Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

We live on our boat and travel country to country. I was excited at what this product can do, both for safety and for family contact. Unfortunately, the text feature works sometimes, but not others. This makes me wonder if it would work during an emergency. I've burned up my alloted texts just trying to see if it's functioning after my daughter did not get my Happy Birthday text. A buddy got my test text after that but his reply never came thru on my end. I called Garmin today and they said that it's working only occasionally because it has been over 2 months since I synced the unit to my laptop. I asked how often that needs to be done in order for the Explorer to function right, and they didn't know the answer to that. Hmmmm... They also refused to credit my account with 10 texts to make up for the test-texts that I have used up. I have synced it again, but have zero confidence in this unit or in Garmins support any longer. I hope it doesn't cost me or my wife our lives.