Hey guys, a family member of mine is having issues with Safelink that I want to document just in case someone else down the line has similar troubles.

For its relevance, they were using Safelink for years, at least as far back as 2014 or 2012. This was one of the little Obamaphones that was not a smartphone. It had airtime on it and was used up until 2022 when they phased service on such phones out. I helped them receive a free smartphone instead, and it worked just fine once we got everything transferred.

At some point Safelink took it upon itself to cancel this service, likely because another provider was using the Lifeline benefits. We were not aware of the particular workings of this sphere of things, so it was unavoidable. This happened in 2022. For that time until this month the safelink smartphone they received went unused.

However we cancelled that plan with the other service provider recently, and that is another story entirely. I can explain it in detail for relevance, but for brevity's sake the other service was cancelled and we returned to Safelink. They were a steady and reliable service for years.

I made sure my family member still qualified for Lifeline, which they do. A new sim card was needed, so we bought one and swapped the old one out. At which point we activated it and got a new phone number, and restarted the service.

So where is the trouble here?

Well, that would be that the service has been deactivated four times now.

After a couple of days, every time without fail so far, upon trying to make a call there will be a message saying that either the phone service has been deactivated, or it will oddly route us to StraightTalk. The SIM status reads as disconnected, but the service state is still in service and the IMS is registered. Two of these instances claimed that the airtime, minutes, what have you, had been exhausted, which is patently false as the phone couldn't have been used that much in the time it was activated.

So, four times now, I've struggled to call Safelink, and I say struggled because it's quite the headache getting the right number to call Safelink, to get this settled. And four times the problem has repeated. I have had the account notated with these problems and the most recent time I was told the issue at hand was that my family member's Lifeline application ID was incorrectly appended to the Safelink account, causing the disconnection and assumption that it would be necessary to buy more minutes for the phone.

Specifically I was told that my family member no longer qualified for Lifeline, which was provably incorrect, at which point it was found that the application ID had not been entered correctly.

I was told that the problem was fixed and it wouldn't happen again, and yet here we are.

In short, Safelink, before its acquisition by Verizon at least, had been a reliable service for many years for my family, airtime phones notwithstanding. However now in the space of a month the service has been disconnected four times without cause or resolution despite my best efforts to reinstate it, and correcting the seemingly primary reason, an incorrectly applied Lifeline Benefits ID, is still not solving this issue. My family member is still qualified for Lifeline, the application is still active. The SIM card is new. Safelink just refuses to supply the service.

If I manage to find a way to correct this issue, I'll make sure to update this post. If anyone else has had this issue or knows how to solve it, please tell me. I have implicitly mentioned this issue to the representatives I have spokemn with and while they were kind and seemed to understand, their efforts have not helped thus far, even with a standing notation on the account (if such a thing actually exists, I don't really know).

Edit: Furthermore, attempting to find my family member's service on the Safelink Wireless website by providing the phone number and other info, it says enrollment not found. However, fortunately I have the enrollment number for the phone, which shows that the phone is still active and approved. It even shows the old phone number from over a decade ago now.

The new phone that I just set up last month cannot be found by entering its phone number alone on the website. Absolute headache.

Edit 2: After a late night attempt to chat over the internet failed and told me to contact the enrollment department, who then routed me to the lifeline department, I was able to once again get the service for my phone reinstated. For how long I don't know, but I was told that the enrollment ID (for the phone or for Lifeline, I am unsure) was not the right one for the account. That has since been, apparently, corrected. As well, several checks were made as to the status of service in my area, the compatibility of the phone with the service, and the current status of my family member's Lifeline benefits (which are still, of course, active).

So once again I've gotten service back on the phone. Let's hope this will be lucky number five.

Ive been on the lifeline plan for the past 6 months. I used a BYOP plan (a Tmobile locked samsung galaxy note 9) and they sent me a tmobile sim. I activated it and it's been working perfectly. Im currently dealing with a looming eviction so I added my ACP credit to the plan because it has unlimited talking minutes and I need to be in contact with friends/family when im homeless. I applied last sunday on the website just fine. It approved it and then monday morning I was fully enrolled but my phone just stopped working. No data, no text no phone service. Every text I send is met with "message blocking enabled" unless it's to their own support number.

I get hold of safelink via my phone and they tell me my sim card is no longer supported and I need to go to a partner store and buy a Tracfone branded sim card that was Verizon enabled. (at this point it's important to note I didnt realize my phone was locked to t-mobile)

I walk miles to my nearest walmart and buy a tracfone sim. I get home and put it in my phone. It says "invalid sim" so I think okay I just have to call and have them activate it before it works. I do that and they transfer my number to the new tracfone verizon sim. This deactivates my old sim. I put the new sim back in and it still says invalid sim and now i cant call customer service anymore or get confirmation texts from customer service.

Now at this point you are probably thinking "Well you should have known your phone was locked to tmobile dumbass!" and You are right. I go to the library to get in touch with T-mobile They get my imei number and unlock my phone. I run the tmobile unlock app and everything is good...or so i thought. My service still doesnt work. So I spend the next 3 days trying to deal with their awful customer service (which is now only able to be accessed via their chat since i have no phone service) that always does the exact same thing over and over. Often it doesnt even seem like they are paying attention. theres a 70% chance they just abandon the chat and the other 30% of the time it's just "take out the sim and put it back in" They tell me my sim is provisioned correctly and my phone and sim card are both compatible but still no luck.

Eventually i had a friend take me to a different store where I bought a new sim thinking maybe mine is defective. I buy it and go to their text chat to activate but guess what. The only way to activate it is to confirm with them via text from the phone number that I cannot access! I ask if they can send it to me via email or a VoIp program like google voice and they refuse because "They cant beak the rules" So now im just shit out of luck with troubleshooting it with that.

As far as researching online to see if i can fix it myself. Ive found some APN settings that seemingly get my data working but it only works for a few minutes before cutting off and I have no way to text or make calls which means after 30 days my service will get shut off. Ive tried different combinations of APN settings but none seem to fix it and none of them allow calls or messaging.

All i wanted was more minutes to help keep me safe and in contact when im homeless and I was rewarded with a total lockout of my service. Ive even tried going on their website to request one of their free phones but the website freezes when it asks for my number and enrollment info.

I know from looking through other posts from this sub that this is a common sentiment but avoid Safelink like the plague.

UPDATE: Thanks for all the kind advice. I went ahead and flashed the firmware to U1 firmware and it all instantly started working as soon as my phone rebooted!

Essentially, Safelink phones and the original SIM card it came with are attached for the life of the phone. DO NOT remove the SIM under any circumstance, even if you have another phone that is unlocked that you would like to use the service with.

This took 3+ hours troubleshooting with multiple CS reps, and then finally a technical supervisor to get my phone back to its working order.

Save yourself the hassle.