Cingular in Raleigh NC area oversubscribed?

mcp6453 wrote:

> xyzzy wrote:
>>
>>The fact is that Cingular is oversubscribed in this area (RDU, NC), as
>>evidenced by plenty of other respondees on this thread seeing the same
>>thing, and that's why I can only reach my wife's cingular phone about
>>half of the times that I try, even when she is in a good coverage area.
>> Buyer beware.
>
>
>
> We are experiencing the same issue with our several Cingular phones. If
> we did not have grandfathered free unlmited incoming calls, I'd dump
> them in a minute. If you complain, they deny the problem.

They routinely denied to me that they had a problem also. Did the tell
you too that no one else had complained about that? Last time I
complained they offered me more minutes -- big deal if you can't use 'em!

> I heard on the
> radio recently that Cingular has the lowest customer service ratings in
> the industry.

Worse than Sprint PCS? Now THAT'S an accomplishment.

Going today to get a new Verizon phone. If the 2-week trial shows it to
be as good as its reputation, it'll be worth it to buy out the Cingular
contract for $180 to get a service that works. It's kind of sad, I
signed up the first day they were available in our area, back in 1998
when it was BellSouth Mobility DCS and until recently it's always been
good and I recommended it to many people and went through many phone
upgrades. It's only tanked in the last 2-3 months, of course Murphy's
Law kicked in and it happened a few months after I signed a 2-year
contract to get a new phone cheap. I know, the contract was dumb, but
the service had been good for 5 years so figured I would not switch and
was fine with a contract. Who knew it would crap out right then.

---

› See More: Cingular in Raleigh NC area oversubscribed?

On Thu, 04 Mar 2004 15:58:51 -0500, xyzzy <[email protected]> wrote:



>Going today to get a new Verizon phone. If the 2-week trial shows it to
>be as good as its reputation, it'll be worth it to buy out the Cingular
>contract for $180 to get a service that works.

Interesting, I had AlTell and was quite happy with them especially
since their calling area [no roaming charges] included all the way to
DC area, down to Florida and west to most of Tennessee. Quit them
when their literature indicated they were going to electronic billing
....meaning your check was processed electronically and no canceled
check is ever received by the payor. This may be the "wave" of the
future, but, I'll opt out of it as long as possible. Since quitting
AlTell, I have had no cell fone account.

For some 20-30 years my LD carrier was AT&T, and about 8 months ago
they switched to electronic billing, with that I changed LD carriers.

Might consider getting another cell fone with some one, [was very
satisfied with AlTell], but none of the newspaper ads seem to show, IN
DETAIL, the calling area with any given plan. I know, most say
nation-wide LD, but, what areas EXACTLY can you call from WITHOUT any
roaming charges. This seems to be a well-kept secret in cellfone ads.

Ray H.

TCol <[email protected]> said:

> I had AlTell and was quite happy

I have Alltel and will quit them the day my one year contract is finished.
The coverage is very good and that is all that I can say that is positive.
The Motorola phone, T720, they gave is the worst junk I have ever used,
it's talk time is about 30 minutes and standby is barely 24 hours. They
overbilled me every month for the first six months. They cutoff my
voicemail 3 times and reset my voicemail several other times resulting in
lost messages. Alltel is horrible.

I used Suncom for 2.5 years in Wilson and they are the bomb, I highly
recommend them.
--
McQualude

McQualude wrote:

>> I had AlTell and was quite happy
>
> I have Alltel and will quit them the day my one year contract is finished.
> The coverage is very good and that is all that I can say that is positive.
> The Motorola phone, T720, they gave is the worst junk I have ever used,
> it's talk time is about 30 minutes and standby is barely 24 hours. They
> overbilled me every month for the first six months. They cutoff my
> voicemail 3 times and reset my voicemail several other times resulting in
> lost messages. Alltel is horrible.

I tell ya, I got a sweet deal for myself and my wife this past month with
Cingular. I got a Motorola V400 cell phone (digitial camera, MIDP 2.0 with
Wireless Messaging APIs and Mobile Media APIs) for $100 and my wife got a
new T720 (you may have one of the earlier models released that had some
bugs in the OS). In addition, I also have software to put new programs onto
the Motorola phones.

If your phone is quitting after 30 minutes of talking, you definitely need a
new battery. The T720 itself is a fairly decent phone (I use one for
testing and bought one for my wife, like I said above). I might have a
spare battery around if you'd like.

--
Darryl L. Pierce <[email protected]>
Visit the Infobahn Offramp - <http://mypage.org/mcpierce>
"What do you care what other people think, Mr. Feynman?"

On Fri, 05 Mar 2004 12:34:52 GMT, "Darryl L. Pierce"
<[email protected]> wrote:

>If your phone is quitting after 30 minutes of talking, you definitely need a
>new battery. The T720 itself is a fairly decent phone (I use one for
>testing and bought one for my wife, like I said above).

When i was with AlTell, I paid about $20 for a Motorola "Talkabout"
fone, model T2260 or T/2267. Seems to need re0-charge more than I
liked.

>I might have a spare battery around if you'd like.

I replaced the original batteries with same ones by Motorola...local
AlTell store wanted $30 for replacements [note, I only paid $20 for
the fone]. Checked the internet and got exact Motorola replacements
for a total of $9 plus some %4-$5 shipping.

Ray H.

> So, there are many cases where a fast busy condition could occur but you
can
> usually tell if it is a local ( on your cell phone ) fastbusy and remote
> fast busy as the fast busy will sound like a cell call for the trunk side
> ( which is rare nowadays as they will have recordings like "all circuits
> busy" )
> and the local one will be clear as it will be generated on your phone
itself
> when the cell site send you a "send fastbusy" via signal/sat channel.on
call
> setup.

Yes that is basically the general rule

Around here.
If you make an outgoing call, and it is blocked by the tower
because of lack of open channels to handle it,
you will hear a fast busy which is generated in the phone,
and it ties up not voice channels to produce.

It you make an outgoing call, and it is blocked by the local land line
carrier,
because the usage is outstripping the capacity of the land line carrier,
you will get a recorded message that tells you all circuits are busy.

If you get an incoming call, and the call is blocked by the tower,
because of lack of open channels to handle it,
the caller will hear one of these canned messages
"The mobile user you are calling can't be reached right now."
or
"The mobile user you are calling is out or range."
Or something to that effect.
Cingular likes using the term "mobile user" in their messages.

If you get an incoming call, and it is blocked by the local land line
carrier,
because the usage is outstripping the capacity of the land line carrier,
the caller will get the message that tells him all circuits are busy.

..............Edit..........

If you get an incoming call, and the call is blocked by the tower,
because of lack of open channels to handle it,
the caller will hear one of these canned messages
"The wireless customer you are calling is currently unavailable."
or
"The wireless customer you are calling can't be reached right now."
or
"The wireless customer you are calling is out or range."
Or something to that effect.
Cingular likes using the term "wireless customer" in their messages.
..
............................
There is another mobile phone company around here that uses
the term "mobile user" that I was getting it mixed up with.
I can't exactly remember which one it is though.

Darryl L. Pierce wrote:
> xyzzy wrote:
>
>
>>Going today to get a new Verizon phone. If the 2-week trial shows it to
>>be as good as its reputation, it'll be worth it to buy out the Cingular
>>contract for $180 to get a service that works. It's kind of sad, I
>>signed up the first day they were available in our area, back in 1998
>>when it was BellSouth Mobility DCS and until recently it's always been
>>good and I recommended it to many people and went through many phone
>>upgrades. It's only tanked in the last 2-3 months, of course Murphy's
>>Law kicked in and it happened a few months after I signed a 2-year
>>contract to get a new phone cheap. I know, the contract was dumb, but
>>the service had been good for 5 years so figured I would not switch and
>>was fine with a contract. Who knew it would crap out right then.
>
>
> I've been with Cingular the same as you, since 1998, but I don't have the
> problems you're describing. Maybe I just don't use my phone enough, but
> I've never had a time where I didn't get a connection when making a call.
>

You don't experience this particular problem. People who are trying to
call you experience it. Because that person is not likely to be a
Cingular customer or to even know who to call to complain, Cingular can
claim they haven't received any complaints. However my wife (who
carried the phone) gets plenty of complaints from people saying they
couldn't reach her on her cell phone because all circuits were always
busy, and I certainly noticed it when calling her.

McQualude <[email protected]> wrote in message news:<[email protected]>...
> TCol <[email protected]> said:
>
> > I had AlTell and was quite happy
>
> I have Alltel and will quit them the day my one year contract is finished.
> The coverage is very good and that is all that I can say that is positive.
> The Motorola phone, T720, they gave is the worst junk I have ever used,
> it's talk time is about 30 minutes and standby is barely 24 hours. They
> overbilled me every month for the first six months. They cutoff my
> voicemail 3 times and reset my voicemail several other times resulting in
> lost messages. Alltel is horrible.

I had a similar bad experience with Alltel. I had cell service thru
them and they called me to sell me their long distance service. They
said if I switched they'd give me 30 minutes a month of free long
distance, so I switched. Got my next phone bill and guess what, I had
received 0 minutes of free long distance. When I called them they
said, that's not what they had promised. They said they offered me 30
minutes of free cell phone calls a month. I switched to Verizon (360
at the time) the next day, and I've been satisfied ever since.

Ken Denny

"Darryl L. Pierce" <[email protected]> said:

> If your phone is quitting after 30 minutes of talking, you definitely
> need a new battery. The T720 itself is a fairly decent phone (I use
> one for testing and bought one for my wife, like I said above). I
> might have a spare battery around if you'd like.

Thanks for the offer. The phone has had poor battery life since day one. I
have worn my AC charger so that it no longer makes sufficient contact to
charge the phone and the mobile charger fits loosely in the socket. The
phone is only six months old.

FYI, Cingular ships the T720 with a long life battery (6.5 hrs talk time),
whereas Alltel ships with a cheap battery (90 minutes).
--
McQualude