Regardless of what entity provides the registration for the VoIP FP SIMs, everything you mentioned about the steps and complication involved in changing to the new voice-enabled SIMs seems spot-on to me. A good warning that this is not as simple as it looks! Definitely too complicated to try to do everyone simultaneously.
Thanks for the alternative lookup service: I'll have to play with that, especially since it's detailing info a little differently than freecarrierlookup. I did see Onvoy mentioned in a quick google search for Neutral Tandem, but didn't go very deep into reading about it.
Update:
So far, it continues to work and I even reactivated a $10 top up that I have had lingering for quite some time now. Speaking of the Top Up balance, has anyone had recent experience receiving the Top Up balance once the service is terminated? Thanks!
Back when they cancelled my Sprint hotspot plan, they changed their policy and no longer issued refunds on the top up balance. I did at least get them to transfer the balance to one of my AT&T SIMs. Don't know if this policy has changed since.
Our two ATT LTE FreedomPop free plans just renewed today. Same 200 minutes, 500 texts, 250 mb data. Made calls, sent text, using data. Fingers crossed it stays this way (Grandfathered).
I didn't have a phone capable of WiFI calling on AT&T: any practical use of the new free plan seems like it would be needed.
I found an AT&T Prepaid Radiant Core on clearance at Target for $15 , and It's supposed to have WiFI calling.
I don't have one of the new SIMs to test yet, though.
If anyone is interested, here's a link to see if your local Target might have this in stock, and current price.:
We've noticed some comments regarding the upgraded Freemium allotment being less than what was provided before. Well, in order to provide a sustainable service and improved customer experience, we've adjusted our plans and upgraded them to cellular voice. Our new Free Plan provides you with the best of both worlds.
Yes, this means no more use of the messaging app in order to call or text.
Feel free to reference our self-help guide regarding the upgraded Freemium Service or continue the conversation and we'll provide some further clarity.
Could you please drop the requirement to renew manually each month. For such a small allotment it is simply not worth the effort or stress to keep on top of this.
Also the automatic upgrade to 500mb for $8 if you run out of data should have an opt out for those who want to control costs. The old freedompop would have stealth charges like this where you got hit with a charge even if you didn't want it and no one likes it. I've accidently used up data before and I certainly don't want to accidently have to pay for the extra 500mb because I didn't notice my wifi was on the fritz.
I hope I haven't steered anyone in the wrong direction!
In researching the Radiant Core, I noticed that all the official descriptions seem to say it does have WiFi calling. I also saw several forum discussions started by folks who could not have WiFi calling working, and observed that the menu setting for it wasn't there.
I ran across this thread:
which seems to imply that the phone does have a setting for WiFi calling, but that the manual & AT&T tutorial is wrong about where that setting is in the menu. The original poster, who was frustrated by the lack of WiFi calling, seems to have responded positively at the end of that thread, but does not specifically say "it works now".
idanth, could you check the phone settings menu as suggested near the end of the linked thread, & see if the setting does appear?
I also noted this from the responder: "The earliest SIMs that supported those features have 27 or higher for the 9th and 10th digits of the ICCID. If those digits are 26 or lower, you need a new SIM."
I could probably check on the one I got: but I don't know if the setting will be visible on a phone that hasn't been activated.
Last message on that thread contains following words:
"The documentation may need updating on that phone. On most of the newer phones I've used the Wi-Fi Calling settings have moved to the Phone app settings instead of Network settings. These screenshots are from an LG Phoenix 4."
This is for LG Phoenix 4 and not for ATT Radiant Core. ATT Radiant Core does not have wi-fi calling option in Call Settings. It is possible that this option enabled only for AT&T Prepaid or Postpaid SIM cards (first generation of Wi-Fi Calling enabled phones supported it only on "parent" operator but not MVNOs).
Even more, I suspect that Premium Freedompop Wi-Fi calling (and texting) works only on iPhone.
@FreedomPop Thanks for dropping by! I will say the new updated plan is effectively good for an emergency phone. Still, one is bound to have billing surprises.
The minutes can easily be managed and the allotments are acceptable for quick calls.
Now, texts and data are a joke. With the amount of text spam received these days (even on a so called "clean line"), I don't see that lasting more than a few days for some. Just with this election, the number of unsolicited political messages skyrocketed (can't wait for that to be over and done with). Once you run out, then what? Top up for unsolicited texts or for that one individual that sent a group text and results in you getting the replies of everyone else? Yeah, probably the biggest joke of this plan. If you offer a hard cap, then acceptable.
As far as data, you try and go to a news website and within a minute or less, you'd blow through that due to the number of videos embedded and ads that load as part of the news article. Even with some serious data management, this is a cruel joke without a hard cap option.
PS, unlike Android which offers a number of options to significantly customize your data usage and even stop it, I have yet to find an option for IOS that effectively forces the data to stop, so folks, you'd have about a 99% risk a top up on iPhones for sure.
In summary, it sounds like a free plan the plan was offered because of a prior expectation however the offered option shows that the company has no interest in supporting a usable option for voice and data. I'd anticipate this would cause more trouble than what is worth - not to count the extra negative publicity / bad reputation. Proceed with caution!
PS.
For that $5.00 almost guaranteed top up, might as well go with Tello and have a much better experience along with allotments.
Sadly I think this is the end of my FreedomPop free SIM, which might be what they're hoping for. I got a lot of good use out of it, but for what my money is worth, I'll just pay a few dollars to another provider.
you can probably use the premium voice free plan with a glove compartment box emergency phone or as a home only wifi calling device, but not much else.
I'm also curious to know if FP will keep the annoying $.01/month charge when a line doesn't have any data use. If that's the case, I would also have to remember to play a few songs a month on Pandora via data. (Each song only uses about 2mb.)