Phone Installment Plan - FYI

After CellNuvo failed to provide the funds within the promised date for the S9 we are looking to purchase, I wrote to find out the status. The following response was provided:

"We are finalizing a major update on our app and this update will be changing the phone installment program, until such time as we finalize the update we are holding all pending phone installments. While this new update is going to include a lot of user requested changes, including more ads and new ad partners, we are also forced to update our phone installment program, as a small portion of our users have abused certain portions of this program.

This new update will bring one big change that we think you’ll love - no more monthly limits!

We anticipate this update will be live soon.

Thanks for your patience as we launch this update."

I have asked for some extra clarifying questions as far as time tables since we all know CellNuvo updates can take a while and we are still waiting on an Apple app.

Needless to say, I am disappointed in this lack of transparency from when the order was placed and the decision to hold up any order placed prior to this communication.

So far, I am not excited about hearing about phone purchase changes.......

I'm also not excited to hear "soon"..... I understand it's sometimes the only timeline that can be offered, but discontinuing a major feature while waiting for "soon" to come is not encouraging.

You might want to hold off purchasing the S9 or S9+ unless you absolutely need the phone now, the S10 & S10 +, and one more S10 budget-minded model are due to release soon. When these new models are released, the S9 & S9+ will definitely be cheaper just like the S8 & S8 plus now. On Ebay, the S8 plus goes for around $275-$300!

Yep, that's why I am not too disappointed. Prices should go down and I would likely be able to get a better phone. I just hope their "soon" is truly that and not some indefinite hold up. Worst, that they end up like RingPlus. Anyway, this did not cost me anything and they have been paying our 7 cell lines, so no complaints there. In fact, their payments have been processing within 24 hours which has been super!

I've been banking money for 10 months toward a phone.

I'm going to be pretty irritated they prevent me from being able to purchase one.

I am there with you Chelle. If they stop that all together, I will be quite frustrated. I can work with a delay - a reasonable one - but the order should be honored as well as any orders placed prior to the communication.

Anyway, back to work and swiping!

Is your phone fully paid for? Are you only waiting for CN to issue the gift card?

I have not completed the purchase, as I am waiting on the gift card or for them to pay the order if they wish (they have the link to the item in question). I am expecting to pay a little out of pocket in the form of taxes.

Are we all to be punished for a few users?

Maybe instead of punishing us. Why not give us all total freedom?

To me this sounds like no more amazon. No more choice. I trully hope I am wrong

I sure did not appreciate the "for a few users" type of thing, now you are stuck waiting until we figure it out. I sure hope that we still have the Amazon option and that the gold is not lost / held hostage indefinitely.

Time will tell, as they indicate no more monthly limits. I am curious to see how that plays out since some users abused with limits in place. I will be content for now so long as they keep pay your phone bill. I did post this just in case there were others considering the phone installment and/or cashing out the funds for a phone. After all, it is nice to be in the know and not be surprised with these things.

Yes thanks tech-stitch. The redpocket annual plan option is also frozen too btw.

I do think that those with redemptions already confirmed in the system should get their payments when the 7-10 days has run its course. Surely that is a better cut off point. Especially those who waited even longer than 7-10 business days already!

I too am curious how this will all play out and how they will make no limits work. It doesn't sound promising. I for one was happy with the current system and hope they don't take away everything that was good with it just to remove the limits.

I've asked for more info and will post it if anything comes through.

I have to wonder how it was abused in the first place (I have only used it for monthly cell phone payments of $10 to redpocket, yes I know a year would have been cheaper, but that wasn't available initially). Especially if they are going to get rid of monthly limits in the "new" update, that sounds like it makes their money flow even more precarious and possibly exploitable?!

Need clarification....

I will be getting my new phone bill from Sprint soon, probably by tomorrow based on previous months. I usually make the payment through the CN app as soon as I get the bill which is always due on the 10th of the next month.

Will this have any bearing on making my payment and it's being sent on to Sprint before the 10th of next month? Or does this only concern phone purchases?

Agreed! I look forward to your update mmfacemm. As far as I know, this is impacting phone ours and the Annual plan purchase based on what was posted.

I can share they processed our monthly phone payments within 24 hours.

Edit:
I placed my order on 01/Feb/19 7:25 PM. That said, certainly 10 business days as required by them and the prior interactions with them within that same request. Let's see how long it takes.

I did a deposit for my red pocket 1-2 days ago and it showed up today on my red pocket account, so it might be just the purchases where you "bank" money for a bigger purchase.

So they need to update their website promptly

"Some of our subscribers have even earned enough for the latest iPhone in less than 1 month."

I really think Doom is on the way. If cellnuvo was going to continue with Amazon why would they hold all payments?

Why do they insist on punishing everyone for a few?

From my perspective I think cellnuvo has a way of pushing away their supporters.

The other thing that I dislike. Is they always hit you with bad news and then silence. What they should be doing is scrambling to explain exactly what's going to happen. Not silence.

Someone will say ,well there's no reason to panic until we get the news. My opinion we already got the news with the Halt of Amazon payments.

Many of us have stuck around with cellnuvo during their almost collapse. We deserve rewards not punishment IMHO.

Does anyone see a rainbow here?

As being one of the patiently waiting for an Amazon gift card, I just received an email from Cellnuvo:

"We are finalizing a major update on our app and this update will be changing the phone installment program, until such time as we finalize the update we are holding all pending phone installments. While this new update is going to include a lot of user requested changes, including more ads and new ad partners, we are also forced to update our phone installment program, as a small portion of our users have abused certain portions of this program.

This new update will bring one big change that we think you’ll love - no more monthly limits!

We anticipate this update will be live soon.

Thanks for your patience as we launch this update. Rest assured your order will be processed so you can purchase your device- we appreciate your patience in the meantime and will update as soon as possible. Thanks!"

I don't like the term "abuse" in this context. Unless some users broke into the system and stole Gold, they must be talking about some unintended consequences created by their own rules (?) Doesn't being paid for watching the same ad, each time, over and over again, fall into the same category?

I just recently received a response to my questions, so at least they are responding (within 24 hours).

They have apologized for the delay and explained that "When you received our message that it would be 7-10 business days on Feb. 4 we did not realize this developer update would interfere with our phone installment program."

That said, who knows how this is tracked on their database. They did further elaborate and stated "Please be assured that you definitely will be receiving your funds through Amazon as soon as we possibly can."

They also went on to add that the issue was escalated to see if resolution could be provided sooner but "unfortunately due to this update and it's interference with our phone installment/Red Pocket annual plan programs, we have to delay the order. We appreciate your patience and know that we are working to get this resolved as quickly as possible so you can get your device or plan."

All in all, it looks like there is hope unlike total silence. Sure, I am not happy regarding the hold up. Still, as long as they remain in business, honor their promise (my gold can be used as intended), and continue to pay my bill, I will be satisfied. After all, just like everyone else, I want them to succeed and improve.

Edit:
Those are some good questions. My guess is that some made new accounts to circumvent the 1 plan / device limit per year since they were lenient with the number of accounts. For our 7 lines, there are three of us with two accounts each (one for phone installments and one for bill payments). At least we have the piece of mind that we consulted this with them prior to going that route and they were ok with that. As far as ads, who knows how that works.

I heard the same that they will be processing amazon payments again once the update is rolled out. Apparently whatever they are doing with the update has disrupted their ability to make payments temporarily but we are assured that payments will resume again. It will still be as amazon egift cards. Support are not aware of any upcoming changes to the program other than monthly limits being lifted.

So apart from the delay it doesn't sound like anything bad is happening as far as we have been told. How long the delay will be is the big question.

Monthly payments towards your plans are not impacted and are being processed as normal. It is just the amazon ones that are delayed.