Here we are going to disclose some Dirty industry secrets: You purchased a Cell phone on eBay but when you call your Cell phone company they tell you the phone has been reported Lot or Stolen, Or it has an Unpaid bill.
What does that mean to you? You will have to contact your supplier and request an exchange or a refund.
Why Would the Cell phone company say that? For a few reasons,
- The phone was actual reported lost or stolen but then found by someone who donated the phone and it ended up by a refurbishing company and then sold on eBay. (many charity programs will sell their phones to a refurbishing house). But this is actually only happening a very small %.
- The phone has a unpaid bill, usually when you switch phone companies and you leave behind a bill even if its $0.01 the phone will get flagged, some phone companies if you spend a few minutes with them on the phone they will clear that off and will then activate the phone, if the bill is larger they do not that so easily.
- It is still on a active account, this does happen from time to time, a person will switch phone companies but will forget to cancel service for what ever reason but then donate the phone without realizing that someone else might run into a problem, usually customer service will not remove it from an account without the owner being on the phone, and being that this is something sellers don't know you will have to request an exchange or refund from the seller.
- They want you to buy a new phone from them so they will make money from selling you a new phone (they don't make money by switching your number to a phone you didn't buy from them) or they want to make sure the phones coming onto their system is with the latest technology. It is known that some companies will take all phones that is being sent back to them for whatever reason and they will add the ESN # to there system as a Bad ESN and they will sell it them self's to prepaid companies buying Bulk minutes from them, that way they can insure only new phones come onto their system, Sprint is well known to be doing this, and there maybe nothing wrong with the phone other then they want it to be new.
So in that case you have 2 options. 1, send the phone back to your supplier for an exchange or refund. 2, take the phone to another Cell phone carrier to get it activated, with this option the phone most be compatible with their system, for example if its a Sprint phone try Cricket, if its Verizon you can try Alltel (contact the service provider to see if the phone is compatible with them).
We want to make a very important point here, no reputable seller will intentionally sell you a phone that has a Bad ESN, there is no way of checking that before hand, bare that in mind before you leave your Feedback. 99.9% sellers will gladly resolve this problem with you as soon as you report it.
We welcome your comments on this review.
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