is the "Points" system a complete scam?

[BytheBay]

I work at a school board that has been hacked, so I've been burning through me own data in order to find info for students. (There are no books in schools anymore. Without the internet instructors are hogtied.) I realized I had lots of points so last night I used them for enough data to tide me over until the wifi is restored (hopefully) on Monday.
No data was ever added to my account.

It's a PD day, so no students, but I am now unable to do any work and will have to sit here for the 4.5 hours staring at the walls because the principal refuses to let us work from home. 

I see Public Mobile took the points, but provided no service, so what is this scam with points. Is it just a fake "perk" to make up for the real dollar value perks they took away?

[Aaronkligerman]

Were you able to find another service provider that has similar service and price points, but offers more rewards to its customers and is easier to navigate?

I don’t like the new points system, I used to have automatic deductions under the old system for things like automatic pay and years of loyalty, and I was paying 31 and change a month, with deductions being applied automatically.  This new system offers 1.7 points per month, so it’s a terrible reward in comparison to the 3 or more dollars I was saving every month, with no work required on my part. Now i have to do the work to access and apply my rewards.  Curious your thoughts and experience. 

[BytheBay]

It may be the "bare bones" nature of the service, but I didn't like the claw-back of the previous sytem, and I think there website is extremely complex to navigate. I have friends that have given up completely and moved on to other providers because they can't figure out how to get into the community to ask a question (Why can't it be accessed directly straight from the sign-in page.), or contact a CS rep (Hard to find unless you can get in the Community and find a post that shared the link.).  I've built websites for provate colleges and social service agencies and I agree with them. The PM site is not user-friendly.

And the fact that someone mentioned that people often buy unwanted add-ons by mistake is a bit of a red flag. Is it an accident that the web site is so convoluted, or a planned way to collect a little extra cash? I have no idea, but I'm a little fed up with trying to deal with it.

[BytheBay]

No. Unfortunately not. I'm on autopay and PM has no trouble taking my money and messaging me about it - So everything is running smoothly from their point of view. 😊

[Ariyel_Rayne]

May have been a technical issue. Your phone also has to be on a current subscription to work

[hTideGnow]

but @BytheBay . even the points system is not as good as the legacy, you cannot say it is a scam.  It isn't.  Just a rewards that is in a slower pace, but it is still better than those without

[BytheBay]

I was already in contact with a service agent. (I know I did NOT buy roaming, because roaming doesn't come in a $15 package, soooo) Honestly, this is just way too time-consuming. I'm sure it's great for some people but I liked it better before. Really good value for many years. Now it's just a bunch of silly hoops to jump through. Not my cup of tea at all.

[hTideGnow]

hi @BytheBay 

i can only think you might have redeem or bought the wrong addon, but we can't comment unless you can provide us more details.  That one you post is just what you can choose, but not exactly what you got

• Can you login to My Rewards site, go to Transaction, take a screenshot and post that here
• also go to My Account site, go to Transaction page and take a screenshot and post that as well

or you can discuss that with PM support agent and I am pretty sure they can explain what happened and make it right again.  Submit a ticket with CS Agent using Chatbot here:
https://widget.telus.tiia.ai/publicmobile/publicmobile.html
Type the question "Submit ticket", Then click the following in order: "Contact Us" , "Other", "Log In".
If any issue with ticket submission, you can submit ticket by direct message:
https://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/notes/composepage/note-to-user-id/22437

Remember CS_agent will reply to your Community inbox within 2 to 4 hours, please check your inbox here:
https://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/notes/privatenotespage

[BytheBay]

No. I'm pretty sure it IS a scam. I liked it fine when I just got the discounts for paying by credit card, loyalty, etc.

Last month I purchased data and the next day they charged me for roaming. Please explain to me how I would get that this is for roaming? (I took a screen shot what I bought just in case, and the invoice says data, not roaming.) Moving to get an annual plan from a competitor with more flexibility for less cost.

[EA4]

Nope! I've used it multiple times to gain free vouchers and pay for alot of my months so far! Great program.

[slusagm]

which school board is that?

add: this?

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/gta-school-boards-data-breach-1.7426480

[BytheBay]

That was the problem. The website does not indicate that it is a two-part process, so I redeemed the points, got a message saying I was good to go, and assumed I was good to go....Not good to go "to the next step".
When I did both steps it seemed to work, but then they put the charge on my credit card the next day. So I lost the points and had to pay.

[BytheBay]

The entire school board was hacked. It  was a professional ransom attack. (It was so bad that every employee has been given 2 years of paid credit protection by the Board)  is no WiFi, no access to Google, nothing. I work with newcomer teens as an ELL instructor and I have no translators for my class - Just me running around with my cell , switching between Arabic, Turkish, mandarin, Kinyarwand...Crazy stuff.  It's been like this for weeks now. 

[slusagm]

no scam.  I redeem $15 bill credit all the time and works well

reboot your phone and check again

check your phone outside the school.  I notice schools has some wireless blocker and blocked data and voice 

and why don't you use school wifi for teachers?

[golfball]

It's possible your account is showing old information and not yet updated. Also make sure you didn't purchase US Roaming data by mistake as it will NOT work in Canada. Several others have done that unintentionally.

[Meow]

Points are not a scam. When you collect enough you have to manually convert them to dollars and then purchase  add-on or apply to your bill.

Funds are shown in 'available funds' and will be used from that account.
If you purchased any add-on, restart your phone and check your account. Add-on should be there.

[ORNGNBLK]

@BytheBay  if you purchased data yesterday, sometimes it takes 24 hours for add-ons to be activated. Sorry to say.  The points are not a scam.  If you would like to follow up with PM, you can send a PM now and perhaps they can unlock your data purchase sooner.  use this link to start the chat. Hope this helps. https://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/notes/composepage/note-to-user-id/22437