service issue.

Please let us know what happened when you tried these steps!
Jul 06, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Sorry CS
by: Mike

I bought an LG Remarq from Kroger. I'm disabled and don't need a data plan so I opted for the $5 a month + $.10 a min plan. Perfect for my needs or so I thought.

I like the phone but every time I turn it on it says Wireless Backup ERROR: W32 (or W1001, it changes from day to day) Unable to retrieve license information.. blah blah). I call I wireless and got a nice lady on the phone. She said the phone was trying to back up my contacts online and if I got a microSD card it would back up the contacts to the card. Well, I installed a micro sd card but I don't know if it backed up the contacts. I could not find any setting to do that and it still gives me that error every time I turn the phone on. I called LG they told me to
call I wireless. I called I wireless back and got some b*tch on the phone who kept telling me to call LG. I told her repeatedly that LG said they could not help. Her reply was to call LG. It was ridiculous. I asked her about wireless backup. She again referred me to LG.

I asked her, what am I supposed to do if both i wireless and LG say call the other. No response. Pathetic. Is it because I don't have a data plan? No one knows. I can't believe I've the only one with this ridiculous problem.


Jun 28, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Sales Tax & Telecom Taxes
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

I certainly understand your concern. I would say, however, that it's more confusing than it is a scam. Yes, there is sales tax on the topup, and there are telecom taxes on the plan. Both are regulated and required. However, different carriers treat telecom taxes differently; some include them in the cost of the plan, while others don't.


Most prepaid carriers these days include them as part of the plan so you never really see them added on top of the plan price. There are, however, some that still do tack them on top of the plan. This scenario is becoming less popular, in favor of the less confusing "inclusive" approach.


Overall, customers should look for these taxes, and determine the overall cost of the plan when making a decision.


Also note that some states don't classify pepaid wireless topup as taxable (ex. CA); that's not controlled by the carrier.


Generally speaking, carriers that ultimately have telecom taxes added to the plan cost should clearly communicate with customers. Even if the effective price of the plan is still a great value, and competitive to others, customers may not add enough money to their account and as a result fail next month's payment and lose service!


I hope this helps.
Jun 28, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		RIP OFF!
by: Tara

I-Wireless has quiet the scam going on. I got my daughter a phone from FredMeyer, thought the $25 plan would be good for her. Come to find out, I pay the $25 at Fred Meyer each month and the tax.. only to turn a round & every couple of months buy $35 in prepaid cards because I-Wireless charges more tax themselves. Sounds like something illegal to me, I always thought you couldnt be taxed twice but the representative told me the $ at Fred Meyer is only the stores tax, they have their own. Switching her to Virgin Mobile next month.It's $35 a month through them (which I have to pay every 2 months anyways).. And it's Unlimited texts, unlimited web and 300 minutes instead of 200. AND dont get charged extra for sent or recieved pictures like I-Wireless.
Jun 27, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Response to Sheila
by: Kelly

Shelia,

This is Kelly from i-wireless. Please send me an email and I'm happy to discuss your experience and see what we can do to reconcile.

iwireless@iwirelesshome.com

Thanks!
Jun 21, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		RIP OFF I-WIRLESS AND LG
by: shelia

My Kroger i-wireless is nothing but a rip off. They tell you when you have a problem it's LG's fault. LG tells you it's i-wireless' fault. They want you to pay for shipping to send it off. It eats all of your minutes. They erase all of your content. Report them to the better business bureau or bbb.com. They're not worth buying.
Apr 18, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Keep Expiration In Mind
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

While I obviously don't know anything about your account (as I don't work for i-wireless), please keep in mind that if you don't make a payment to your account within the defined period (ex. 30, 60, 90 days), your remaining account balance will be swept. This is standard for every prepaid wireless carrier on PAYG products. If you add money before the expiration date, your balance will carry forward to the next period.

Of course, if there's something else going on with your account, I recommend that you definitely call i-wireless or email Kelly at the address provided.

All the best!

[Please note that I've deleted all profanity from your posts.]
Apr 18, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Response to Anonymous
by: Kelly, i-wireless employee

Hello - We would love to keep you as a customer. If you email me at iwireless@iwirelesshome.com, I can look into your account and see why your balance was removed.

Thank you - Kelly
Apr 18, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Dumb Plan !
by: Anonymous

I Hate You IWireless ! Yall Always Taking Away My Damn Minutes ! I'm Tired Of Yall And I'm Switching To Cricket!
Mar 18, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Why?
by: Anonymous

The title says it all. The damage was done and both I-wireless and Kroger shrugged it off. Now I, and hopefully many others shrug off I-wireless and Kroger.
Mar 15, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Response to Anonymous
by: Kelly - i-wireless

Hello Anonymous - if you send me an email with your i-wireless phone number, I can look into your account for you. The email address is iwireless@iwirelesshome.com.

Mar 14, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Ripped Off
by: Anonymous

Couldn't have said it better...RIP OFF!!! Buying the damn cards & not even anywhere near getting the service you are supposed to be getting. This is BULL!!! Then as soon as I buy the card they won't even let me see my balance all of a sudden or how much they are charging (since they overcharge EVERY call), then the the balance is gone.
Feb 15, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Response to Macrat
by: Kelly - i-wireless

Hello! I saw your comment about the trouble you had purchasing an additional plan for your mobile broadband service. You can do this two ways - using a debit/credit card on our website, www.iwirelesshome.com, or by purchasing an i-wireless airtime card from a Kroger family store.

Any online PIN purchase is not an authorized distributor of i-wireless. There are three different i-wireless brands, and you likely purchased one for T-Mobile i-wireless or Cincinnati Bell i-wireless, which explains why it didn't work. I apologize for this confusion and the inconvenience it caused.

As I stated above, we do offer the ability to add a plan/time to either your phone or your broadband card online, and it's quick and secure. I hope this helped.
Feb 15, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Broadband modems, UGH!
by: Macrat

First off, I bought their broadband modem to see how it stacks against Virgin Mobile. Price was very stiff for the modem, and so was the $50 refill.

It performs no better than the Virgin Mobile that I have, exactly the same speeds. I bought a refill to put in it in case the Virgin mobile device's grandfathered $40-a-month plan would ever quit on me.

When I went to refill it, it was quite troublesome, as the webpage for the wireless broadband refused to accept the codes. Turns out the pins I bought were for the Iwireless PHONE service. No wonder the refills for the phone service had a deep discount at Callingmart, nobody really uses it. There are NO discounts or any vendors other than Kroger as the broadband cost to Kroger prohibits it, as there are too many subcontractors handling the Iwireless service. It costs them so much more, that they had to differentiate the refill for it. It took me a few months with CallingMart, since they had to re-sell the PINs, and once the other buyer reported no issues, passed the refund to me.

To this day, I see no differentiation with the labeling of the brand on online PIN sellers. The only difference is a yellow sticker on the Iwireless broadband modem box stating that it requires only the Iwireless broadband refills, at $50 for 30 days/4 Gigs. Still, it's the cheapest outside of the grandfathered Virgin Mobile plan, since other prepaid broadbands, like Clear and ReadyBroadband, are at $60 a month with lower Gig allowances.

What happens when that box is long forgotten? Quite confusing.
Feb 07, 2012
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Agreed . . . .
by: Cyber Ninja

The reception always sucked, I consistently had someone calling wrong number, the prices aren't that great, and above all Net10 offers unlimited EVERYTHING for only $30 a month with decent phones and great reception!
Nov 23, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Prepaid Smartphones ARE a "Smart" Option
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

I just want to clarify that people seeking no contract plans can now select from a myriad of great prepaid smartphone options. Contrary to what's inferred in the previous post, no contract IS in fact for everyone; it's no longer just for the credit challenged.


If you want a free or lower cost phone, you can sign a contract to get a subsidy, however, in most cases you'll end up paying more due to a higher monthly plan cost on average. And now that the cost of smartphones has come down a lot, you can get a fully capable handset for under $200. Also note that a lot of higher end handsets offered on prepaid ARE subsidized by the carrier (though less than postpaid carriers of course). Yes, currently postpaid smartphones are more capable for the same price, however, that gap is quickly closing.


I feel the lesson here is that prepaid customers need to better understand the expiration rules. Carriers that don't make this easy to understand, or easily accessible, will ultimately suffer as customers flock to plans that are clear at the point of purchase. In other words, both the customer and the carrier have responsibilities to fulfill here.
Nov 23, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		O_o
by: Anonymous

When purchasing a mobile service most savvy consumers compare two things: 1. phone quality and price 2. coverage quality and price. And let's face it the average consumer in the market for a minute-to-minute service isn't looking for a long term commitment. If your looking for a smart-phone shopping prepaid doesn't make much sense. If you compare the phones available from Net10, Tracfone, or Straight Talk in the $20 price range I-Wireless has better phones; probably cause they're Sprint's overstock. And as far as the price-per-minute I-Wireless is extremely competitive. Most consumers find Net10, Tracfone, and Straight Talk to have splotchy coverage at best. The coverage under Sprint that I-Wireless offers makes them competitive in coverage quality also.

Agent orange? Completely off topic, however I would never support the use of a known carcinogen within the vicinity of American soldiers. Besides if we're going to rally against corporate rip offs we should be rallying against cell phone contracts and the grotesque mark up of the cell phones. The average mark-up of a text message is 6000 percent! Or better yet the bailed out banks. I would rather put my money in a personal safe, than give my money to a thieving financial institution.
Nov 22, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Seriously?
by: Yank

Hey Anonymous,
You must be a politician. You distort the facts, twist the truth, and then accuse me of doing what you have done. The facts are accurate and have been confirmed by not only me, but i-wireless, Kroger, and other consumers. Your misleading and misguided post was a waste of your time and that of anyone else reading it who understands what has actually happened. You do however, have the right to say what you want, so go ahead and have yourself a little fun even if it is at the expense of ripped off consumers. Grow a pair and stand up to corporate rip offs. I bet you would defend the makers of agent orange.
Nov 22, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Just did . . . .
by: Anonymous

And all I see is a bunch of irrelevant complaints (facts about the product) that you have twisted to degrade this company. As I read further this time I recognized more invalid complaints. Like the fact that the phone can't be used with any other service . . . . that's standard for any cell phone carrier. Besides Sprint coverage is way better than any local month-to-month or pay-as-you-go service. And for what appears to be your primary complaint about free minutes advertised . . . . you either misunderstood or are twisting the information for the purpose of degrading the company. What you appear to be referring to is not marketed on a main headboard. It's pamphlet that says, "free minutes for using your Kroger card". Unless of course you don't have a Kroger were you're from. Regardless you mentioned in a previous post that you have had this product for awhile and were pleased . . . . why the sudden need to degrade the product on the internet. I would bet it doesn't go all the way back to the original purchase of the product. In a nutshell this product is far from a rip off or false advertising. Actually, I would consider it to be the best non-contract service available.
Nov 21, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Ummm...
by: Yank

Hey Anonymous - did you read the entire original post?
Nov 20, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		?????
by: Anonymous

Ummm . . . I'm not sure exactly what your complaining about here. All you said was that your minutes roll over so can use them or let them accumulate . . . .
Oct 19, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Reasearch?
by: Yank

You did research? Really? How can you possibly research a policy that was changed to protect the company? Do you think Kroger or I-Wireless is going to tell you they ripped you off? I'm not the only one who complained about this, just the only one, apparently, who felt like this was just another corporate rip off that should be exposed. I did you a favor by getting this out and causing a change in which consumers would be informed BEFORE they made the purchase.
Oct 19, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Is Kroger Separate?
by: He's Right Ya Know

Why is it called "Kroger I-Wireless? Why is it only available in Kroger stores? Why is this I-wireless entity not affiliated with the Iwireless from, oh say Cincinnati Bell? Why won't the phones or airtime cards sold at Kroger work with any other i-wireless outfit? Do a little research before knockin' what a guy is tryin' to tell ya. If you read ALL the posts you'll see that he's absolutely correct and you'll also notice, maybe because of this, "Kroger I-Wireless's policy has been changed,or at least updated to prevent consumers from being taken advantage of. Way to go Yank!
Oct 18, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Kroger is seperate from i-wireless
by: Anonymous

I work at a Kroger Family Store myself, and we as employees are given very little if no information on the i-wireless plans and airtime cards that we sell. (We've brought it to the attention of corporate and are going to a meeting this week focusing on i-wireless products.) But in this case, I don't feel it's the seller's fault. Any consumer buying a gift card/ prepaid card should look over the card before buying it to ensure they really want to buy the product. Especially since all gift cards and prepaid cards are non-refundable. The first thing I do when a customer asks a question about a card is refer to the back because most of the time the answer is there. All cards have information on the back regarding fees, expiration, activation, 1-800 #'s and the like. Maybe it's not right for I-wireless to have this detail revealed in only the "fine print" but it's not the Kroger cashier's/ Kroger company's fault that the detail is not displayed else where or that you didn't read the back of the card before buying it. Now, personally, I researched them a bit when I was looking for a phone last year and found I'm not fond of i-wireless products or their plans. But the point is I did my research before buying a phone. You can find all the information on the expiration of minutes on their website. i-wirelesshome.com
Aug 21, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Stick 2 the point
by: Yank

This wasn't meant to be an advertising platform for Google Voice, Net 10, or any other phone service. Let's try to focus on the main point which is "CONSUMERS BEING RIPPED OFF".
Aug 19, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Be Cautious of Call Display Number With Google Voice
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Google Voice is an excellent suggestion. I love it, and use it myself! The post below speaks of giving people one number so they don't get confused. That's extremely great advice. However, just one word of caution, which is when you call from one of your phones, people will see that number. So while they call your Google Voice number and reach you no matter what phone you answer with, when you call them back, they'll see the number of the phone you're calling from.


Unfortunately, the current Android app doesn't allow for your Google Voice number to be displayed UNLESS you call OUT using Google Voice. The problem with doing that is that any free mobile-to-mobile minutes that are included in your plan won't work. i.e. You'll be charged for calls that would normally be free. If you don't have that type of plan, it won't matter. Also, if you have Sprint postpaid service (which hopefully you don't b/c you know that prepaid wireless is better!), they have full integration with Google Voice, so you can avoid this complexity.


Definitely worth playing around with for sure!
Aug 19, 2011
Rating
starstarstar 		re: unanswered calls - use Google Voice
by: Anonymous

If you find for some reason that you do not get a ring and your calls go unanswered, try this: get a free Google Voice account.

Then give people your Google Voice number, not your home number or your cell phone number or your work number or ...

When someone calls your Google Voice number all those numbers you associated will ring at the same time. The first time it happened to me both the house and cell phones rang at the same time and I did not understand what was happening. LOL!!

If you do not answer a call for any reason then the caller hears the Google Voice system ask them to leave a message. No calls are lost. You do not have to rely on i-Wireless or any other cell carrier to take a message. Later you can retrieve your Google Voice calls. Also, Google "tries" to translate the message by converting it to text and sends it to your email account, often with very funny results.

Another nice thing about the free Google Voice service is you can have a phone number with an area code that is not the same as the city where you live. So if I were a big shot movie actor I could have a Hollywood or New York area code phone number even though I might live in Atlanta. Very cool.

Next week I'm going to get a Kroger i-Wireless Android phone and at the same time keep my Net10 phone. I will add the Android phone number to my Google Voice service. This will allow me to experiment with the Android phone and if I do not like the phone or the i-Wireless service I will not confuse my friends and business associates by telling them to call me using some other number because all they know is my Google Voice number.
Aug 19, 2011
Rating
starstarstar 		Net10 does add up your days
by: AtlantaTerry

I've had a Net10 phone for several years now. When I purchase their prepaid cards I receive both time and days.

I usually use up time faster than days so right now my phone display says:
Time: 85 Minutes
Days: 329 Service Days

That's about 10 months!

Unfortunately Net10/TracFone does not currently offer an Android phone so I'm going to have to jump ship until they do.
Aug 09, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		love tha service!!!!!!!!!!
by: shaun reynolds

I dont know what tha fuss is all about....i wireless gave me a 50.00 deal for getting a smartphone....o im sorry...a 250.00 discount on my smartphone...so take that vmobile and boost...cause yall never have any deal like iwireless...o and by tha way...when do u go shopping at a store and get minutes for it????? Answer that!!!
Aug 08, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		I love I-wireless by: Anonymous
by: Snowman

You, sir or madame, must be an idiot. This guy has not only exposed this phone service for their sneaky underhanded ways of doing business, but has attempted to educate others so they don't get ripped off like he did. He;s not saying "don't but their product or service", he's simply stating his experience with this company and how he was treated. To call him a liar when you are apparently ignorant to the facts is just plain irresponsible, not to mention stupid. Hmmmm... could this be considered liable?
Aug 08, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		What's your definition?
by: Yank

Before you print to the public that someone is a liar, you should look up the definition of slander and liable. EVERYTHING stated inmy post post are not only the TRUTH, but has been substantiated beyond doubt. And why did you hide your identity? Which do you work for I-Wireless or Kroger?
Aug 06, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		I love I-wireless
by: Anonymous

I've read everything in this forum and i just have to say that I've had my phone for a year with I-wireless and I've been on their $25 dollar plan, the 200 minutes with texting and web, and it's the most affordable plan out there. I only need to use my phone for making calls here and there and all of the minutes I have remaining rolls over. To me that is awesome! I learned a few things about the expiration date that I didn't know, but everything in America expires eventually. I just love the fact that if I can't afford my plan, I don't get pentalized like every other phone company. I didn't feel it right to see this "Kroger I-wireless Rip Off" comment and not say that it is a complete lie. I have a low income budget and I can afford an amazing plan, so i say thank you I-wireless. :)
Jul 31, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstar 		Scheme
by: Anonymous

Get enough hooked with $20/90 day card, cut days, jack up price high enough to far more compensate for quiting customers with those who remain. This has been going on with tobacco and now everywhere. Buisness model long ago was "Supply and Demand." Nowadays greed changed it to "What the Market will bear." Milking for all it's worth. Personel Managers now called Human Resource Manager. What happens to resource... it is mined, extracted for every dime and then discarded.
May 25, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Thanks
by: Yank

Thanks for proving my point which I have tried feverishly to establish. You wrote,"The reminder to purchase airtime is included on our brochure, which is on our unit in-store and the expiration details are included on the airtime card in-store as well."
Do I need to break it down for you? A "reminder to purchase airtime" is not a notice of expiration. The fact that this information is disclosed on the airtime card post phone purchase is a little "after the fact" wouldn't you say Kelly? Would it matter if you disclosed the information in the Wall Street Journal? No! The people shopping and buying these phones at their local Kroger stores are not being treated fairly. What ever happened to honesty and integrity? That was rhetorical since I-Wireless doesn't practice either.
May 24, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Reply to Yank
by: Kelly - i-wireless employee

Yank - I'm sorry you feel that we do not disclose this information. The reminder to purchase airtime is included on our brochure, which is on our unit in-store and the expiration details are included on the airtime card in-store as well. If shopping online, we make the information available on our website.

In no way are we trying to deceive our customers. As with most no-contract wireless providers, we have a lot of information to communicate and we try to do so in a way that benefits all of our customers and those folks who are shopping around and comparing carriers.
May 24, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Typical corporate response
by: Yank

Apparently Kelly, you didn't read the "original" complaint which clearly stated concerns of hiding these "expiration" facts prior to the phone purchase from Kroger stores at which time an airtime card is not required due to the "free" minutes given as bonus for the purchase. NOWHERE before, during, or after the purchase is the expiration of airtime mentioned, discussed, or printed, except on the actual card itself which is purchased AFTER the phone sale. My beef is not with the actuality of expiration. My problem is with the fact this information was not made available until after the phone purchase. This information may have prevented me from switching carriers and I feel this is unfair to unsuspecting consumers.
May 23, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i-wireless Response
by: Kelly - i-wireless Employee

Hi there - this is Kelly from i-wireless. I wanted to respond to some of the comments myself. Feel free to engage/interact with me here, or on our Facebook page - www.facebook.com/krogeriwireless.

Yank - I see you're concerned with balance expiration. Our policy, as stated in our Terms and Conditions - Adding funds to your account before your balance expires or is suspended will give a new Balance Expiration Date to both your old balance and your new balance. This is also stated on the back of our airtime cards. To further clarify – we will not ‘add’ the expiry, but it is updated. Example: If you purchase 3 $10 airtime cards with 30 day expiry and add them at the same time, it does not mean you get 90 days to use them – they are still a 30 day card. The same rings true if you add a card before your expiry. We will not add the card to your current expiry, rather, your new balance expiration date is 30, 60 or 90 days from the date the card is added.

Quasi - you posted about our change from a $20 airtime card with a 90 day expiration to a $25 card with a 60 day expiration. In the last year we have done away with our $20 i-wireless airtime card which boasted a 90 day expiry. It has been replaced with a $25 airtime card that hosts a 60 day expiry. The change was noted on the airtime card, our FAQs and our Terms & Conditions. Customers who purchased $20 airtime cards were granted the 90 expiry as we sold through inventory. By changing the denomination as well as the expiry, we had hoped to avoid confusion among customers.

I hope this helps to clear the air a bit. Please let me know if you have any further questions on i-wireless or our policies. All can be found in our Terms and Conditions at www.krogeriwireless.com.
Apr 17, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Prepaid Wireless Airtime Expiration
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Your experience definitely sounds frustrating. Although the terms and conditions of most prepaid wireless companies will note that terms are subject to change, and often without notice, an abrupt change is not customary.


Prepaid wireless companies will usually grandfather people into the terms you have at the time you purchased the topup. A messaging campaign is also usually done to make sure that customers know exactly what's going to happen BEFORE it happens. This can often include SMS, email, and even messaging on their website and IVR.


While I don't know the specific legal requirements, from my experience, some degree of advanced notice is require from my understanding, even though the terms note "subject to change without notice." I've debated this point with internal lawyers in the past when I've wanted to roll something out earlier (and noted the "change without notice" clause), but they required that certain advanced steps take place to be 100% legally compliant.


Anyway, full advanced disclosure is always to a prepaid carrier's benefit given that it's relatively easy to change services, particularly if you've purchased an inexpensive phone.
Apr 17, 2011
Rating
starstarstar 		iWireless
by: Quasi Anonymous

I completely understand what user: Yanki stated above, I notice something very awry regarding this wireless discrepancy. I tracked about 90% reception for both incoming calls and text messages, I find it very unreliable for this company to have quasi reliable service, especially when people are looking for jobs (who to respond to).. The service just abruptly drops and calls to my iWireless phone aren´t always forwarded to voice-mail, rather, they keep on ringing seemingly eternally and perhaps lost into the universe? Any others out there with a similar issue?

In addition, just months ago, I purchased a $20-something dollar card, which expired in three months, but iWireless policy recently changed unannounced, from three month expiration to two month expiration. Until I had to inquire and research to only read on the back of their prepaid cards, that indeed, their fine print stated the new expiration in minuscule font, without overtly announcing this policy update on the website; rather one must dig through the mud.

Why must it expire hastily for economically conscious individuals? Why must it be so cryptic and seemingly unprofessional?

My complaints against iWireless is that I also notice my service malfunctioning as I get a lower monetary balance on my phone. Any explanations as to why that is?

Besides, does anyone work with any wireless companies? Anyone sense a rat?
Apr 02, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Now they do
by: Yank

The original post was accurate at the time as admitted by the iwireless people I originally contacted. The information available at Kroger stores regarding the rip off issues was recently added and I hope it was direct result of people like me complaining about it. I didn't complain about the service, just the failure of disclosure of facts. Honesty is the best policy, right?
Apr 01, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		not a rip off at all
by: Anonymous

I have had my Iwireless phone for over two years now and have been EXTREMELY satisfied with both their service area and the affordability of both the prepaid minutes as well as my new monthly plan of $30 a month. I don't have any problems with any of it and I have to say that the reading material available at Kroger did state the "issue" that you are having with roll over minutes as well as the expiration information.

On another note, my wife has a Boost phone and their unlimited plan. She loves it.
Jan 25, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Airtime Expiration Confusion
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

Thank you for your feedback Yank. I think that maybe I'm confused as to what you're experiencing. I have a Boost phone that I've had on hand for about a year that I use for when out of town family and friends visit (it's SUPER cheap given that I only have to load $10 every 90 days, for a grand total of $3.33 each month when it's not being used!). Because I have an iDEN phone, service is not very great, and battery life is atrocious even when the phone isn't being used (just on with no talking)...but that's another story...


Anyway, the expiration rules that I experience are as described in my note below. Expiration time is never cummulative, but based solely on the number of days attached to the reload. For Boost it's simple b/c it's 90 days no matter how much you load. I feel as though I may be misunderstanding your experience?


Regardless of what the rules are, however, you make a great point regarding rules needing to be clear on the handset package b/c some services don't require that you buy a topup card to get service activated. In the meantime, I would encourage prospective buyers to take a look at the topup card terms and conditions before buying a handset. Some stores will allow you to return an open handset package (even if it's been activated), however, many don't.
Jan 25, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		It is a rip off
by: Yank

Thanks for your contribution PWG, but you are not entirely correct. I had a prepaid IWIRELESS account through Cincinnati Bell and just prior to this I-Wireless account through Kroger I had a prepaid Boost account. BOTH added the newly purchased minutes and expiration time to the previous amounts. If it weren't for the poor service of Boost Mobile I would have stayed with them since it was only costing me about $7.00 per month per phone. When I say I was getting ripped off it was because of Kroger and I-Wireless' failure to disclose this information at the point of sale. The new phone came with a 400 minute bonus making it unnecessary to immediately purchase an airtime card. The airtime card clearly states the terms of the expiration time, however, these terms are not disclosed at the phone display or during the sale of the phone or the service. If this information would have been made available I would not have purchased this phone or service. Failure to disclose such important information is in fact, a rip off.
Jan 25, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i-wireless Expiration Rules - Part 1
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

First let me say that I understand your frustration. Expiration rules (along with other factors unique to prepaid wireless) can be very confusing, which is largely why this site is here...to help untangle the options and details that aren't always very clear. I rated this question 5 stars because it's a very common question and point of confusion for many people, and clarifying it here should hopefully be helpful. Even people that work for prepaid carriers get confused over how these things work!


i-wireless' expiration rules are such that the full amount of your account balance is extended to the new expiration date attached to the value of the new card/topup amount. For example, if you have a current balance of $5 with 1 day, or even 20 days remaining, if you add a $10 card, your $5 balance will carry forward, and you will now have $15 that will expire 30 days from today (the day you added the new $10 card). Note that if you still had 20 days remaining on the old $5, those 20 days are NOT added to the new 30 days to make it 50 days. Another example: If you were to add $50, you would have a new balance of $55 that would expire 90 days from today. i-wireless' expiration rules are as follows:

$10 – 30 days
$25 – 60 days
$50 – 90 days

Some people think that the remaining money (i.e. the $5 in this example) would carry it's own expiration date from when it was originally added; however, this is not the case. For the most part, prepaid wireless carriers cannot differentiate which funds are which (i.e. old vs. new). When you add money to your account it's like adding water to a bucket that already has water in it. The total volume of water is known and can be used, but which water droplets were there before you added the new water cannot be distinguished in order to carry different properties.
Jan 25, 2011
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		i-wireless Expiration Rules - Part 2
by: PrepaidWirelessGuy

The good news is that once you master prepaid wireless expiration rules, you're set, because this is how every prepaid wireless carrier that I know of works.


Now to your point regarding the carry forward limits. This applies to free minutes that you earn, as well as minutes included in monthly (non-unlimited) plans. If you're on a basic plan, you can carry forward 100 minutes each month; if you're on a monthly plan you can actually carry forward 1,500 minutes. This is actually a pretty good deal, because many carriers don't allow any carry over of minutes for monthly plans; whatever you don't use in a given month is lost. Also, if you fail to add money to your account before the expiration time to keep service going, you'll lose all of your free/included minutes.


Lastly, because prepaid wireless is usually what we call an unassisted sale (i.e. there's no one there to help guide you thru the initial purchase process), carriers rely on phone packaging, topup cards, and brochures at the point of sale to communicate these types of rules. Fortunately, most of the basic policies are the same across all carriers. Though carriers tend to have very different rules regarding carry over, and switching between plans, so these are things you'll definitely want to research before making a purchase.


Note that I was able to speak with someone at i-wireless corporate to confirm these rules. I also reviewed the terms and conditions on their website, though I haven't had a chance to review their in-store materials.


I hope this helps to reassure you that you're not getting ripped off.


As a side note, I was at a Radio Shack this past weekend where a customer was asking the sales associated about a particular phone and how the plan works. The sales person was giving them completely wrong information. I was compelled to pipe in and offer some help. The point being that even if you're in a store that is an assisted sale, the sales associates aren't always good/knowledgeable. There's really SO much to know that it's hard for them to be trained and remember everything even if their motivated to do so. Again, one of the reasons why I built this site! ;-)

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