Just so you know. My daughter had a phone from VM and started having problems with the email and messages being sent multiple times. When she call VM they told her it was a known problem with her phone (which I think was an LG). Anyway the only solution from VM was to purchase another phone, which she did. She then gave the old phone to my wife (her mother) and we tried to transfer the old phone to Ting. Ting is very good provider but said there was a financial hold on the phone and they couldn't transfer it. My daughter checked and there was $1 still owed on the phone which she then paid. Still couldn't transfer. When we called VM they said the phone had to be in use for 1 year before they would release it. Said it was for our safety because it could be stolen. They had the whole history of the phone and knew my daughter bought a new phone from them to fix the problem they knew about when they sold her the original phone. They still wouldn't release the old phone. Their only solution was to activate the old phone on VM but that would just have the original problem back and we didn't want to do that. I find it hard to believe that a company as big as VM would sell you a phone that they couldn't support with a known problem and then wouldn't take it in return or release it to Ting. Just saying........
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General Information on Virgin Mobile
- Thread starter JimReid
- Start date
This is a Sprint policy called Financial Eligibility Check (FEC) that they started in 2015. The phone must be paid off, and when bought from an MVNO like Boost or Virgin Mobile the phone has to be used for 12 months before it can be moved to a new carrier.
Both Virgin Mobile and Ting use Sprint and have to follow it. Most other MVNOs lock phones to their network for a period of time, usually 3 - 12 months.
https://help.ting.com/hc/en-us/arti...-pass-a-financial-eligibility-check-What-now-
https://swappa.com/faq/answer/sprint_mvno_fec
Kate,
Thanks for the response but I think this should be the exception. She was a customer of VM for several years. When she needed a new phone she purchased it from VM and paid for it in full. When she had problems with the phone and VM said it was the phone they wouldn't take back. She finally purchased ANOTHER phone from VM to correct the problem and transferred her number to the new phone. Now the original phone is sitting in a box and disconnected from any service. We wanted to give it to my wife to use and could not get VM to release it. No money was owed on it. They said it has to be in service for 12 months. Now that it is disconnected from VM it will never be 'in service' for 12 months because it isn't in service now. Not sure what will happen after it has sat in the box for the 12 months. I think since VM wouldn't take it back and she purchase another phone they should release the old one but they won't do that. So she has had to purchase the two phones and one can't be used at all anywhere but VM which would still have the same issues.
aml1025
Android Enthusiast
Virgin Mobile does offer a discounted price on their handsets (check what the same device costs to buy outright from Sprint), and that is part of their justification for the 12 month period of use before unlocking.
If you feel that you deserve an exception, you can try climbing the ranks of their customer service hierarchy or contacting their social media team on Facebook or Twitter to see if they are willing to help.
svim
Extreme Android User
I tend to agree with this. Customer service staff we deal with rarely have the last word on decision-making matters, if you didn't specifically request to speak to a manager instead, do so. If you're still not getting results, keep working your way up the chain of command. Virgin Mobile is just another cell phone corporation, proud that it functions on layers of convoluted bureaucracy, so as a consumer, a lot of times the responsibility gets dumped on you to just keep trying until you get what you deserve.