Backup Assistant USELESS
SwitchingOver
Newbie

While travelling in another country last week, my phone was lost, not to be retrieved. I had been using backup assistant for two years to keep my contacts updated. When I returned home I checked online to see if my contacts were still there in my account. I felt relief to see them all there. I then got an unused replacement phone from my brother and went to the Verizon store to connect it to my account. When I returned to my account online my contacts were GONE. There was an error message on Backup Assistant saying I needed to register my new phone for the first time. This replacement phone does not have Get It Now which is needed to download the contacts. I thought at least I would be able to see my contacts online and print them out so I could type them into the new phone. But I cannot access them. After calling support they said the contacts were wiped clean when I registered the replacement phone and could not be retrieved anywhere. The agent tried registering a different phone, with the Get It Now feature enabled, to download my contacts but it did not work. Basically, if you lose or damage your phone THIS FEATURE IS USELESS! I am pursuing this with higher level customer support managers to see if there is no way to pull the data off their servers.

 

Word of CAUTION: if you lose your phone, print off your backed up contacts from your online account BEFORE you register a new phone, whether or not it has Get it now enabled, so you don't wind up like me. I'll be sending a lot of emails in the next few days to friends and colleagues to get phone numbers.

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Re: Backup Assistant USELESS
AStormUser
Contributor - Level 2

Switch,

 

Call customer service and ask to speak with Tech Support from a phone other than the cell phone you are having the issue with. Then ask them to open a trouble ticket to have the contacts restored. This can be done, it just might take a couple days and maybe a couple phone calls, but call and be calm and they should be able to help you.

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Re: Backup Assistant USELESS
lrando1
Contributor - Level 1

Backup assistance has always worked on my new phones.  Both when I have had to use a spare phone and also when I have upgraded to a new phone. It must have to do w/not having the Get it Now? Maybe when you registered this type of phone, the system deleted the contacts knowing you couldn't download them?????

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Re: Backup Assistant USELESS
awholeotherl0ve

This exact same thing happened with me. When I was at the Verizon store the girl said she was trying for a while to back up my contacts, but then wasn't able to, so she sent me home myself to try. And of course when I get home, and pull up Verizon, it says the same thing that I have to register. Even though 2 months ago when my phone broke I backed it up myself. If they knew this was a possibility why even bother having it if it doesn't work for some?

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