Usage appearing on a new PM account and the phone hasn't even been turned on yet

[elpa]

I referred someone to publicmobile and they activated a new account this afternoon.  They selected a new phone number set up autopay and all seemed to go smoothly.  We logged into the main publicmobile dashboard and it appeared that a quarter of the allotted text messages under the plan have already been used.  We hadn't yet put the SIM into the phone or even turned it on.  How do I have this corrected ?

Also, when he tried to set up a community account to ask for help it would not let him register for an account so I had to log in and ask for help on his behalf.  It would be great if we could get a community account set up.

Thank you to any and all for your help!

elpa

[bigmouth2015]

When you create a Community account, make sure you use the same email account for the registration to gain Community rewards! PM uses the email address to tie your Community account to your PM account!

[elpa]

Absolutely, it would make more sense.  Thank you so much for all your help. 

We sent a private message to the Moderator Team for help on the texts.

Also, he was finally able to create a Community account today.  Turns out the issue was connected to the "I'm not a Robot" tick box and the version of Firefox he was using but the error dialogue was displaying yesterday.  Today it was showing we updated Firefox and all is good.

[srlawren · Accepted solution]

---

@elpa wrote:

I wonder why public mobile wouldn't automatically block this number.

---

@elpa because iCloud is a core Apple service that I would presume the vast majority of iPhone users probably enjoy using.  iMessage and iCloud are two of the selling features of an iPhone for many customers.

EDIT the better question might be "I wonder why PM doesn't whitelist this number so these inadvertent messages don't count toward $10 customers' 50 message count?".  I suspect they probably aren't allowed to zero it out for net neutrality reasons.  Or, it's expensive to implement and they can't be bothered.  Either is possible.

[angeliquem]

---

@elpa wrote:

Its the $10 plan so every text message counts.  He just wanted to try out public mobile service.

---

Oh no! As others have said, the best thing to do is get in touch with a moderator through private message and include all the necessary information like account number, phone number, and PIN. I hope this doesn't drive him away from public mobile! It's defintely worth it!

[elpa]

Its the $10 plan so every text message counts.  He just wanted to try out public mobile service.

[angeliquem]

---

@elpa wrote:

I referred someone to publicmobile and they activated a new account this afternoon.  They selected a new phone number set up autopay and all seemed to go smoothly.  We logged into the main publicmobile dashboard and it appeared that a quarter of the allotted text messages under the plan have already been used.  We hadn't yet put the SIM into the phone or even turned it on.  How do I have this corrected ?

Also, when he tried to set up a community account to ask for help it would not let him register for an account so I had to log in and ask for help on his behalf.  It would be great if we could get a community account set up.

Thank you to any and all for your help!

elpa

---

I'm curious as to what plan your friend is on? Unless you're on the $10 basic plan, you should have unlimited text messaging. 

[Anonymous]

---

@elpa wrote:

It's an iPhone.  I think you are on the right track.  I just thought to check usage details and its texting to destination# 474663.  I searched the Community posts and sure enough this has happened to others.

https://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/Discussions/outgoing-messages-to-474663/td-p/66707/pa...

I've disabled iCloud and will block the number.  I hope the moderators will help with resetting usage.  I wonder why public mobile wouldn't automatically block this number.

---

Because it's a phone specific service. Not their problem.

Are you on the $10 plan?

[elpa]

It's an iPhone.  I think you are on the right track.  I just thought to check usage details and its texting to destination# 474663.  I searched the Community posts and sure enough this has happened to others.

https://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/Discussions/outgoing-messages-to-474663/td-p/66707/pa...

I've disabled iCloud and will block the number.  I hope the moderators will help with resetting usage.  I wonder why public mobile wouldn't automatically block this number.

[Anonymous]

---

@elpa wrote:

It's an iPhone.  I put the SIM in and started up the phone.  There are no outgoing messages and the public mobile dashboard usage hasn't updated.  I really thought this might be the solution.  It was a great idea but no luck.

---

It was worth a shot I guess.

Would you be willing to post a screenshot of the Overview page? Blank out personal info of course.

The mystery is why, before anything was inserted and turned on, that there appeared to be some consumption. Weird.

Although now your iphone may have shoved a bunch of texts and/or mms up to its little sandbox.

As srlawren mentioned, you'll need to contact the mods and explain the mystery to them and maybe they'll reset things back to scratch.

[elpa]

It's an iPhone.  I put the SIM in and started up the phone.  There are no outgoing messages and the public mobile dashboard usage hasn't updated.  I really thought this might be the solution.  It was a great idea but no luck.

[Anonymous]

---

@elpa wrote:

I referred someone to publicmobile and they activated a new account this afternoon.  They selected a new phone number set up autopay and all seemed to go smoothly.  We logged into the main publicmobile dashboard and it appeared that a quarter of the allotted text messages under the plan have already been used.  We hadn't yet put the SIM into the phone or even turned it on.  How do I have this corrected ?

Also, when he tried to set up a community account to ask for help it would not let him register for an account so I had to log in and ask for help on his behalf.  It would be great if we could get a community account set up.

Thank you to any and all for your help!

elpa

---

So what happens if you put the SIM in and start it up? Might it be some junk spurious data in self-serve because nothing is connected to it. Maybe upon seeing the SIM on the network it'll say "oh there you are here you go new blank account".

Maybe.

[srlawren]

---

@elpa wrote:

Its a new phone and there are no outgoing messages. 

---

@elpa is it an iPhone?  If so, iCloud may be sending set up messages behind the scenes.  Fortunately, it will eventually stop, but will use up some of the messages.  You can reach out to the moderator team via private message to ask if they can credit you back the messages.  Details here:  https://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/Knowledge-Base/How-to-Get-Help/ta-p/251745

If not iPhone, is it in a Google Pixel (any variety of Pixel) Nexus (any variety of Nexus), or Essential PH-1?  If so, it may be Google's dialer app.  Try revoking the SMS permission from the dialer app.

[elpa]

Its a new phone and there are no outgoing messages. 

[elpa]

He has never had a public mobile account and never signed up for any services with the email address he is using.

[will13am]

@elpa, is it possible that the email being used to sign up the community account has been previously used.  It's the only reason I can think of that might glitch.  Otherwise there really isn't much that can reject an account setup. 

With respect to SMS used before the SIM card is inserted into the phone for first use, that's a difficult one to explain.  There has been many reports from iPhone users that in first use, sync functions chew up quite a number of text messages.