Customer Reviews

Samsung A820 Prepaid Phone (STi Mobile)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

If you don't use this phone, it costs $3/month. Normal hours til 9 p.m. it's 12 cents per minute, which is a bit less than half of what most prepaid phones cost. Perfect for my occasional use and for locating family members when I'm in transit and feel that I simply must know where they are and what they are doing. I don't use cell phones much, but if I must have one, I might as well have one that doesn't make me worry about another huge bill. For kids who think they can mangle the budget, forget it cuz when the card is used up -- that's it kiddo. Once they use up the card, the only number they can dial is 911, but that's it. Bonus features: clock is always accurate and it has a great alarm which tells me when to get up to go to work and another to tell me when to go home at the end of the day. At some point, I might not be able to live without this.

STI is the worst service carrier ever. I called twice to make sure they can transfer the promotional air minutes to another existing account. But after I activated my cell phone, they ate their words.

At the same time, I found whenever I made a phone call, they charge me once the phone call is connected, even though no one answers the phone. This is one of their hidden charges.

My experience is so bad, I will never use their service again.

I've previously had subscription cell phone services with a variety of providers, but found I rarely used the number of minutes I was paying for. A prepaid phone service seemed like the way to go, and STI Mobile sounded like a good alternative because the price was competitive and minutes don't expire. I signed up and shortly after received my Samsung phone. It arrived, however, defective - the port for recharging the phone was damaged. Per the STI Mobile web site, I contacted them within 14 days to arrange for a replacement phone. This resulted in a number of email exchanges with customer service. In the first one, the rep told me that I was mistaken, and must have been sent the wrong charger. No offer was made to replace the charger, strangely, which was included as part of the package deal. After additional emails where I reassured her that I did in fact have the right charger (I took the phone in to a local merchant, who showed me the charger I was shipped worked with an identical model phone - it was the port on the shipped phone that was defective). At this point, the rep apologized and told me I would have to contact Samsung for a replacement phone! This entire process took several weeks.

In short, I guess you get what you pay for. If I had been shipped a working phone STI Mobile probably would have met my needs, but I was turned off by the poor customer service and have since found another prepaid phone provider.