Well... I guess that is where you might be wrong. I don't know much about the ION, but if it is already"rooted" you wouldn't have to do anything for root access, so it looks as though it is not.
Besides, your statement is very contradictory, you were told it was already rooted, it just needed the root access. The two are one in the same, if you catch my drift. Rooting has become a catch phrase for attaining root access. Once a phone is "rooted" it has root access.