Phones for Consumer Cellular

Re: Consumer Cellular

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I wll be happy to advise you as I am a former employee there. First off its not a bad deal if you NEVER go over your minutes. They back date plans so if you call in after you went over, you can change and it will then just be your usage out of your normal plan.

They will require you to at least pay a 35 dollar activation fee, which pasy for their cheepest phone. You can take the sim card our of it and use it in your unlocked phone... They won't tell you that or advice you to do it.


A few things listed are both pros & cons as well as good and bad aspects both related to service, hiring practices and the people you are talking to on the other end of the phone.







A few things though moral wise I have quams about. They do not do back ground checks on their employees. Your FULL social security number is displayed 60% of the time as well as FULL credit card information exp date etc.

If you have a credit score of 550 or less you won't be allowed to have their service and a credit score of 550 to 599 will net you a year of being on Auto pay which you must then provide a debit or credit card that your monthly bill will come out of.

Most of their client base is seniors who care little to use the phone outside of needing to call AAA or report a drunk driver via 911, both free calls.

The owner is pretty generous with the employees and they celebrate almost every ones birth day with a cake etc. Theres min office politics but plenty of gossip from the 40% divorced over weight women who are jelous to see others who are in happy relationships


Anyhow I no longer work there due to a moral issue in which a customer had her friend pay her bill with a cc.

This CC was then added as the auto pay card in which her friend did not authorize. Note her friend was using one of the 3 phones on the acct.

Anyhow her friend called in to have her card removed and also read the full number to me. I was going to do it but I checked with billing AkA the owners wife and she told me to leave it and that although the lady was not authorized to go over the acct, she was still resposible since she was using one of the phones.

This sounded wrong because A) She was never ON the acct as an authorized user B) She was never informed that her friend ( the acct holder) had bad credit and that her one time payment would net her credit card to replace the account holders old declined card.

Anyhow I followed the card holders request even after billing said to leave it. The decision was simple, I put my self in that ladies place.


Anyhow I don't want it to be a full rant, Consumer cellular is a growing family business with failry decent ethics ( aside from my rant) I'm not sore since I just got hired at comcast which pays 16.00 an hour VRS the 11 I was making.

#Lastly a few tips in dealing with consumer cellular. 99% of the reps will take the time to help you.

#ALL and I mean ALL calls are recorded and heald for 30 days/

#They will ALWAYS try to assist you before sending you to a supervisor.

#They pay more for their cell phones than they sell them to you for.. After all they make their money on service, not cell phones.

#If you threaten to cancel service over a disputed overage ammount, they will almost always try to rerate the plan, if not ask for a supervisor.

#If you ever have a porting issue, ask to speak to the only lady in porting, she knows EVERYTHING!!!

# They do not carry any wireless services other than Txt msging and regular cell service. This means no internet.

# Consumer cellular is a reseller of Cingular. This means they have an account with cingular and resell plans.

#Every rep has access to email. Although email CAN be screened by the network admin, its never screened.

# Reps are told to when taking payments verify only the last 4 digits of the Credit card number, although the whole thing is visable, they won't tell you that so you have a false sense of security.

( THIS, combined with the fact they do NO credit checks OR background checks may leave a sour taste in your mouth. ) I can prove they don't They also have hired people with out checking the work references..

I can also prove they have in the past hired convicted felons who were convicted of Felony Theft

The have though started doing drug testing.





In conclusion its not a bad company. I advice you use a credit card if you make online payments. Credit cards are easier to deal with when you have fraud than for someone having dirrect access to your bank account$


Thank you, any questions? Feel free to post them here.

 

Anyone reading this blog site, PLEASE take anything said by UncleHams with a HUGE grain of salt. I am a current employee and know very well the SEVERAL inappropriate things done and said by "UncleHams" while an employee - both to customers and coworkers. Upon being fired (for MANY more reasons than he admits on his blog), he had copied down info to contact AT LEAST one of our customers. On calling her, he identified himself as a Consumer Cellular rep, repeatedly insulted her and cursed at her, and told her not to call anymore with her STUPID questions. Unfortunately for him, she had caller i.d., we did a reverse lookup & found out it was him. UncleHams is ABSOLUTELY lying on several points. Only the last 4 digits of a person's SS# are asked for on any credit check - and this is an Equifax Credit Bureau requirement, not ours. Also, the company DOES background checks. The line about hiring convicted felons convicted of felony theft is a bold faced lie. I do know an employee that was caught stealing from the company & fired immediately. As said before, UncleHams was fired for SEVERAL reasons & given MANY warnings before being let go. He said ANYTHING that came to mind with no thought to whether it was appropriate or not (mentioned sticking his cat in the fridge for a couple minutes when it was in heat). He also passed on info to customers that was often incorrect, all because he never asked questions of those of us who had been there longer & knew the answers. He just made stuff up as he went along & left us to clean up after him. Given this, and how he handled himself after he was fired with the harrassment of a client, I would disregard basically anything he posts.

 

Its best to just move on to another company. This one is not what you are looking for.

 

As I stated elsewhere, ignore UncleHams. Simply a disgruntled past employee. You can try using a Cingular phone, they occasionally work. Consumer Cellular just can't guarantee it will or troubleshoot cell if you go that route.

 

You 2 are not helping the OP by these back and forth comments, if you can't post anything constructive, then don't post it.

 

I aggree. While I may be a past employee I did go in depth about consumer cell. Because they are a smaller company they have not had alot of consumer reports one way or the other.


I would suggest to search this forum and perhaps a consumer reports site with regards to his possible service at consumer cellular.

 

Consumer Cellular service and phones

I signed on with Consumer Cellular about 2wks ago. For the interest of anyone reading this, I went for the free phone Nokia 1112. It's a candy bar style, with no camera or color screen. I spent several hours researching the 4 phones that Consumer Cellular offers and the 1112 just seemed to be the way to go. So far the phone performs amazingly well and has an amazingly long standby life. Of course some hate the idea of a bare bones phones. I know this sounds really strange but I use cell phones only to make and receive calls. With Consumer Cellular (cingular network) I now get service where I didn't have any signal before with Sprint, or Verizon.

As for customer service attention, I have found the help when I have called to be prompt and very competent. The reps are knowledgeable, and patient. Rates are quite reasonable I think, and the fact that there is no required contract is a real plus. Other companies will not allow you out of a contract if you already have service, move to a different location and cannot get a signal.

Overall, I would rate Consumer a good deal.

 

I have been a customer of Consumer Cellular for several months and have nothing but the highest praise for their company, service, and support. Everyone I've dealt with has been fantastic in every aspect. In addition, not having to commit to a long term service agreement is a huge plus.

 

I was a customer of Consumer Cellular about 10 years ago. They had the cheapest prices back then until other carries caught up with them. I recently swiched back to Consumer Cellular and again their prices are the best I have seen lately. Their 1600 minute plan and 10 cents a minute over the limit plan is unbeatable. You don't need to worrry about going over your minutes with this price. Here are the questions I needed answered from them before I signed up along with their answers:

Friendly staff, she did not tell me her name. I had to wait about 30 minutes to speak to a live person. This was OK since I had the phone on speakerphone and I was doing other things in the meanwhile.

How many members can I have in the family share plan?
Maximum 5 cell phones, depending on credit.

Are the calls between family members free? NO

How much do the taxes add up? 15-30% of the final bill. For a $20 bill it would be 3 to 6 dollars additional.

Can I change down to a plan or change up anytime to keep up with usage? Yes, change up or down anytime. If I want to save money I need to change before the billing cycle ends.

Can I add or subtract a line anytime? yes

Can I invite a friend and port their number to be on the same plan with me? Yes, as long as I have their information and they are not under contract. I will be responsible for their usage.

Do you support blackberry and data plans. NO. Only texting.

Can I check messages from a landline for free? Yes, no minutes will be charged if I call from my home line.

They are a great company for people who want basic cell phone service. And when another company offers better rates, you can always cancel your service with no cancellation fees.

 

Hi! I'll back the positive remarks about Consumer Cellular, in addition to the AARP endorsement that includes a 10% discount.
I've got the Nokia 2760 which has web browsing, but CC's offering, starting at $5 a month, is limited -- CNN, USA Today and the weather.
I used Bluetooth to try to add my Apple Safari browser but when I tried to use Safari, the phone crashed.
Bummer. (I had to recharge it to get it going again, with the help of good support.)

 

I work with Consumer Cellular and one thing I’d like to mention is the friend and family referral program. If you refer a friend or family to Consumer Cellular, you and your friend/family member will each receive $10 off your next billing cycle. Enjoy your phones in the mean time!

 

I got a new cell number to try this service without switching from my current provider ... and it's a good thing I did. I can't say anything terrible about the company or the service, but it did not work for me.

The cheaper phones were the only ones that would take a regular headset, not earbuds or bluetooth, so I got the $20 Nokia 2760. The functions on it are hard to figure out, but I guess you would get used to that. However, there was no way to prevent the display from going dark after a few seconds ... even though the power saver was off and sleep mode was off and one other setting was changed from 10 seconds to 8 minutes ... and even though I turned the phone off and then back on several times ... that darn thing just kept going dark.

The voice mail (which I assume is the same on every phone) didn't offer the right features for me, and there were no settings to make it work. Also, every incoming called showed a "1" before the number, so I couldn't redial that number without first saving it and then editing-out the "1."

Today I called the company to say that I was ready to cancel my service. Naturally I had used more than 30 minutes, so they couldn't give me a full refund. Then they said they couldn't refund anything. I would be billed for service from the time I placed the order (even though I didn't have the phone for a while) until the third of the month. And I would also be billed from the 3rd through the 7th when I called to cancel. Also, they don't want the phone back, so I can't even get my 20 bucks. It looks like this test is going to cost me about $75 ... I guess I should have started with the cheapest service plan. USE CAUTION IF YOU WANT TO "TEST" THIS SERVICE ... IT CAN BE EXPENSIVE TO CANCEL IT.

So does anybody out there want to buy this phone? The supervisor said you would still be able to sign up with Consumer Cellular (if you pass their credit check) and have this phone activated. I assume you can use it with any provider.

Can someone tell me if I should remove the SIM card before I sell the phone? thanks for your advice.

 

I work with Consumer Cellular and I’m sorry to hear that the phone didn’t work out for you. Consumer Cellular would gladly accept your old phone if you send it back, in return, Consumer Cellular can ship you a new one to replace it, perhaps a Nokia 6085, which has features that may be more in line with what you need.

If you plan to sell it, we recommend that you take out the SIM card before you sell, especially if you currently have saved contacts on there. This will ensure the privacy of you and your contacts. Thanks for your candor and please call Consumer Cellular at 1-888-345-5509 if you have any additional questions.

 

I ordered 3 phones from consumer cellular & 2 out of 3 were fine. Mine was the nokia 6085. I simply think it was a lemon. I was into 57minutes before i realized it wasn't right. 45mins. Is the cut-off for returning the new phone. I sent it back to nokia to be fixed 3 times. Its not consumer cellular that is bad. Nokia is dishonest in their so called repair fix. So i sent the phone back completely. Consumer cellular was very good about it.

 

I just received my phones from consumer cellular, they were cheap and the sound quality was awful. I swapped one sim chip into an old AT&T phone, and all was hunky dory.

I called support and was told they use they AT&T network, and they authorized a phone return, and said I could pick any phone they had or purchase any AT&T phone.

They were friendly and helpful.

I'll post more later..........:

 

We feel your pain! We have 4 phones, same story, would you like to combine forces, and we can try to sale all of them? We have invested 261.00 in phones and activations. The fact that my wife and I BOTH get charged minutes every time we talk to each other really sucks, and burns your minutes up very quickly. I personally do not recommend Consumer Cellular
Bob h

 

Consumer cellular does not do back ground checks at least not when I worked there. I will say I never called a customer outside of work on my cell phone other than testing their cell phone when they called from their house phone and were on the phone with me. This was a normal thing to do for all the reps needing to test a phone line.

She called me at night thinking to bypass waiting on hold, I informed her not to call me. Also " Mike" cause I know its you I asked plenty of questions and recieved plenty of help and that was never the issue. I got paid 11 bucks an hour to provide service, easy job and easy money. My REFORMED ADULT MORAL compas told me that charging a credit card belonging to someone repeatedly because they called in 1 time to pay their friends bill one time was wrong.

The last rep left that cc info on an account being lazy. I removed it after the card holder verified the card number. The greedy billing lady ( co owner ) got angry and told me if she had a problem she could sue. Who the hell is going to sue for 200* dollars from across the US? This was a chance to do the right thing and I did it and still would do it.

In the end Karma will catch up... I'm making 35k as an assistant MGR with no kids or mildly retarded wife... How about you mike?





So there you have it folks, a disgruntled ex employee stating his reasons for no longer working there and a current employee moving up the ranks. My advice is to google consumer cellular and read the BBB reports.. Good luck.