Are there Cingular pre-paid SIMs out there?

"Shaolin Superfly" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "Joel Kolstad" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> "Shaolin Superfly" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>> news:[email protected]...
>> > Have you tried walking into a store???
>>
>> No, for the following reasons:
>>
>> -- There isn't a 'real' Cingular store all that close to me
>> -- Do you REALLY think those kids at the carts at the mall selling
> Cingular
>> phones typically know what an unlocked GSM phone is? That they'll sell
> you
>> a SIM for some phone they've never seen before? That they even have SIMs
> to
>> sell you? I wouldn't be on it.
>
>
> Who said anything about a mall kiosk? When did this post become about
> unlocking phones? I thought you wanted a SIM for a KIC account, am I
> wrong?

You're correct, but what I'm saying is that, since there isn't a Cingular
store near me, how exactly would I 'walk into a Cingular store and ask?' I
was suggesting that the closest alternative I could come up with would be
asking at a Cingular mall kiosk, and such a tact doesn't strike me as
promising.

> I sure sell alot of phones in my fantasy world, answering questions for
> fantasy people, in my fantasy Cingualr store.

You may have a very good Cingular store in your area, but I don't. We don't
all live next door to you -- and judging from your attitude, I think this is
a Good Thing.

---Joel

---

› See More: Are there Cingular pre-paid SIMs out there?

"Shaolin Superfly" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> We sell KIC prepaid cards/SIMs in EVERY Cingular owned store whether
> orange
> or blue.

But I bet they're a lot spendier than going the eBay route, right?

Another good reason to post to Usenet -- learn of options a Cingular store
wouldn't have even mentioned.

---Joel

"Shaolin Superfly" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
<snip>
> We sell KIC prepaid cards/SIMs in EVERY Cingular owned store whether
orange
> or blue.
>
> HTH
>
> --
> SS
>
>
No HTH or Shaolin Superfly at the company owned store in Trusville Alabama.
They are very busy selling Razors for $500 no insurance available, maybe
have insurance in March. If you leave your name and number they may call you
back (205)-655-0089. No SIMS but if you buy a phone ($69.95 + tax ) it comes
with a sim and you can sell the phone on ebay. Or you can order online free
shipping.

[POSTED TO alt.cellular.cingular - REPLY ON USENET PLEASE]

In <[email protected]> on Thu, 06 Jan
2005 14:05:06 GMT, Jack "Chicken Little" Zwick <[email protected]> wrote:

>Exactly what I have been chirping about after Cingular claimed that all
>AT&T Wireless stores had been fully ocnverted over to be Cingular stores
>on November 15. 8 weeks later, it still hasn't happened. Doesn anyone in
>Atlanta know - or care?

Nobody cares but you.

--
Best regards,
John Navas <http://navasgrp.home.att.net/>

"A little learning is a dangerous thing." [Alexander Pope]
"It is better to sit in silence and appear ignorant,
than to open your mouth and remove all doubt." [Mark Twain]

Never thought I would add to such a passionate thread.

Here in Pennsylvania we have "real" Cingular stores and "real" what
used to be AT&T Wireless stores. Here, both varieties of stores give
to you, at no cost, a GSM SIM card when you purchase a $20 (or the
denomination of your choice) prepaid card. While in the store, they
also obtain a local telephone number for you and add the $20 (or
whatever amount you selected) credit to the account/local telepone
number they just obtained. Thereafter, if you choose, you may go to
the www.kiconline.net Web site to purchase additional time.

Since you wish to avoid a mall kiosk, and don't have "real" Cingular
stores there, do you have what used to be AT&T Wireless stores? If
so, if they are like the stores here, they have the Cingular KIC Kit,
which includes the free SIM Card, and they also can sell you the
prepaid card, and setup a local number in one transaction.

Good luck!

On Wed, 5 Jan 2005 14:27:55 -0800, "Joel Kolstad"
<[email protected]> wrote:

><[email protected]> wrote in message
>news:[email protected]...
>> Sorry, meant ...
>>
>> www.kiconline.net
>
>Thanks for the response. There isn't much to that web site if you're not
>already a customer, though! In particular, I don't see anywhere where
>they'll sell you a SIM card???
>
>---Joel
>

[POSTED TO alt.cellular.cingular - REPLY ON USENET PLEASE]

In <[email protected]> on Thu, 6 Jan 2005 09:09:41 -0800,
"Joel Kolstad" <[email protected]> wrote:

>-- Do you REALLY think those kids at the carts at the mall selling Cingular
>phones typically know what an unlocked GSM phone is? That they'll sell you
>a SIM for some phone they've never seen before? That they even have SIMs to
>sell you? I wouldn't be on it.

I think you'd be surprised -- kids tend to be much more clueful about these
things than adults, my 14-year old daughter being a case in point.

--
Best regards, HELP FOR CINGULAR GSM & SONY ERICSSON PHONES:
John Navas <http://navasgrp.home.att.net/#Cingular>

Thanks for the advice, Mr. No One. I'll check out the options you
suggested.

My pleasure.

One last thing. If the representatives there are like those here,
they don't care what type, i.e., manufacturer, model, etc., into which
you will be placing the SIM Card. There is a field in their database
for an IME (or some acronym similar to this) that they need to provide
to identify the device. However, the representatives here indicated
that while it is a required field, Cingular's database/network will
accept any valid number. You may wish to look at your handset for
this number and take it with you so that you may provide it.

On Thu, 6 Jan 2005 13:20:21 -0800, "Joel Kolstad"
<[email protected]> wrote:

>Thanks for the advice, Mr. No One. I'll check out the options you
>suggested.
>

Per [email protected]:
>While in the store, they
>also obtain a local telephone number for you and add the $20 (or
>whatever amount you selected) credit to the account/local telepone
>number they just obtained. Thereafter, if you choose, you may go to
>the www.kiconline.net Web site to purchase additional time.

How long does it take for the prepaid to expire? I've got 4 phones on an old
family account and if I could switch 2 of them to prepaid (they're just carried
by other family member technophobes "only for emergencies"...i.e. they're never
used....) I'd be able to ditch the current account and move to a GSM account.

Things attractive about a single-phone GSM account:

- I can get a PDF/Phone
- I suspect the monthly charge for low minutes but no roaming charges could be
less than the nominal $45/actual $60 I'm paying now.

Comments from those in the know?
--
PeteCresswell

> How long does it take for the prepaid to expire?

$10 card, 30 days; $20 and higher cards, 90 days

Balance rollover if before expiration.
Unused account balance is forfeited at expiration date.
KIC accounts will be canceled 60 days after expiration.

"Stanley Reynolds" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "Shaolin Superfly" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> <snip>
> > We sell KIC prepaid cards/SIMs in EVERY Cingular owned store whether
> orange
> > or blue.
> >
> > HTH
> >
> > --
> > SS
> >
> >
> No HTH or Shaolin Superfly at the company owned store in Trusville
Alabama.
> They are very busy selling Razors for $500 no insurance available, maybe
> have insurance in March. If you leave your name and number they may call
you
> back (205)-655-0089. No SIMS but if you buy a phone ($69.95 + tax ) it
comes
> with a sim and you can sell the phone on ebay. Or you can order online
free
> shipping.

The reason they are so busy selling things is because they are COMMISSIONED
salespeople. Since it's Alabama they baby momma need the benjamins. Werd.

HTH

--
SS
p.s. HTH means Hope This Helps.

Cingular Take Charge lies without shame in their promos and brochures,
and they have trained their personnel to repeat the lies, that late
evenings and weekends are "free minutes". No wonder all you others are
angered by your relations with Cingular customer service.

Without the lies, Take Charge would be a little better than most
prepaid plans in that one pays on average about 13 cents a minute
rather than 25 cents a minute, which is what most companies charge for
prepaid unless you have a very special deal.

Why Cingular [have they outsourced Take Charge to a subcontractor who
has no qualms about ethics?] makes these preposterous claims and offers
is simply surprising, but it is in essence ILLEGAL, and deserves a
class action lawsuit.

What you get when you pay for Take Charge is a debit on your checking
account monthly, for $29.99 or $39.99 or $49.99 [plus about 12 percent
federally mandated taxes], which is easier than inserting a prepaid
chip into your cell phone, you can purchase online with your debit card
for Take Charge.

But in effect it is no more than a $50 or $40 or $30 prepaid card, that
debits your card amount around $13 to $15 cents per minute, and then
you are out of funds and service.

There are no free night and weekend minutes, Cingular is pathologically
insincere in offering this to foolish consumers, and they did it to
outcompete the other prepaid suppliers who have not yet resorted to
such institutional lies, even though they too might have a few gimmicks
up their sleeves also.

AT&T is no longer the "friend" of the consumer, like long ago.
Cingular is ATT and they brag about it while you are put on hold
waiting endlessly for customer service.

Amen.

barry

>>
>>

CORRECTION: I meant "crammed" not "slammed".

http://www.ehow.com/how_15888_protec...f-slammed.html

Most problems with cell phone companies are either a matter of 1) not
getting what you paid for in the agreement, and then 2) paying way too
much on top of it as a big surprise.

This means you were lied to at many levels, especially when you are
condemned to 10 to 30 hours of dealing with a customer service which is
unhelpful and lubricious for fear of losing their job[s] with so many
supervisors listening in to their calls and monitoring them, a form of
facism and the heart of outsourcing.

Class action lawsuits and letters to fed reps and fed agencies is the
one true path to reform and to your swift rebate for your unsolicited
troubles.

We are the NEW AMERICAN REVOLUTION. Stand up tall and be a Paul Revere
or a Dolly Madison. Don't be a putz.

barry
>>


what the **** is this guy going on about? If you have a problem
With Cingular (or any phone company), write a hand-addressed letter to
the President of Cingular, and make sure that you clearly c.c. the NY
Attorney General, the US Attorney General, and the Federal Trade
Commission. If necessary, say that you were "slammed" or lied to about
your service. You will get a call back from the president's admin
within two days apologising profusely and dropping all money charges.
\
Cingular are the worst, and have just paid out millions in a class
action suit in California. We also had a nightmare with them two years
ago, until in desperation Helen resorted to the above strategy. Just
recently, we had a similar problem with AT&T, who had offered to lower
our long distance then charged us 3.00/minute to call UK, when we had
been paying 0.10/minute!!!.

PAcBell was going to cut us off for non-payment of an erroneous $487
bill for one month's worth of international calls. AT&T service reps
refused to listen, kept denying all or any previous conversations until
Helen did the above again and immediately got the same reaction-
grovelling profuse apologies from Corporate HQ, plus all money charges
dropped. The phone companies really do NOT want any more flack--the
heat is on them big time from various Fed consumer agencies.

Barry



Bryan Adrian wrote:


I was ****ed over by Cingular after I purchased their Take Charge
services. And more "evidence" can easily be supplied.

And i am not mincing my words by saying "****ed over". "Screwed" is
not descriptive enough.

If you care to stop posturing and lend a helping hand rather than being
a blow hard, email me and stop me from closing the account on Tuesday
morning.

Cingular in no way is 'honoring its terms of service'.

Where do you get such words, from MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE?

Most people who use prepaid cards or chips in their cell phone do not
have time to joke around on the internet usenet groups like you do all
day ... this does not indicate a "revolt" is not brewing -- that few
are posting, as you implied.

A class action lawsuit is soon underway. I will post the name of the
aggressive law firm very soon so you can digest the meaning of this and
so that the few prepaid customers who bother with Usenet can be
informed of where to seek comfort re: Cingular Take Charge skull
duggery.

Yes, you are very welcome.

John Navas wrote:
Snipped to the nubes....

....

Pick up the Take Charge brochure, they are plastered all over Cingular
outlets, and read it. Cingular states that it provides 400 free
minutes from 7am to 9pm, absolute free usage from 9pm to 7am, and the
entire weekend to enjoy the free minutes. This is their deal. This is
their measure of honesty at Cingular, they set their own bar. Those
are Cingular's terms upon purchase.

In actual practice, there are never any free minutes with TAKE CHARGE
and one uses up the $49.99 much quicker than with a simple prepaid
chip...

The Cingular Take Charge customer service computers do NOT register the
monies deducted for each minute of each call [12.5 cents per minute],
although the money is deducted from your account on another database
system they are not privy to, so the CS reps do not have a clue what
you are talking about when you call in to complain for corrected
services regarding this error. They see only the TOTAL AMOUNT date for
each itemized call [which is nearly always a $0.00 charge to them from
their viewpoint]. It looks like you have scads of free minutes to
them, but in practice you never even get one lousey free minute ever
with this Cingular Take Charge account, which is raking in money for
Cingular like a new kind of underhanded prepaid scam.

Each minute used receiving or making a Take Charge call, is billed at
12.5 cents per minute, be it after 9pm weekdays or weekends too, the
alleged FREE MINUTES hours.

Also, if you do a *777# to see how many minutes are left of your
alleged 400 FREE HOURS DURING DAYLIGHT WEEKDAYS, you get only a balance
of how much of your $49.99 is left after all the minutes associated
with your cell number are deducted at 12.5 cents [this is called your
MAIN ACCOUNT BALANCE]. Lord help the person who calls after 9pm or on
weekends to a family member or spouse or relative and chats away for an
hour or longer. Busted!

This will all be deducted from your $49.99 rather than ignored as free
minute time. It really adds up !

Also, you can see what kind of chicanery is going on in the corporate
heights when you do a *646# or a *MIN# to see how many of your free 400
daytime weekday minutes are remaining. You get a text message back.
that says your TAKE CHARGE account is not allowed this service, even
though there is a recording while you are on hold that encourages you
to do just this with your Cingular account.

The customer care reps never get a view of your MAIN ACCOUNT BALANCE
[totally different from your TOTAL AMOUNT, which in itself is very
Orwellian in its suggestion] which you can see as a paying customer
online on the web at www.selfincharge.com --but the CS reps cannot
locate on their screens nor database this MAIN ACCOUNT BALANCE for each
itemized call, unless you give them your pin number and they go online
themselves on the internet to look at your account history, but they
have been trained not to do this, i.e, accept your pin number.

So it is a Catch-22 and the customer is the big time loser, and
Cingular prospers!

Have a prosperous New Year !!

>>>

Please BEWARE !!

Cingular-ATT has been offering to people with no credit card a new cell
phone account TAKE CHARGE, which promises for $49.99 per month 400 free
minutes during non-free times, and free calls after 9pm and all
weekend.

They can debit your checking account or your debit card once per month.

Well, here's the rub.

The database for Cingular for the TAKE CHARGE account is divided into
two dissociated databases, one which shows to Customer Care for
Cingular a ZERO charge for all calls made during so called free minute
times of day, and this is called the TOTAL AMOUNT column. This is ALL
Customer Care can see on their screens.

Yet, on the customer online CALLS LIST a Take Charge user/customer can
go to the full detail history list of all calls and on the extreme
right hand column of the complete calls list, there is a blue ball with
a white carat in it that is called CALL DETAIL for each individual
call. If you click on this, you get many more details than are given
to the Customer Care call center rep.

You must scroll down in this pull down box past the ZERO amount and
just below is the MAIN ACCOUNT AMOUNT which charges your debit card
and/or account balance for your Cingular service at 12.5 cents per
minute DURING the free minutes times of the week!! Your calls from 0
to 399 of the free 400 minutes are billed at 12.5 cents per minute
also!!

So, if you made an hour call on your cell phone account on the weekend
it will be deducted about $5 ASAP and your phone service will be
discontinued quickly due to this ploy unless you address the issue
brought up by voice and text mail to you that YOU MUST CHARGE ON YOUR
DEBIT CARD as soon as possible either $15 for 100 minutes or $25 for
150.

This is a reprehensible business practice that should blemish the
reputation of ATT also, and not just Cingular cell phone company.

Dec. 24th, today, Christmas Eve, is a day off for most of the 'Take
Charge' Cingular call center helpers, so the bulk of the complaints
about this criminal billing procedure practice at Take Charge are going
to the main general Cingular help center workers, who are much more
helpful than the usual Take Charge specialist call center workers [have
the Take Charge customer care center workers been trained to be
uncooperative and play dumb about this horrible glitch and thieving
tactic of the Cingular management?].

Each time [about 15 times i have called and had to spend over an hour
trying to resolve this snafu to no avail and to suffer the damage of
severe microwave headaches from the cell phone radio waves after so
much exposure], the Take Charge staffers are very rude in putting the
fault of the service charges and billing during free minutes on the
stupidity of the customer/client. It is a crime up there with Enron,
Halliburton, and Global Crossing scams. Cingular is blaming the
consumer for a rip off product.

Nothing else could promote WORSE customer relations on the globe !!!
Would anyone disagree?

Please call your Better Business Bureau and your local 'CONSUMER
COMPLAINT, SHAME ON YOU' local TV network to look into this,
investigate it, and report it.


DoctorZ wrote:
> Lawyers on retainer (i.e real ones) could handle the case and win,
but
> for my $20K+ in fees, it would take 3-6 yrs to get my money back.
> Given Cingular idiot policies I have the risk they would go chapter 7
> before collecting. Then I am left holding the bag.
>
> Its possible a class action will pop up, but once again is it worth
my
> time (i.e. money). My losses so far are $7K plus and unless something
> turns up, hardly worth the significant effort a lawsuit will involve.
>
> Before someone advises "complain to the federal state x agency" I
can
> assure you Cingular has not done anything to offset their poltical
and
> legal connections.
> Time will tell if Cingular is being a World Comm or if for whatever
> reason I am in a subclass of customer they want rid of.

Alas, word has not yet arrived at any of the Cingular...formerly AT&T
Wireless...stores throughout the Rockies. The employees haven't yet heard
of "KIC", but when they ask their manager, he/she says, "we'll be getting
those in one of these days" (as of 12/27/04).

I asked to be connected to a store in the nearest 'old' Cingular market
(Dallas), and, wouldn't you know, it was an ex-AT&T store. They knew what
KIC was, but told me I would have to call the "real" Cingular store up the
street in Richardson.

I'm happy to hear they are now available in every store.

-Bill Radio

"Shaolin Superfly" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> .
>
>
> We sell KIC prepaid cards/SIMs in EVERY Cingular owned store whether
orange
> or blue.
>