Complaint Review: Freedom Pop - Internet

After reading several shady reviews I decided against my purchase of a freedom pop device.  I was assured my order was cancelled.  However, I ended up being charged anyway and they sent me the device.  First disappointment!  They sent it to the wrong address also, and I received it without a battery, which I did not know was missing because I thought it wasn't supposed to have one.  They have not sent the battery yet.  Bad way to start.  Then one day I noticed the internet was not working.  I had more than enough data left, but I find out if you disable automatic top up they shut it down early, going on about over usage and fraud, whatever that could be, but they shut it down fine when it hit the right number.  So I waited a few days to use it until the month rolled over.  I signed on, which I couldn't have done previously, and noticed the account was still displaying the former months data info.  What?  It also said I needed to add a payment method and they were trying to charge me.  Now that's fraudulent, is it not?   They had shut off my account and I never enabled automatic top up.  Oh, sure, sometimes the internet is slow and free, and what's two dollars?  Not much, but I cancelled the order way in the beginning, and they offered no solution except to force the device on me or intercept the package, they said, which is virtually impossible, especially if it is sent to the wrong address, the billing address, I expected it elsewhere.  I also read reviews where people did that and could not get the refund.  Just a bad vibe and no customer should feel bad about complaining if something feels wrong, like using unfriendly tactics to make money, even stealing a measly two dollars.  No one's perfect, but from the get go it hasn't been nice.

I noticed these 99 cent charges on my credit card and contacted the company. They said they'd make sure I wasn't charged in the future, but would only refund the charges for the last three months. I assume this is because that's how long I could dispute the charges with my credit card company.

I've rarely used the device, and wasn't aware I was being charged for not using it enough. The charges probably total less than $50 for the few years I've had the hotspot, but it just seems underhanded to sneak these charges in under the radar and then not even refund them when you're called on it.

FreedomPop has revised their policy to remove this fee. I just thought I'd update my original report with this information. I consider this issue resolved.

 I paid for the $105 for the phone and have waited almost 4 months and still no Phone. I have requested a refund but just given excuses and no refund. I'm beginning to think its a RIPOFF !

Now they do not charge you for not using 5mbs, but they have the offers to complete to earn MBs out of the 40 offers i completed I only got MBs for 5 of the 20 offers i completed and/or downloaded. They give you a whole run around to give you the MBs you earned for completed offers, Not only do you start to get alot of junk mail from the offers but when you start to download the downloadable office my virus software goes crazy with warnings.

beware of putting in time to complete offers that you may not get MBs for. 

I don't work for FP or have any association with them other than as a customer, but the article above is much more "I'm angry because I didn't read before I bought it" than "the company did me wrong." 

FP spells-out that for their "100% free" plan (where you pay nothing at all for the service) you first buy the wireless gizmo, and you're given 500 MB free every month. They ALSO spell out that if you don't use at least 5 MB each month, they'll ding you for a maintenance fee - they're up-front with that. 

So, keeping your usage between 5 and 500 MB each month, you should expect to pay $0.00 for the service. That's been my experience for about 4 months now, and I'm quite happy with it. Granted, their network is spotty - I have no coverage at my house, but I also have a nice speedy fiber optic connection at home. I didn't buy the FP puck to use in my own living room. 

Dollar for dollar, I give a pretty good recommendation for FreedomPop. They're nowhere near as widespread coverage as Verizon, but they also don't cost doodly either. I think some of FP's newer gizmos use Sprint's network, which is more robust than Clear (which I have), but still not a US-wide blanket. 

Perhaps they changed their terms of usage reciently......but I doubt it......if you take time to read it you will find they state clearly about using less and more data and the extra charge.........

Plus the OP's complaint about his returning equpment and the small charge seems resonable from my point of view.

I say "beware of overly complaining people" rather than his first sentance about" beware, the internet offered by Freedom Pop is not totaly free"............

I do not work for this company.  But in their defense what you experienced is just the standard terms and conditions that you didn't read situation.  As consumers we are all guilty of it.  It does seem like a bit of a sneaky business practice but by law as long as they have it in their terms and conditions and disclaimers they are fine.  ALL companies do this so it's not anything new they pulled out the bag.  It does say in their terms and conditions if you don't use 5mb they charge .99 cents.  99 cents for a month!  I know how you feel but come on I say enjoy Freedom POP while they last at these rates.  Hopefully they will stick to the same rates as they grow.  The big internet and cable companies would have charged you way way more than that.  I switched my family to ALL prepaid services because now we have the exact same bill every single month.  I was with 3 different major cell phone providers and every month it was a different price and sometimes it was due to overages from data usage raising my bill well over 200 bucks a month EXTRA on top of the normal bill.  Same with cable sometimes. I don't know how a bundle package runs different prices every month and we barely watched TV some months, barely used the home phone, and rarely used the home internet connection because we were always on the go, yet the bill still bounced up and down. 

I wouldn't be mad at these guys, once you found out about it to use 5mb in a months time is soooo easy.  That's pulling up one website and doing a few clicks on it I mean that's nothing.  Play a quick game on Facebook or send a couple of emails out. Out of 30 days that is really not hard to do.

If you're not even using 5mb in a thirty day period then you may have not needed the service in the first place.

And the shipping situation, that's the same thing for a lot of companies.  You foot the cost to ship it back and they have a certain percent shelf fee it's another standard practice.


I do understand how you feel but you were no where close to being ripped off.  

Hello,

As a new start-up devoted to shaking up the mobile data industry, we are charged a real fee by our data partner in order to keep your device active within its system. If you use more than 5MB, your account is not marked as inactive and we are not charged to keep it open. Users can avoid this small $0.99 fee by just turning the device on once a month and downloading a few megabytes of data. Our customer support agents are usually more than happy to provide a first-time refund for users who did not read our available information on our website.

The cost of the device is $99. As a small business giving away tons of free data every day, were unable to cover shipping charges. When devices are returned to our distribution center, our logistics partner charges us a fee to inspect, clean, and restock the device. If we were to absorb this small fee, we would not be able to provide the device as a security deposit, and we would really like to ensure that people have that option to return the device outside of the short 30-day return policy that most other businesses have.