Provider guide · Updated August 2026

Q Link Wireless Free Tablet: Read This First

You cannot get a free tablet from Q Link, and you should not try. The company pleaded guilty to conspiring to defraud the Lifeline program, and the FCC has suspended it from Lifeline and from every federal universal service support mechanism.

This is not a rumor or a bad review. It is a matter of federal record — a guilty plea in October 2024, a sentencing in July 2025, and a resolution totaling $110,637,057. If you were a Q Link customer, your benefit was moved for you and there is something specific you should check. That is below.

If you were a customer → Find a real provider

The short version

  • Suspended from Lifeline since November 2024
  • Company and CEO pleaded guilty, October 2024
  • $110.6 million criminal and civil resolution
  • Customers moved to Assurance Wireless, not StandUp

Every figure here comes from the DOJ, the FCC or the Federal Register.

What Actually Happened, With Dates

Searches for a Q Link Wireless free tablet and phone are still running at scale, and almost every page answering them was written before any of this and never updated. Here is the record.

  • October 15, 2024 — Q Link Wireless LLC and its chief executive Issa Asad pleaded guilty to conspiring to commit wire fraud and theft of government funds, and to defrauding the United States
  • November 8, 2024 — the FCC suspended Q Link from participation in Lifeline
  • November 22, 2024 — the FCC’s Wireline Competition Bureau issued an emergency order to keep affected subscribers connected
  • December 12, 2024 — the Federal Register published notice of suspension and the start of proposed debarment proceedings
  • July 24, 2025 — sentencing before U.S. District Judge Rodolfo A. Ruiz II
  • July 28, 2025 — a civil settlement was announced, bringing the global resolution to $110,637,057

What the conduct was. According to the Department of Justice, the scheme involved submitting false claims to the FCC’s Lifeline program for customers who were not actually using their phones — manufacturing cellphone activity and providing false and fabricated records to the agency, including for phones the FCC already had in its possession. Roughly $38.4 million in improper payments were received between February 2018 and October 2019 alone.

The scale is worth sitting with. The Federal Register notice records that Q Link received approximately $618.7 million from the Lifeline program between 2013 and 2019, with roughly 21 percent attributable to fraudulent claims. This is money from the Universal Service Fund — which is to say, from the small charge on every ordinary phone bill in the country. Where Lifeline money actually comes from →

The suspension is not narrow. The Federal Register notice states that Q Link “is prohibited from participating in or receiving any benefit associated with the Lifeline program as well as any other program funded by federal universal service support mechanisms.” If debarment follows, it runs for at least three years and can be extended.

If You Were a Q Link Customer

You did nothing wrong and you were not meant to lose service. The FCC took specific steps to keep people connected, and it is worth knowing exactly what they were, because a widely repeated version of this story is incorrect.

Your benefit went to Assurance Wireless, not StandUp Wireless. The FCC’s November 22, 2024 order temporarily waived certain Lifeline rules so that Assurance Wireless, a T-Mobile subsidiary, could take on Q Link’s former customers without a break in service. Several widely shared articles say the customers went to StandUp Wireless. The FCC’s own order says Assurance. Go with the order.

You were never locked in. The same order states that affected subscribers “may, however, opt-out of receiving service from Assurance by transferring their Lifeline benefit to another Lifeline provider in their area, or requesting to de-enroll from the program.” If Assurance does not suit you, moving your benefit is your right and costs nothing. Compare providers that ship tablets →

Two things worth checking today. First, that your benefit is actually active somewhere — if you stopped using a transferred line, the non-usage rules still apply and the order allowed 15-day cure notices to households with more than 30 days of non-usage. Second, that you know when your annual recertification falls, because a benefit you have forgotten about is the easiest one to lose. How to confirm where your benefit sits →

Was There Ever a Q Link Free Tablet and Phone?

This deserves a direct answer, because q link wireless free tablet and phone is the single most searched phrase in this cluster and the premise was never sound.

A free tablet and phone together was not possible for anyone, from any carrier. The Lifeline application states it plainly: you may only get one Lifeline benefit per household, not per person, and if you take it as phone service you can have one mobile or one home phone but not both. The combinations people remember paired Lifeline with the Affordable Connectivity Program — two separate benefits stacked — and ACP stopped funding in June 2024. What happened to ACP →

And Q Link’s own site does not offer a tablet. When we checked in August 2026 it was advertising a free unlimited talk, text and data phone plan and inviting new sign-ups — with no tablet anywhere on it. So the qlink free tablet pages filling the search results are describing a product that the company itself does not list, offered under a program the company is suspended from.

It is worth naming the phrasings, because the affiliate pages are built to catch all of them — qlink wireless free tablet, qlink free phone and tablet, free tablet with EBT qlink, and even a q link wireless free tablet and phone application form that leads nowhere. None of the wordings changes the position: the company is suspended from the program, and the program never allowed the phone-and-tablet pairing in the first place.

Which raises the more useful question. A live, professional-looking website is not evidence that an offer exists, and it is not evidence that a company is in good standing. The next section is how to check that for yourself, on any provider, in about two minutes.

How to Check Any Provider Yourself

This is the part worth keeping. It works on any carrier, takes minutes, and would have answered the Q Link question long before most websites did.

1 · Search the FCC

Search fcc.gov for the company name. Enforcement actions, notices of apparent liability, suspensions and debarments are all published there, in full.

2 · Search the DOJ

justice.gov publishes press releases for criminal resolutions. If a carrier’s executives have been charged, it will be there and it will be specific.

3 · Check the approved list

A Lifeline carrier must be a designated eligible telecommunications carrier in your state. If it is not on the approved companies list for your state, nothing else matters.

The lesson from this case is not that Lifeline is a scam. It is the opposite. The program’s own auditing caught the fraud, the FCC suspended the carrier, the Department of Justice prosecuted it, and the money is being recovered. The oversight worked. What failed was the layer of affiliate websites that spent years recommending the company and have still not updated their pages.

If you are reading a provider recommendation anywhere — including here — the question to ask is when it was last checked against a primary source, and whether the writer will tell you what they could not verify. How we check things →

You Cannot Get Free Tablet From Qlink. Here Is Where You Can

The benefit itself is real and still running. Q Link’s conduct did not change the program, the eligibility rules or the device offers available from carriers in good standing.

  • Qualify first. SNAP, Medicaid, SSI, Federal Public Housing Assistance or a Veterans Pension qualify your household automatically, as does income at or below 135% of the poverty guidelines
  • Get approved before you choose a carrier. Approval is not tied to any one company, so approval first keeps your options open — and makes a carrier’s collapse survivable
  • Pick from carriers that actually ship tablets. Most Lifeline carriers offer phones only; the ones bundling devices are a smaller group and differ on co-pay, data and warranty
  • Expect a small co-pay on a device, not a $0 tablet. A modest charge is normal and, under the old ACP rules, was actually required
Compare providers in good standing →

Q Link Questions

No. Q Link Wireless was suspended from the Lifeline program in November 2024 and is prohibited from participating in or receiving any benefit associated with Lifeline or any other program funded by federal universal service support mechanisms. Its own website does not list a tablet either. Any page telling you how to apply for a Q Link free tablet is describing something that does not exist.

The company and its chief executive Issa Asad pleaded guilty on October 15, 2024 to conspiring to commit wire fraud and theft of government funds and to defrauding the United States. According to the Department of Justice the scheme involved submitting false claims to the Lifeline program for customers who were not using their phones, including manufacturing cellphone activity and providing fabricated records to the FCC.

The global criminal and civil resolution totals $110,637,057. The Federal Register notice records that Q Link received approximately $618.7 million from Lifeline between 2013 and 2019, with roughly 21 percent attributable to fraudulent claims, and the Department of Justice cites about $38.4 million in improper payments between February 2018 and October 2019 alone.

To Assurance Wireless, a T-Mobile subsidiary. The FCC issued an emergency order on November 22, 2024 temporarily waiving certain Lifeline rules so Assurance could take on Q Link’s former subscribers without a break in service. Several widely shared articles say StandUp Wireless; the FCC’s own order says Assurance.

No. The FCC’s order explicitly says affected subscribers may opt out by transferring their Lifeline benefit to another provider in their area, or by requesting to de-enroll from the program. Moving your benefit costs nothing and is your decision.

Not as a Lifeline offer, and not from any carrier. Lifeline allows one benefit per household, not per person, and taking it as phone service means one mobile or one home phone but not both. The phone-plus-tablet combinations people remember stacked Lifeline with the Affordable Connectivity Program, and ACP stopped funding in June 2024.

It was when we checked in August 2026, still advertising a free unlimited talk, text and data plan and inviting new sign-ups. A live website is not evidence that an offer exists or that a company is in good standing, which is the single most useful thing to take away from this case.

No, and the case is arguably evidence of the opposite. The program’s auditing identified the fraud, the FCC suspended the carrier and moved subscribers to protect them, the Department of Justice prosecuted, and the money is being recovered. The oversight worked. What did not work was the layer of affiliate sites that recommended the company for years and still have not updated.

Search fcc.gov and justice.gov for the company name — enforcement actions, suspensions, debarments and criminal resolutions are all published in full. Then confirm the company is a designated eligible telecommunications carrier in your state, since Lifeline authorization is granted state by state and a carrier without it cannot serve you at all.

The Benefit Is Real. Start There.

One carrier’s conduct did not change your eligibility. Two questions, thirty seconds, nothing stored.

Check my eligibility →

Sources: the guilty pleas, the charges, the sentencing date, the $110,637,057 resolution and the description of the conduct come from the U.S. Department of Justice; the suspension, the quoted prohibition, the $618.7 million figure and the 21 percent attribution come from the Federal Register notice of suspension and proposed debarment published December 12, 2024; the transfer of subscribers to Assurance Wireless, the opt-out language and the cure-notice provision come from FCC order DA 24-1182, adopted November 22, 2024; the one-benefit-per-household and phone-or-internet rules from the Lifeline application form; ACP’s end date from the FCC. Q Link’s current website content was observed directly in August 2026.

Guilty pleas are convictions and are reported here as findings of fact, not allegations. Nothing on this page characterises the company beyond what those federal documents state. We hold no commercial relationship with Q Link or with any carrier named here, and we did not contact the company. Last updated August 2026 and reviewed quarterly — a suspension can be lifted and a debarment has an end date, so confirm the current position with the FCC before relying on this page. FreeTabletWithEBT.net is an independent resource and is not affiliated with any government agency, carrier, or program.