BigFlyer

I think I'm fair in posting this because on two recent trips Boingo Mobile did not work where it was supposed to and their support was a joke.

BTW, this is using the Iphone/Ipod Touch client.

First was a trip to Madrid earlier this year. It was supposed to work on two major networks, one of which was Telefonica which was all over Madrid, the second was in all of the Starbucks. Neither worked, I got the "not a Boingo Network" message.

Emailed customer service, took days for a response. The response made no sense, then I called them. No one was in the mobile department because ti was a 3-day weekend, and then I was home so it didn't matter. Finally spoke with someone on the phone when I got back tot the US (of course it was too late then), who confirmed that no one had logged in at the locations I had specified for quite some time. They credited me a month, but of course what I wanted was responsive customer service that would deal with the problem.

Recently was in Sydney. I got the same message "not a Boingo message" at various locations. Sent an email listing those locations, over 24 hours later telling me that there had been log-ins at the location (singular) and telling me to download the latest software.

Of course, I already had the latest software, installed, I responded telling them that, asking which location of the many I was talking about had a log-in, and inquiring as to whether the login was with the mobile product.

More than 24 hours later I received another response which didn't answer any of my questions, and telling me that I should call from the location as they could troubleshoot better. I had already told them it was expensive to make an overseas cell call from the location, and asked what troubleshooting they could do if I was at the location. They basically responded saying reinstall the software (which I had told them I had already done) and make sure my login info is entered correctly (I had already told them it worked at other locations so what I had entered was not an issue).

So, in summary (this is kind of long-winded). Boingo frequently does not work where they say it will. If you email customer service, they will take over a day to get back to you, and they will respond with non-helpful information. No matter what you tell them, they will assume that there is some problem with what you are doing, and no matter what you say they will not check out and see if the location is working. They will respond with fairly generic answers and not pay attention to what you actually said.

On the other hand, perhaps $7.95 per month is worth it for a 50/50 chance that you will be able to use their service (I am serious when I say that, it worked like a charm at AMS.)