M C.

I thought I had finally found a pair of decent blue Levi's 560s since being discontinued by the manufacturer. I purchased one without prior knowledge of any incidents. It took them roughly five business days to ship.

To my surprise, when I opened the padded Priority Mail envelope, nothing but a faded black pair of jeans! Baffled as to why, I decided to see if anybody else encountered this same scenario. Seems like I'm not alone based on some of the reviews.

I contacted the company and explained the mishap. They let me send everything back with a prepaid label and a copied invoice. It was returned on a weekday morning.

Days went by without a refund. After waiting roughly seven of them, I composed an e-mail inquiring about the status. A response was written, instructing me to give them a tracking number, quantity, style, and size. They then went on to say it must be inspected. May I ask why? It's not as if I'm going to bother trying them on, let alone wear them out.

Well, after an additional week of complete silence, I followed-up before letting the payment issuer handle the transaction. Luckily, I was credited in a prompt manner. All of these events took place within a 30-day period.

What in the world is going on with Name-Brand-Jeans and mailing the wrong clothing? Are they colorblind? From what I gather, this isn't some one-off thing. I would've been content had they provided me with something lightly used in the right shade, but this was not the case.

The way they conduct business is highly questionable, regardless of whatever's stated in their Terms of Service.

I purchased a simple, basic toaster from AAFES. Upon opening, I noticed brown stains on the outer coating, as well as a burning smell while being used which never subsided. The appliance had been repackaged at one of their warehouses and resold. How they get away with sending used goods labeled as brand new, I'll never know.

The free shipping option with the Star Card isn't worth it.

I've had nothing but a horrible experience for one year after receiving Lifeline Assistance. Their phone was utterly useless.

The ZTE Quest N817 is absolute bottom of the barrel smartphone one could ever receive. It takes FOREVER to load. God forbid there's an emergency and it just so happens to be turned off, you're gonna have to wait a few minutes and pray it doesn't glitch when bringing up the keypad.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not expecting iPhone quality for something that's issued for free, but my goodness, can they at least manufacture something moderate? Maybe one that, you know, won't die after an hour of usage? I couldn't even play a simple game of solitaire without the battery draining continuously with airplane mode on.

And why limit the cap to 350 minutes/month? What does that come out to, roughly 6 hours of being able to talk every 30 days? What are they thinking? I couldn't even have a conversation with my own mother in that amount of time without being forced to pay for additional minutes that should be free! At least be a good sport and roll the unused minutes over. Give us a chance to build some of it up.

Whatever you do, do NOT purchase or receive one from a relative or friend. I was planning on replacing the hunk of junk they sent me and swap it with something that actually worked when I wanted it to. Wrong. Even though it was fully compatible as per their website (has to be Sprint CDMA), they still shot it down. I honestly think Assurance does it this way since they make a profit off of giving you their unreliable pieces of horse dung. Anyhow, this is where customer service (or lack thereof) comes in.

I called to see if the phone I was given could be transferred. They said in a very thick, heavy accent that no, the ONLY way you can swap it is if it's purchased off of THEIR website. They want YOU to PAY them if you don't like what you have. I told them absolutely not and disconnected the call. That completely defeats the entire dang purpose of being on Lifeline. So much for trying to make it a little better on my end.

When it came time to recertify, I dropped them like a hot potato. There's other services out there with much better phones. I went with somebody else and the phone they gave me was actually pretty decent with 1,000 minutes every month plus unlimited data! I couldn't believe I was stuck using Assurance's subpar communications device with annoying text reminders to place a call every 30 days.

As much as I hate being in the current financial situation that I'm in, I would rather have a landline than ever contemplate coming back to Assurance Wireless.