General Tips for New Customers

[ucjffj]

how does landline figure into all this? (ie calls made by you to a landline or received from landline). does location of landline matter?

[Belatra]

Originally posted by PreFknLude_SiR
One more question - As for text messenging, does TMO charge for oversea (mostly just HK) text messages?

My experience shows NO!
I have extra feature 300 text messages for $2.99 and I send and receive them to(from) Europe (Belarus, Norway). And I have never seen extra charges in my bill for those messages.

[mrdeucie]

Originally posted by Belatra
My experience shows NO!
I have extra feature 300 text messages for $2.99 and I send and receive them to(from) Europe (Belarus, Norway). And I have never seen extra charges in my bill for those messages.

Well as some of the other threads are showing they may have started charging $0.15 for international SMSing.

[virtualet]

you have free nights and weekends... you have a phone # in the eastern time zone, but you are currently in the central time zone... you make a call at 8:01pm central, 9:01pm eastern... is it free?

[Sfkn2]

Anyone with an unlocked phone on TMO service notice the free GPRS recently? I took off all the info for WAP/GPRS, but I can log onto the net just fine with my P800.

[mrdeucie]

Originally posted by virtualet
you have free nights and weekends... you have a phone # in the eastern time zone, but you are currently in the central time zone... you make a call at 8:01pm central, 9:01pm eastern... is it free?

I believe free nights and weekends start at 9 PM local time in whatever time zone you are in. Therefore it would not be free if you were in central time zone making a call at 8:01 PM regardless that your home time zone is already 9:00 PM.

[tms]

It's going to sound like a gripe, and I guess it is.

Seven-year SPCS user, on a killer retention plan. Got a stupid idea to move to TMo, and that was two weeks ago.

Nokia 3660. TZones sounded good, as did the functionality of the phone. Of course, the two work hand-in-hand.

So here it is, two weeks later, and T-Zones on my phone tells me I need to sign up for T-Zones. CS tells me I did. My T-Mobile tells me I did. T-Zones setting online tell me I need to sign up for T-Zones.

Ten or so calls to CS, and ten or so e-mails.

AGREED that CS phone on TMo is excellent. I get through in seconds. But what I hear makes no sense. I'm told "72 hours this will be addressed." 72 hours go by, and it is not.

I file a trouble ticket by phone, then learn by e-mail two days later that I need to file a trouble ticket.

I access TZones on my phone, and it does not work.

Co-workers, amazed at how cool my phone is, have purchased three identical ones this last week ALONE. All work. Mine does not.

I call CS, and am told something about "location" and "WAP deck firewalls." I look around here, and see all kinds of tips about different access points and CSD. I see all kinds of cool/covert/geek things to do with this phone and TMo.

But I also know I'm paying for TZones, and I'm not getting it.

Is this par for the course on TMobile?

Should I bail?

Should I go get another TMobile account, swap SIM's and be happy?

[jonazen]

tms -

I ran into this recently. Been a t-mobile user since they were Voicestream, having been burned before by half a dozen other carriers. T-Mobile is the only one I've EVER renewed.

Anyway - I had been using free WAP until they shut it off (Aug 1?), and then had to sign up for T-Zones. I went the through same frustrations that you're describing for the first few days.

The story I've heard is that they had a problem between their accounting software and their actual provisioning database. It seems that a process that *should* be automatic simply isn't. The end result being that some users, like you and I, have to wait until someone in their systems group can get to your pending request and manually key in the new provisioning information. Now - I don't know, for a fact, that this is correct, but it seemed to come from people who would know, and when I mentioned this to the T-Mobile tech support people, they paused and said that it was something "sort of " like that.

Anyway - it *did* take a few days, which it shouldn't, but they did fix it. They also were excellent about following up with me, making sure I was happy, and throwing in some extra credits on my account as an apology.

Now, with full provisioning, it's a great service and an excellent value. I've actually gotten into the habit of browing news and weather while I'm on the train on my way to work each morning. I also set up a separate email address just for use with the phone, and a few select people can reach me that way as well. Email works just fine through this setup.

All in all, it's a bit trying, but it *will* get fixed - shouldn't take more than a few days. And once they've got you in the right database, it works very well indeed.

It's a good service, and a great price. If you can, I'd suggest waiting a bit longer.

[rancidhooligan]

What a fantastic thread. Since I work in the wireless industry I know to ask many of these questions but having them posted here with T-Mobile-specific details is a god send. I would recommend anyone signing with T-Mobile (as I plan to do next month) read this thread. Glad it's stickied, well done ColdFlip. (Any updates in T-Mobile's policies would be greatly appreciated.)

[tvbdude]

question... If I get a national plan which includes free domestic long distance and no roaming charges, does that uses up your packaged minutes even though it is free? does family plans have free long distance and no roaming charges?

[mrdeucie]

The free domestic long distance does use up your package minutes, unless you have nights and weekends and make the call during those times. It is free from long distance charges but will still deduct from your bucket of minutes.

The Family Plans also have the free long distance.

[EPIC_TRUTH]

Originally posted by virtualet
you have free nights and weekends... you have a phone # in the eastern time zone, but you are currently in the central time zone... you make a call at 8:01pm central, 9:01pm eastern... is it free?

It's based on when the call starts in the time zone that you are at currently, 9 pm central time if you are in Texas, 9 pm eastern time if you are in Florida, etc.

[EPIC_TRUTH]

Originally posted by mrdeucie
I believe free nights and weekends start at 9 PM local time in whatever time zone you are in. Therefore it would not be free if you were in central time zone making a call at 8:01 PM regardless that your home time zone is already 9:00 PM.

Yep, you're right.

[outspan]

ColdFLIP -

You schooled this data boy good.. nice job

TMS -

Your problem is not unusual unfortunately.. There were about 3 and a half billion (or near) network trouble tickets opened for this problem after free WAP access was nixed. They (the netengs) are still addressing this on a ticket-by-ticket basis. The key is to follow up, follow up, follow up... :-\ Good luck!

[knownskillz]

for the people dont know about the family plan much, m2m free only to the two family line, but tmobile got glitch thinks every family plan user have the m2m free right now u get no charge but when they finds out they gonna take ur air time and if goes over they will extra charge you by .40/min......