Trade-in Scam

As a new T-Mobile customer, I feel completely blindsided by their trade-in process. I traded in my iPhone 13 Mini for a brand-new iPhone 16 through customer care, all done online and over the phone. I was promised an $830 promotional credit, but instead, they claimed “water damage” on my trade-in and took away the promo, forcing me to pay for the new phone in full. To make matters worse, I didn’t even find out until after the 14-day return window had passed. They dragged their feet returning my device, and I didn’t get it back until three weeks later—too late to return the iPhone 16.

Now, my once-pristine iPhone 13 (they returned it with gouge marks on the charging port, a mystery to the manager at a local store) is basically worthless unless I upgrade to their most expensive 5G Next plan and trade it in “in any condition.” That would cost me $53 more a month just to salvage something from this nightmare.

I’ve spent hours on the phone and in chats trying to resolve this. Customer care even promised to manually apply the $830 credit because of my situation, and I have a screenshot to prove it. But they still refused to honor it.

Yesterday, I went to a T-Mobile store to get help in person. The manager and a very patient salesperson spent two hours fighting with me through customer care, but T-Mobile wouldn’t budge. There’s no recourse here. It’s your word against theirs, and even with proof, I have no leg to stand on.

I was told this offer was only available online, so I couldn’t bring my phone into a store to confirm its condition beforehand. If I could’ve done that, I would’ve never bought the new phone. This feels like a bait-and-switch, plain and simple.

T-Mobile has shown me zero loyalty as a new customer, and I’ve wasted so much time and energy trying to fix this. If anyone else has experienced something similar, contact me—this might need a class-action lawsuit to hold them accountable. Let’s get the conversation going. Customers deserve better.