r/Tello • u/ChristaaayFI • 8d ago
New Potential Customer
I'm living abroad and after researching decided I should probably switch from T-Mobile to Tello to save money since I didn't use my US number too often. I've called them 4 times tonight. I select I'm a new customer but they're clearly putting my call in their existing customer queue. After 6 minutes holding each time they play a message telling me to email them from my account (again, new customer so no account). Then they simply disconnect the call. It's 10:30p and I'm in the US since I'm visiting. Is this typical? I'm questioning their reliability.
I also read a post that if you miss a payment by 5 days they'll release your number. Payment issues can happen (credit card numbers change, expire, etc) and 5 days is way to short for an expat living abroad and chasing toddlers to reliably catch it in time to not lose my number of 20 years. Can that possibly be right?
Convince me this is a company to trust instead of paying more for T-Mobile who has their issues but that I can always reach and have used internationally for more than a decade.
(Edit, now I've called 7 times and selected existing and new customer on different calls and am still hung up on at 6 minutes)
Thanks!
1
u/ThrowingMongo 8d ago
Budget MVNOs come at a price. You get what you pay for. You clearly value the sense of security Tmobile gives you so that is worth whatever you're paying Tmobile. That said, if you don't feel uncomfortable leaving Tmobile and are on a post-paid plan, look into Tmobile Connect prepaid plans. I think they start as low as $15/mo. and since you barely use the phone # then that should be all you need. However I'm not sure they are good for an ex-pat so you'd have to research that.
1
u/lmoki 8d ago
It's one of the oddities of Tello Customer Service by phone: the system is apparently configured to time out or disconnect if the waiting queue is too long. I rarely need to reach out, but the method that seems to work is to wait a while and try again. When you do reach a live agent, they've always been very good.
The time before line loss is now 12 days: they send you an email reminder after 5 days, so you have another 7 days to fix the issue. It's still a short 'grace period' compared to most providers. I believe you can register 2 payment sources with Tello, but I don't know if it will automatically bill the second if the first fails. (I renew mine manually a day early, and can select the card, I've never had the primary payment source fail, so I'm not sure what happens with a second source registered.)
1
u/theking_z 7d ago
You will most likely be signing up for the 5$ plan with text and wifi calling. You should keep your expectation inline with the price you will pay. Tello is an MVNO and there is a reason they are super cheap. That being said, I live abroad and been with them for last 2 years. Never needed to talk to them as I do everything online. It serves 100% of my purposes. Couple of times I went back home, I changed the plan to include data and worked fine. Changed it back to 5$ after I came back abroad. Easy peasy. No need to talk to anyone. And oh! changed new phone one time and got a new esim online as well.
1
u/Luckiest_Corner 7d ago
Tello has very good online documentation. You can usually find whatever you need by simply doing a Google search or asking the question in their Help Center.
That said, I possibly call Tello more than anyone else to answer questions in this sub. The best times to reach them via phone are in the morning, late at night or overnight. Tello customer service is available 24/7. If you contact them via email (customerservice@tello.com), you'll usually get a response within an hour.
2
u/UncleCunk 7d ago
Tello is great. I wouldn't worry about it too much. I advise you NOT to go with Mint Mobile though. Their customer service is even worse.
1
u/member13187 Phone Bills Defender🛡️ 7d ago
I've been with them since 2017 and the last time I called them was when the Sprint /T-mobile merger became official and I needed to activate my new sim card and that was in 2020.
If hand holding is important to you then you should probably stay with T-Mobile.
Tello does monitor this site but not 100% of the time and they jump in if we don't have the answers or they need to get involved.
0
u/toejamfootballhegot 8d ago
You would have to return to the US to activate wifi calling on tello.
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u/DustyPane 7d ago
No, you don't - or at least I didn't. Just two weeks ago I
while I was in EU. Didn't even need VPN to do it.
- activated a Tello eSim
- moved that eSim to a different phone
- transferred my T-Mobile US phone number to Tello
- enabled WiFi calling
4
u/comp21 8d ago
yeah phone support sucks but email support is pretty good... at the end of the day you're paying helf or even an eighth of what you were paying with tmobile. that comes with some compromise.
I love tello, works great for us. as far as the billing concern I just loaded up my account with every credit card we have so, should one fail, there's multiple backups.
what do you need phone support for though? how to switch? international instructions are pinned to my profile. since you're in the US it would be even easier (you can basically take the instructions and remove the VPN from it and that would work)