Consumer Cellular
reviews and complaints

This information was emailed to Consumer Cellular CEO John Marick on 6/29/2023. As of 8/7/2023, no response has been received by his office, or any other Consumer Cellular staff.

We recently completed a trip to Vancouver, BC, Canada beginning June 17, 2023 and ending June 28, 2023. Wanting to ensure we had service in Canada, and the calls we were to make would be properly rated, I called your customer service department as instructed on your website.

In early June, I called your JD Powers recognized customer service to request international access for the upcoming trip starting June 17th. At that time, I was told to call back about 2 days prior to travel, not 2 weeks. The Consumer Cellular web site states: "To confirm your international roaming options, contact Customer Support at [protected]. We recommend doing so at least two weeks before leaving the U.S." The representative told me to call back, 2 days prior to our departure, despite being made aware of the obvious contradiction.

On Thursday, June 15th I once again called customer service and spoke with Randall. He was surprised that I waited this close to my departure to call to arrange international service. I explained to him what had been told to me previously. He committed to complete the forms for both lines on my account and have service set up for Saturday, our first full day in Canada.

Upon landing in Vancouver, BC on Saturday, I turned my phone off then back on and I had service.

Unfortunately, the other phone on my account did not have service. Randall was supposed to have submitted 2 forms to get both lines setup for international service. Apparently, another service or process failure had occurred. At this point, I had spent nearly two hours on various phone calls to Consumer Cellular and was let down at every turn.

Later that day, I called Consumer Cellular only to learn your office was closed. I was frustrated. I called early Sunday and spoke with Myra. She said she couldn’t help because the activity had to be completed prior to leaving the US. I persisted and asked if she would just go ahead and try. She said she would, but it could take up to 64 hours to activate. When I mentioned it had only taken 48 hours for one of our lines last weekend, she said it was completed as a special request to get that change order processed.

But she did submit the change order, and within 5 minutes the second number was active in Vancouver.

So, it appears Myra’s information was incorrect, and Randall didn't do his job.

The irony, while I was on hold, the message came on stating that JD Powers had awarded Consumer Cellular best in customer service knowledge for non-contract carriers. I was laughing as both of your reps were misinformed and the service, I received was inconsistent with your brand and brand promise.

Consumer Cellular should consider changing the process to notify a customer prior to leaving the country, that the proper forms have been submitted and completed. I trusted your company and it failed. Since there is no current way to test international calling prior to leaving, how would I know that my request was processed?

The website and your customer service staff have very different information regarding this process.

I am certain AARP, JD Powers, Reader’s Choice, and Forbes would agree.

Date of incident 7/29/23 - needed to make a payment arrangement due to financial difficulties. Since CC is geared towards senior citizens, you would think there would be a grace period. I was told service could be interrupted at any time. I pay for mines and my mother cell phone. This is our only means of communicating with family and friends. Sometimes things happen. I believe CC just like all cellular services is a rip off. I was told they can cut us off and also raise the plan cost too. There is no cellular service to switch to because they all do the same thing; take advantage of hard working people and they don't give a darn whether you are a senior or a young person. What is the harm in giving people a grace period of five days or even three days? I hate them all and as far as I"m concerned CC can kick rocks.

When we changed from ATT to CC (June-July 2023) our phones worked fine for about a week and a half. Everything was just like our service with ATT. We live in a spot with very poor service where we have to use WiFi calling and this was discussed before we switched. I was told it would be no problem and WiFi calling would be as usual. I believe it was July 5th or later, both me and my husband noticed that we were dropping calls and people were not able to get in touch with us. This happened on the same day with both of our phones. I noticed that WiFi calling was turned off on both of our phones. I attempted to turn it back on on both of our phones and we both got the same message. "Couldn't set up Wifi calling. Try again later in Settings". I took my phone to work (various offices all over the state) and it would not connect to WiFi calling on any WiFi system. MULTIPLE calls to CC and numerous troubleshooting sessions resulted in nothing. Was initially told that a tower for ATT was down near me and was given no timeline as to when the repairs would be made. I find that interesting, because I checked ATT website, entered my address and was told that service was normal in my area. CC finally opened up a ticket and I was told that I would receive a call within 24 hours-nothing. Called twice more, same guarantee-nothing.

James A. Gordon, [protected] Wright Street, The Dalles, OR 97058.

On Oct 3, 2022 I purchased a home tele base which I was told had a 1 year warranty. When received, it had broken parts laying in the bottom of the box. I called Consumer Tele and they replaced it. The antenna was loose but it seemed to work okay even though there were usually no bars and up to 3 bars showing. I started having trouble about a month ago when after talking for 10 minutes or so, it would cut out so the person on the other end could not hear. I could always hear them. After several attempts to diagnose the problem, Consumer Telephone agent said on July 10, 2023, the 1 year warranty was on the original broken phone and only 6 months on the replacement. She said I had to keep making the payments on the phone base but would have to purchase a new one also. I think the replacement phone was defective but I did not make any extended calls to cause the outage. Right now I cannot make a call lasting more than 10 minutes and I feel Consumer Cellular has been unfair in not fixing or replacing the defective home base.

I was told by a Customer Service Rep that I was able to purchase a 2023 G5G phone that just came out this July for $199.00. When I received the phone it was a "2022" G5G phone, not what I ordered or was promised. I have called several times to have the correct phone sent to me with no results. Spoke with Nickie who said would return my call after researching the problem. I never did receive a call back from Nickie. I called again and spoke with Edwin, who was rude and I asked to speak to his supervisor Tanish (sp) who was also going to call me back the next day but never did. Apparently the $199.00 promotion ended July 5, and I called after that date. The fact is that one of your Customer Service Reps told me that I could still purchase the 2023 G5G for $199.00. I have been billed $223.44 which includes standard shipping plus sales tax. All I am asking for, is to send me the phone I ordered (2023 G5G) so I can return the 2022 phone I did not order. You state that the goal for Consumer Cellular is to make sure the customer is always 100% satisfied, with "EXCEPTIONAL" service. Not returning phone calls to a customer, and addressing the problem, does not live up to that statement.

I got an advertisement in the mail from Consumer Cellular about their lower cellular service pricing. In the advertisement it states "Available at Walmart". I went to Walmart to buy one of their service plans. The cashier in the electronic department told me that all they do is sell the phones that I had to go online. I went home and contact Consumer Cellular and bought a plan and installed the esim card in my iPhone 14 that I had with at&t. I transferred over to Consumer cellular with the at&t transfer pin and installed the esim card in my phone. The Phone stopped working. I couldn't call, text or use data. I took my phone to Walmart's electronic department to see if they could help me. I was thinking if I could use one of Walmart's phone I could solve the problem with Consumer Cellular. The cashier said they had no phones for me to use that I had to get a friend to help me. I'm 71 years old and most of my friends were in New York, Richmond and Rocky Mount. The young cashier asked me "So, what am I suppose to do?" I told him to get me a manager. When the manager finally arrived she also had the same respond and the look of not caring. I asked her, "This is not the way you do customer service for a customer who spends hundred of dollars at your establishment.” I also told her that Starbucks let me use their phone when I needed to call their customer service. Her response was that Walmart doesn't allow outside calling. I had to go to Starbucks and use their WiFi to chat with Consumer Cellular. The phone was locked at the fault of AT&T not following through with the transfer. However it took Consumer Cellular, AT&T and myself 2 hours to find that out. My complaint is: If a store like Walmart is going to sell electronics it would be customer friendly if the salespersons knew how to work the product.

I purchase a Consumer Cellular cellphone for about a$100.00 and I call the company to have the Boostmoblie account number and transfer the number to the Consumer Cellar number or give me a number.

Consumer Cellar refuses to transfer my service and to me that the account number and the trainer number is wrong.

My Boostmoblie cellphone is "hack' and i needed a new cellphone; I gave them my landline number and they say it went to voicemail. Nothing is wrong with that landline number to verify me.

Consumer Cellar has caused me to buy a cellphone that will not serve. I felt like they don't want to help to get another phone. I am out of pocket

I have had a phone with you for years and have recommended you to several people but this upgrade you sent to me has totally messed up my phone and can't even use it. I have talked to at least 3 of your people to no avail. I am so disappointed and will never recommend you again. I got this phone because I am a senior citizen and not electronic smart. There is no place that I can take it to get it straightened out and my family who pretty smart can't figure it out either. I think the new sim card had too much in it and over loaded my phone and you should have known that when you sent it out as you have the info of what size of phone I have on your records. Now I have to go to Best Buy and buy a new phone. Rose Vance Platte City Mo

on April 4th 2023 i needed a second phone for health reasons and called consumer cellular bought an i phone 8 for $469.73 from them with insurance set up the account paid with a credit card in full so i would own the phone out right.

the number one thing i wanted to be sure there was no contract.

now on june 21 2023 i wanted to get a different provider the new provider sent me a sim card and my phone is lock so i called consumer cellular and asked why is my phone locked and asked them to unlock my phone they wouldn't also explaining we agreed there was no contract they told me that it was there policy when buying a phone from them i must keep my plan for 180 days i ask them to show me where i agreed to that they couldn't show me nothing. where i agreed to that policy my account is and always paid on time and up to date.never late

Me and my partner were loyal customers of Consumer Cellular for two whole years. We had two phones that we used for everything from calling our family to browsing the internet. However, we recently found out that our phones were not compatible with 5G, which is a requirement for Consumer Cellular. So, we decided to purchase two new factory-unlocked 5G phones that were listed as compatible with their service.

To our surprise, my phone did not work with their service even though it was supposed to be compatible. We contacted technical support and even spoke to a manager, but they could not fix the glitch. Frustrated, we decided to switch to another company. My wife's phone transferred without any issues, but when I tried to switch mine, I was told that my factory-unlocked phone was locked to Consumer Cellular's service.

The customer service representative gave us the run-around with illogical responses, such as a non-iPhone would be locked to their service for 30 days, unless it was purchased through them. But my new factory-unlocked 5G-compatible phone was with them for almost 60 days and my wife's new factory-unlocked 5G-compatible phone was with them for less than 30 days. So why was mine locked to their service and hers wasn't?

Now, I'm without a phone for 1-3 days, even though the process has been "escalated". As a disabled person with children and grandchildren, this is totally unacceptable. And to top it off, they want us to come back? I don't think so!

Overall, our experience with Consumer Cellular has been disappointing. We were loyal customers for two years, but when we needed their help, they couldn't provide us with a solution. Their customer service was unhelpful and their policies were confusing. We would not recommend Consumer Cellular to anyone looking for a reliable phone service.

So, I had to stop using Consumer Cellular and switch to another provider. It was a real pain in the neck! I spent a total of 3.5 hours on the phone with their rep "Chris" on the first day. He was so inconsiderate, negligent, and just plain stupid! He ended up dropping both of our phone services before they were even ported, and then he deliberately hung up on me because he didn't know what to do. I had to call back and start all over again with another rep. Then, on the second day, we had to finish the porting/transfer of service, but the porting numbers they gave us just wouldn't work. It took me and the new provider another 2.75 hours on the phone with their reps just to figure out what was wrong on their end. Consumer Cellular sent multiple porting numbers trying to get their system to work, but it was just a total mess. Most of their reps seem ignorant as to fixing their own system problems. In total, I spent 6.25 hours dealing with Consumer Cellular just to port our 2-phone service over to Spectrum. It was a nightmare! I guess they were really mad at me for leaving after 7 years, and they wanted to really screw me over. And they did! If it weren't for the persistence of Spectrum Mobile, we would never have gotten our numbers ported over to them. So, in my opinion, Consumer Cellular's system and their inadequately-trained reps are not worth the lower cost service they advertise.

So, I gotta say, I had a pretty rough experience with Consumer Cellular. When 5G came out, I heard that 4G LTE would still work, so I thought I was good with my LG phone that had 4G LTE. But nope, Consumer Cellular cut off my service. I called their customer service five times, and every time they told me my phone didn't have 4G LTE and that I needed to buy a new 5G phone from them. They wouldn't listen to me, not even the guy who was obviously on the toilet while he was talking to me!

I decided to call LG to see if they could help me out. I talked to two different reps, and they both told me that my phone was 4G LTE capable. I could even see that on my phone's info. The last LG rep I talked to offered to do a three-way call with Consumer Cellular, but the CC rep still wouldn't listen to her. After 10 minutes of listening to them argue, I hung up.

Later that night, I switched to Mint Mobile, and they assured me that my phone was 4G LTE capable. Their customer service reps were super helpful and walked me through the setup process. I had been with Consumer Cellular for over 10 years, but they only wanted me to buy a new phone from them. I wish I had reported them to the state consumer protection agency.

It makes me wonder how many older people they've pulled this stunt on. I'm still using the same phone in 2023, by the way! Overall, I wouldn't recommend Consumer Cellular. Their customer service was terrible, and they didn't seem to care about their long-time customers.

This company, Consumer Cellular, is supposed to be easy for senior citizens through AARP, but let me tell you, it's not. My 70-year-old mother was overcharged for months due to mistakes made by the company. To make matters worse, they canceled her account and gave her a new number without even telling her! She received a new SIM card in the mail and a new number, and if something had happened, she would have had no cell phone and no idea that her phone wasn't activated.

The company doesn't even check their change of address on the envelope and then mails it to the old address for three months before trying to reach her. And when they do try to reach her, they call her cell phone instead of her home phone, even though my mom doesn't have her voicemail set up. They never tried to reach her any other way or even went back to check their records.

Needless to say, we canceled our service with them. Beware! Don't trust this company to take advantage of your unsuspecting senior citizen parents or grandparents. They are robbing more than just my mother! The company's training is poor, and their customer service is bad. This has been going on since May 2015, and it's now December. They still couldn't get it right, so I canceled today and will be going to a better company. A few dollars more per month is surely worth avoiding this headache.

I've been a Consumer Cellular customer for three years now, and I have to say, I'm not impressed. Recently, they offered me a free SIM card when I paid my last bill online. I thought, "Great, free stuff!" and accepted the offer. Little did I know, they had stopped using T-Mobile's network, and my phone - which I've had for the entire three years - wouldn't work with the new SIM card. I installed the SIM card on Friday, May 19th, and my phone immediately stopped working.

I called Consumer Cellular from my work phone line and spoke with three people, including two supervisors. They explained that they no longer use T-Mobile's network, but couldn't explain why there wasn't a disclaimer with the new SIM card. I also asked why I wasn't sent an email, letter, or text message explaining the change, but they didn't have an answer for that either. When I asked if I could just use my previous SIM card, they said it had been deactivated.

I was frustrated and confused. There was no information on their website or online stating that they no longer used T-Mobile's network. I even saved screenshots to prove it. They told me my only option was to buy a new phone from Consumer Cellular. Are you kidding me? I'm not falling for that scam. I cancelled my service with them immediately.

Overall, I feel like Consumer Cellular's actions were fraudulent and deceptive. They tricked me into getting a new SIM card without explaining the consequences. They didn't provide any warning or explanation about the change in network. And when I called to ask for help, they couldn't provide any real solutions. I'm disappointed in their lack of transparency and honesty. I wouldn't recommend Consumer Cellular to anyone.

I'm a single mom and I'm always looking for ways to save money. I don't use a lot of data, so I thought I could save some money by switching to Consumer Cellular. At first, everything was great. But after a few months, my bill started going up and up. I ended up paying more than I did with my old service provider. That wasn't the only problem, though. When I tried to call or text my son, my calls and texts wouldn't go through. I couldn't get in touch with him when I needed to. And when I needed driving directions, my phone wouldn't work. It was like having a useless phone.

Yesterday, I decided enough was enough. I called Consumer Cellular to get my transfer pin so I could switch to a different provider. The first person I talked to was okay, but she wasn't very nice about giving me the pin. Unfortunately, my son didn't get the pin. So I called again and waited on hold for about 30 minutes. Finally, someone answered. But she was really mean to me. She started yelling at me about how the pin had already been sent. I was so glad I decided to switch! If they can't treat me with respect now, they won't treat me with respect later. These people need to remember that they should treat their customers with kindness and respect. You never know when a customer might decide to come back if they receive excellent customer service. But if they keep being nasty, they'll never get any repeat business.

I was a happy customer of Consumer Cellular for many years, even though their flip phones are really cheap. However, I recently had a terrible experience with their customer service that made me switch to a different carrier.

In the middle of an important phone call, Consumer Cellular deactivated my phone with no notice. When I called them to find out why, they gave me no reason for the deactivation, but said that my phone didn't match their records. I had gone through a few phones and was on my third one, but they demanded a code to get into my account from when I enrolled. Unfortunately, I didn't have that code and there was no way to get my phone working again according to them without it. They asked for that code many times, but no other information mattered proving that I was who I said I was.

After going around in circles for three hours with two reps and one supervisor on internet live chat and phone, I finally gave up in disgust. The next day, I went to T-Mobile and got a better deal and phone. I got live chat next day on internet with Consumer Cellular and told them I wanted my account and number disconnected because I got a new cell phone carrier and new number. Imagine my surprise when they told me to give them that code again to disconnect my service. After a go-around and more requests for the code, I said, "I'm done. Do what you want to do. I'm done with your company," and disconnected from live chat.

The next day, I got an email for another month's service. To hell with them! If I owe a few days of service past my last bill, I'm not paying it because of all the grief and lost time they caused me! I'm glad I switched to a different carrier, and I wouldn't recommend Consumer Cellular to anyone.

I gotta say, I was pretty disappointed with my experience with Consumer Cellular. I was drawn in by their low prices on their website, but boy was I in for a surprise when it came to billing. I signed up for the $25 Plan, which was supposed to give me 250 minutes and 2GB of data, plus some extra AARP benefits. I was excited to see that they offered a 5% AARP discount and a 100% risk-free guarantee, so I figured I had nothing to lose.

But let me tell you, things did not go as planned. I expected my first bill to be around $23.75 plus state taxes, which I calculated to be about $2.11 in New York. But when I tried to cancel after 40 days, I was told that the special AARP deal only applied to usage of 500MB, and I had gone over that limit. I was then hit with an additional fee of about $20, on top of my first month fee of $34.74. And to make matters worse, there were all kinds of extra surcharges and fees tacked on, with "Government Taxes & Fees" listed at $5.08. All in all, my bill came out to a whopping $43.06. And none of these additional charges and fees were explained to me beforehand, nor was I warned about the 500MB maximum usage.

I did some calculations and figured out that the real price for my 40-day trial, based on what was advertised, should have been $25.86. That's what I paid them, and I'm not going to pay a penny more. It's just not right.

To make matters worse, the first SIM card they gave me only allowed for limited phone use. I had almost no useful phone service for the first week, and had to make multiple trips to TARGET to try to get it sorted out. And to top it all off, they don't even have email communication - you have to call them and wait on hold forever.

All in all, I have to say that Consumer Cellular is a bit of a scam. I would definitely recommend staying away from them if you can.

I don't usually write reviews, but I had an experience with Consumer Cellular that I just had to share. I've been in customer service for over 6 years, so I was excited to apply for a job with them. I received a call back right away (on a Saturday, no less!), and the phone interview went really well. Because of my experience, I was told I would have another interview with someone else to discuss the right pay rate. Unfortunately, I missed that interview because they didn't have my current email address. That was my fault, but we rescheduled for the following Monday at 10am.

Over the weekend, my 8-year-old son had to go to the ER and we found out he has asthma. They gave him an inhaler and put him on a steroid. On Monday, I was in a rush to drop him off at school and make it home in time for the interview. I forgot to leave his inhaler with the school nurse, but I assumed I had enough time to turn around and make it home. I made it home at 10:05 and tried to log in to the Teams meeting. It took me a few minutes to find the info in my email, so I didn't actually log in until 10:07. There was no answer, so I waited for 45 minutes on Teams and sent an email to Tyler to let him know I was waiting. He emailed me back right away and said that because I logged in at 10:10, I missed the interview.

I was confused because even a real job gives a grace period or at least understands that things happen. I emailed Tyler back and asked what exactly that meant. Does it mean I'm no longer a candidate? Because he wasn't specific in his response. I never got a response back from him, and honestly, this isn't a company I would want to work for or recommend to anyone else. I can see why they only have one star.

I gotta tell ya, I had a pretty rough time with Consumer Cellular. I'm a senior and I don't usually bother with warranties or anything like that, but they went ahead and put one on my phone without even asking me. I didn't even realize it until a few billing cycles had gone by and I saw the charge on my online bill. I called them up and they said they'd check the recording of our previous call, but then they never got back to me. I had to call them again and they finally took off the charge, but they wouldn't give me a refund for the months they'd already charged me. They said I'd authorized it by paying for it, but I didn't even know it was there!

Anyway, after going back and forth with them for a couple of months, I decided to just close my account and go somewhere else. I did it on the 10th of the month, which was the last day of the billing cycle, but then I got a bill for $22.27. They said it was for the cycle from the 20th to the 10th, but that wasn't reflected on any bill I'd ever seen. I tried to talk to them on their website chat, but I'm pretty sure I was talking to a robot or something. They just kept offering to send me last month's bill, which I already had, and they wouldn't listen to anything I said. Every time I made a point, they just said they'd check the recording and get back to me. It was really frustrating.

Talking to them on the phone was a little better, at least I knew I was talking to a human, but it didn't really get me anywhere. They promised to investigate, but then nothing ever came of it. Honestly, I'd rather bang my head against a wall than deal with them again. So if you're thinking about using Consumer Cellular, just be careful and make sure you read all the fine print.

I spent $180.00 to get a new phone because you all were moving from T-Mobile to ATT. The represent set up a new account wrong - I only want one account with ConsumerCellular. I had that cancelled after talking to several representatives. Rep said go to Target to get a new SIM, I did; the new Moto G- Stylus 2022 arrived Saturday - the SIM card I bought at Target worked. So I thought I'd activate; well, that was a farce. Then I was told to activate online at my account so I did. It said it was successfully activated - wrong - Now not only don't I have my old cell phone activated - that was turned off - but the New Phone is still not activated. I am about ready to go to Verizon or some other company if CONSUMER CELLULAR doesn't help me to get my new phone working, Raymond Moreland