Ripped off by United Mobile and Intouch USA

[bolim]

I bought a Global Riiing SIM card from Telestial 3 years ago, but United Mobile actually held my account. As I'm planning to travel in the next few months I tried to recharge my account at United Mobile, but to my dismay I saw EUR 12,- had been transferred to a different phone #, leaving me with 27 cents balance. When I emailed United Mobile, their response was Intouch USA, one of their distributors, took the money, from my account, and I was to contact Intouch USA since I was "not a direct customer" of United Mobile. Whose customer am I then?
I could not get hold of either United Mobile or Intouch USA on the phone, with odd reasons like, 'number could not be reached from my location', and 'I am away from the office for the next 30 days'. Has anyone had a similar experience with any of these providers, and can anyone recommend me a reliable and trustworthy provider ? I guess I must consider my EUR 12,- stolen and purchase a new SIM card. Thanks in advance.

[dmapr]

I also bought a Riiing from Telestial (about 4 years ago) and have been transitioned to United Mobile. As far as it appears when I log in to my online account there, I am a direct customer. Also, my understanding is that you have to make sure that at least once every 9 months there's a balance change, otherwise the SIM will be canceled and deactivated. Have you maintained this pattern?

[mrcamp]

About 2 years ago or so, united mobile came out with a new +44793 number and they gave all their customers with the +4236 number to transfer to this number and they will send you a sim card with the +44793 number for free. It looks like you were transferred to this number without your knowledge and the sim card was not sent to you. They sent it to whatever address they have on file. In my case I transferred most of my credit from the +4236 number to the new +44793 number, because the former has coverage in a few Caribbean countries that I visit that the latter does not.

A lot of carriers either block calls to the +4236 number or charge extremely high rates to connect to it. And UM had to come up with another option quickly as they were not making any money with that platform. I do not think UM even sells the +4236 number any longer. At least not for voice calls.

[dmapr]

Originally Posted by mrcamp

About 2 years ago or so, united mobile came out with a new +44793 number and they gave all their customers with the +4236 number to transfer to this number and they will send you a sim card with the +44793 number for free. It looks like you were transferred to this number without your knowledge and the sim card was not sent to you. They sent it to whatever address they have on file. In my case I transferred most of my credit from the +4236 number to the new +44793 number, because the former has coverage in a few Caribbean countries that I visit that the latter does not.

A lot of carriers either block calls to the +4236 number or charge extremely high rates to connect to it. And UM had to come up with another option quickly as they were not making any money with that platform. I do not think UM even sells the +4236 number any longer. At least not for voice calls.

That transfer was optional — and I actually transferred mine and kept the original, too, so I now have two UM numbers. The roaming coverage is slightly different, so I wanted to keep my options open. They indeed stopped selling the +423 one, but they're still maintaining them.

[bolim]

thank you all for your replies. I currently have a 423663 number, every 8 or 9 months I use it to send a couple of text messages to my local number, and that has kept my account active.
The suspect transaction said "recharge" with a negative amount, transferred to another 423663 #, not to a 44793 #, so it could not be the case mrcamp described. My email requests for reimbursement remained unanswered. Finally by sheer luck I managed to talk to a reasonable person at Intouch USA, I gave him my current # and the # the money was transferred to, he said none of them were customers of Intouch, he told me he'd talk to United Mobile. Before I posted this reply I checked my United Mobile account, and the missing money was back. I suspect something fishy was going on, first United Mobile told me I was not their direct customer, but Intouch USA's, but the latter said I was not their customer either.

[dmapr]

Whatever the case, I'm glad to hear you got your money back. I use the same method of sending an SMS every now and again to keep the account alive, btw

[groznybay]

United Mobile is out of business.

OneSimCard made posting offering a free SIM with $10 in exchange for non-working United Mobile SIM.

[bolim]

I just found your post, I didn't know about United Mobile, which explains why my SIM card did not work when I was in Europe last May. So now that I'm looking for a new International Roaming SIM I've found out OneSimCard is offering a replacement SIM with $10 initial balance for my UM card. I'm thinking of getting a Telestial Passport SIM. Anyone has any experience with OneSimCard or Telestial, good or bad ? Thanks in advance.

[dmapr]

Originally Posted by bolim

I just found your post, I didn't know about United Mobile, which explains why my SIM card did not work when I was in Europe last May. So now that I'm looking for a new International Roaming SIM I've found out OneSimCard is offering a replacement SIM with $10 initial balance for my UM card. I'm thinking of getting a Telestial Passport SIM. Anyone has any experience with OneSimCard or Telestial, good or bad ? Thanks in advance.

Haven't seen much said about OneSimCard, but there's quite a lot of discussion about Telestial Passport SIM (I understand it's actually Ekit brand) here.

[groznybay]

I have been using onesimcard for quite a while. Good service, many options including an US or Canada number, and as far as i see it better rates. I have no problem.

[mrcamp]

One sim card uses an Estonia +372 number. If you find a carrier that connects to this number(A few of them actually block calls to this number range), it will be very expensive. For outgoing calls, the rates, while not the cheapest, are OK. I had bot UM +423 and +44 sims myself. I have since replaced them with trevelsim(easyroam) and Telna mobile. I recently used them on a trip to Europe and West Africa without any problems.