I ordered a ringtone in September and a game in October. My phone could not download either. I had been calling, emailing and text messaging Virgin Mobile about this from the beginning. It took my persistence and nearly four months for this to be resolved. Not only that, my last phone call to them which lasted 34 minutes consisted mostly of me waiting on hold and being asked by two different representatives if I was willing to accept "about $5" instead of what I paid.

I insisted on a full refund, which I did receive. I subsequently filed a formal complaint about their customer service.

The second time I phoned their company to get my phone activation corrected (the first attempt was unsuccessful) I was assisted by an incredibly nasty and downright insulting representative. She was snide and very short with me, to the point I was rather dumbfounded as well as offended. At the end of our conversation I requested to participate in their customer service survey, which was offered at the start of the phone call. The rep turned vicious and snapped "Definitely!" and then actually hung up on me.

While I have spoken with some courteous and efficient people at Virgin Mobile over the months, which I did mention in my complaint, the hassle and negligence I have come to associate with this company is not worth putting up with.

I'm getting a new phone and going with MetroPCS.

A few months ago I pressed the $ button on the handset by accident, which allowed me to get access to my account balance (I usually don't want to use this function because it will charge me 10 cents each time). Since then I have been careful not to touch this button again. But I didn’t know that the company kept charging me 10 cents every day for the flowing months, until recently I found my account balance unusually low and went online to check my account activities. I called the customer service line and I was told that once I press this button they will automatically activate the service of “access to account balance” and charge me 10 cents every day. I don’t think this is fair; charging a customer for a daily service without informing the customer is not an honest practice for business.

The $ function, located in an up-scroll button, is very easy to be pressed by mistake. I don’t understand why Virgin Mobile designed this button that way. In Virgin Mobile's theory, customers of Minute2Minute (a prepaid program) are those who use their cell phones infrequently, which is true, but then why Virgin Mobile would think that these infrequent users would need to check their account balance every day? To me this is a way Virgin Mobile designed to make extra money. I don’t expect them to do their business in decent manners, but charging customers without their awareness is unfair and should be stopped. They should have clearly informed customers by a message in the handset screen, or in the user agreement when the contract is signed at the first place. When I complained about it in the phone to their customer service department on Nov. 26, 2007, I was told by the company’s representative that this information is available in their website. But do we need to go through so many pages of their websites to search for the possible hidden charges?

My husband and I have been customers with Virgin Mobile for some time now. We utilize the prepaid cards service. It works for us at this time for our needs.

In the beginning, we did not have to ever call Virgin Mobile for anything. Everything worked properly, top ups were very easy, bonuses were paid on time, etc.

Then "IT BEGAN" (and it still has not ended): In the past six (6) months my husband and I have had to send back 5 -6 phone units to be replaced by the company for various defects.

One phone developed an orange spot on the screen (was small at first). The mysterious spot grew over a few days to almost cover the entire screen. The service of the phone was not affected, however the information on the screen could not be seen. Virgin Mobile replaced this phone with the exact same model, and withing 3-5 Business days by UPS, and gave us 45 days in which we needed to send back the damaged phone. They even supplied the shipping box or envelope to use all shipping to and from was paid for by the company. I was in fact impressed by this.

Then this little thing became a routine. We were having to have our phone replaced every 3-4 weeks over the past months. It was OK at first, bearable in the middle, and highly questionable later in the months. We were then advised by Virgin Mobile that the phones that they are sending us to replace the phones that we have paid their full-value price for, are reconditioned models and could have a long shelf life or a very minute one.

Virgin Mobile just keeps replacing the phones without a resolution in the works.

I finally shook my head at myself, laughing and wondering why it has taken me so long to admit that I do not want these hassles with this company any longer. We are taking our business elsewhere and soon.

On Monday 08/27/07, I attempted to make a call on my phone to call my father to pick me up from school and the phone said I had O balance just a few days after I topped up with $20.00. When I saw my account file it showed that I downloaded a song I never tried to download 3 times within 3 minutes of each other at 2.50 for each download, and further checking revealed a 10.00 charge that I never authorized. When I checked the time on that charge that it happened was on 08/25/07 at 4:19 p.m to a number I've never seen before.

A VERY UPSET customer,
Ryan Harris.

Virgin Mobile violating Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991

For the past year I have been attacked by deliberate hack spammed text messages, disabling my phone, possibly as retaliation. Sophos recommended that Virgin Mobile provide the header information from those messages, which will give me the sender site. I can then contact the site that is sending the messages and request they provide the sender I.P. so I can go after the criminal behind this. Unfortunately Virgin Mobile, who is making 5¢ per spam refuses to do anything despite the fact that it is a violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991. I have contacted the FTC, the FBI, my Congressman, and the FCC and they all say Virgin is my only remedy source.

Any advice smb!