Where to go from here?

I've had sprint for 4 to 5 years and for the most part have been completely
satisfied. Was thrilled when my TP2200 phone got replace with a Sanyo
RL7200, much better signal strength. Over the last 4 months things have
gone down hill. Words get dropped while listening and started getting many
dropped calls. I usually have 2 to 3 bars on the antennae. What I find odd
is that this happens much more frequently on nights and weekends, like the
tower I'm on is overloaded. After 9PM during the week, I can't stay
connected to my home phone (land line) for more than a few minutes, same
holds true for most of Saturday and Sunday.
Sprints local service center is no help, updated phone firmware and PRL and
it worked the same. Had the phone replaced with a flip Sanyo RL7300,
exactly the same problem. I can drive 2 miles away and stay connected
forever. A friend less than 1/2 mile from me is having the same problem.
While I guess one could say your in a dead zone, it wasn't dead for the
previous 4 or 5 years, everything worked great. *2talk is of no help, the
last time I called the girl said I'll have someone go out and boost the
signal in your area, yeah right.
I don't do anything fancy, no text messaging, no downloads, no picture
sending, all I want to do is talk. Any ideas on who to complain too, sent
an email yesterday to sprintpcs but haven't heard back from them. Is my
only recourse to change carriers?

---

› See More: Where to go from here?

"BR549" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:%[email protected]...
> I've had sprint for 4 to 5 years and for the most part have been
completely
> satisfied. Was thrilled when my TP2200 phone got replace with a Sanyo
> RL7200, much better signal strength. Over the last 4 months things have
> gone down hill. Words get dropped while listening and started getting
many
> dropped calls. I usually have 2 to 3 bars on the antennae. What I find
odd
> is that this happens much more frequently on nights and weekends, like the
> tower I'm on is overloaded. After 9PM during the week, I can't stay
> connected to my home phone (land line) for more than a few minutes, same
> holds true for most of Saturday and Sunday.
> Sprints local service center is no help, updated phone firmware and PRL
and
> it worked the same. Had the phone replaced with a flip Sanyo RL7300,
> exactly the same problem. I can drive 2 miles away and stay connected
> forever. A friend less than 1/2 mile from me is having the same problem.
> While I guess one could say your in a dead zone, it wasn't dead for the
> previous 4 or 5 years, everything worked great. *2talk is of no help, the
> last time I called the girl said I'll have someone go out and boost the
> signal in your area, yeah right.
> I don't do anything fancy, no text messaging, no downloads, no picture
> sending, all I want to do is talk. Any ideas on who to complain too, sent
> an email yesterday to sprintpcs but haven't heard back from them. Is my
> only recourse to change carriers?
>

Where are you experiencing the problems? Name the city and neighborhoods.
Someone might pipe in, from your neck of the woods to pass on their results.

As for the problem you've been experiencing, it might be a tower problem.

Bob

My location is Tampa, FL 33615. neighborhood is Pat Acres.

BR549 wrote:
> Over the last 4 months things have gone down hill. Words get
> dropped while listening and started getting many dropped calls.
> ... I can drive 2 miles away and stay connected forever. A
> friend less than 1/2 mile from me is having the same problem.

These are all the symptoms of a bad tower. I have had _exactly_
the same problem. There was a two second drop out every 1 minute.
Every minute of every hour, 24x7 for nearly two months! It was
_literally_ like clockwork. Once I realized what was happening,
I looked at my watch and I knew exactly when the dropout was coming.

When you are at home you are using the tower that is closest
to you. When you're away from home, using different towers,
there is no problem. QED it's not a phone problem. Try to
convince a first level CSR of that.

The field tech that they finally put me in touch with said that
they had done a major upgrade to the tower in mid-December.
That's when the problem started. It took them nearly two months
to fix it.

> What I find odd is that this happens much more frequently on
> nights and weekends,

The Sprint field tech told me that this is when they take the tower
down to work on it, because of high useage during the day.

> Sprints local service center is no help

No kidding. The first time I called, the CSR told me to
power cycle the phone. Then he insisted that I remove the
battery for half an hour. No first level CSR took the problem
seriously. After several calls, I finally got one to transfer
me to the next level. We have three phones on our account.
All had the same symptom, of course, since it was a tower
problem. I had the other two call in also, since Sprint doesn't
seem to act unless they get multiple calls about a problem.

Find out if others in your neighborhood have Sprint and are
having the same problem. Have them call in. And here's
the real solutions: 1) ask the first level CSR to transfer you
to "voice troubleshooting". 2) tell that second level that you
want a field service tech to call you.

"ll" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> BR549 wrote:
> > Over the last 4 months things have gone down hill. Words get
> > dropped while listening and started getting many dropped calls.
> > ... I can drive 2 miles away and stay connected forever. A
> > friend less than 1/2 mile from me is having the same problem.
>
> These are all the symptoms of a bad tower. I have had _exactly_
> the same problem. There was a two second drop out every 1 minute.
> Every minute of every hour, 24x7 for nearly two months! It was
> _literally_ like clockwork. Once I realized what was happening,
> I looked at my watch and I knew exactly when the dropout was coming.
>
> When you are at home you are using the tower that is closest
> to you. When you're away from home, using different towers,
> there is no problem. QED it's not a phone problem. Try to
> convince a first level CSR of that.
>
> The field tech that they finally put me in touch with said that
> they had done a major upgrade to the tower in mid-December.
> That's when the problem started. It took them nearly two months
> to fix it.
>
> > What I find odd is that this happens much more frequently on
> > nights and weekends,
>
> The Sprint field tech told me that this is when they take the tower
> down to work on it, because of high useage during the day.
>
> > Sprints local service center is no help
>
> No kidding. The first time I called, the CSR told me to
> power cycle the phone. Then he insisted that I remove the
> battery for half an hour. No first level CSR took the problem
> seriously. After several calls, I finally got one to transfer
> me to the next level. We have three phones on our account.
> All had the same symptom, of course, since it was a tower
> problem. I had the other two call in also, since Sprint doesn't
> seem to act unless they get multiple calls about a problem.
>
> Find out if others in your neighborhood have Sprint and are
> having the same problem. Have them call in. And here's
> the real solutions: 1) ask the first level CSR to transfer you
> to "voice troubleshooting". 2) tell that second level that you
> want a field service tech to call you.

BR - When you call CS, ask for a tier two tech and make a trouble ticket
listing out the neighborhood and the cross streets of the intersections you
are know have a problem.

Bob

"BR549" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:%[email protected]...
I've had sprint for 4 to 5 years and for the most part have been completely
satisfied. Was thrilled when my TP2200 phone got replace with a Sanyo
RL7200, much better signal strength. Over the last 4 months things have
gone down hill. Words get dropped while listening and started getting many
dropped calls. I usually have 2 to 3 bars on the antennae. What I find odd
is that this happens much more frequently on nights and weekends, like the
tower I'm on is overloaded. After 9PM during the week, I can't stay
connected to my home phone (land line) for more than a few minutes, same
holds true for most of Saturday and Sunday.
Sprints local service center is no help, updated phone firmware and PRL and
it worked the same. Had the phone replaced with a flip Sanyo RL7300,
exactly the same problem. I can drive 2 miles away and stay connected
forever. A friend less than 1/2 mile from me is having the same problem.
While I guess one could say your in a dead zone, it wasn't dead for the
previous 4 or 5 years, everything worked great. *2talk is of no help, the
last time I called the girl said I'll have someone go out and boost the
signal in your area, yeah right.
I don't do anything fancy, no text messaging, no downloads, no picture
sending, all I want to do is talk. Any ideas on who to complain too, sent
an email yesterday to sprintpcs but haven't heard back from them. Is my
only recourse to change carriers?


Thanks all for your comments, I'll call customer service tomorrow, figure I
might have better luck talking to someone that knows something about
cellphones during the day rather than in the evening. Will post back.

Thanks all for your comments, I'll call customer service tomorrow, figure I
might have better luck talking to someone that knows something about
cellphones during the day rather than in the evening. Will post back.

I called customer service yesterday around noon. Explained my problem to 3
different people and the 3rd person I spoke to was to open some type of
trouble ticket about the tower in the area I live in. She said to give it
51 hours to be resolved. How they come up with 51 hours is beyond me but I
really don't hold out much hope. The reason I feel this way is that I also
contact sprint via email and it's amazing that they had no idea I had ever
complained about my problem before when in fact I had gone to the service
center 3 times and have called *2talk 3 times. Seems like there is no
continuaty with regard to problems and each call gets treated as a new one.
I should know if anything happened after 9 PM Friday, my 51 hours should be
up by then.

In article <[email protected]>,
[email protected] says...
> All had the same symptom, of course, since it was a tower
> problem. I had the other two call in also, since Sprint doesn't
> seem to act unless they get multiple calls about a problem.
>

There is a lot of wisdom in that. With over 2000 towers (and now the
EV-DV upgrade) to keep Sprint's attention, troubleshooting resources go
to the squeaky wheels, if you know what I mean.


--
RŲß
O/Siris
-+-
A thing moderately good
is not so good as it ought to be.
Moderation in temper is always a virtue,
but moderation in principle is always a vice.
+Thomas Paine, "The Rights of Man", 1792+

O/Siris wrote:
> In article <[email protected]>,
> [email protected] says...
>
>>All had the same symptom, of course, since it was a tower
>>problem. I had the other two call in also, since Sprint doesn't
>>seem to act unless they get multiple calls about a problem.
>>
>
>
> There is a lot of wisdom in that. With over 2000 towers (and now the
> EV-DV upgrade) to keep Sprint's attention, troubleshooting resources go
> to the squeaky wheels, if you know what I mean.

So was the information I got incorrect? A Sprint reseller rep told me late last
year that they would be doing EV-DO...




--
JustThe.net - Apple Valley, CA - http://JustThe.net/ - 888.480.4NET (4638)
Steven J. Sobol, Geek In Charge / [email protected] / PGP: 0xE3AE35ED

"The wisdom of a fool won't set you free"
--New Order, "Bizarre Love Triangle"

"Steve Sobol" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> O/Siris wrote:
> > In article <[email protected]>,
> > [email protected] says...
> >
> >>All had the same symptom, of course, since it was a tower
> >>problem. I had the other two call in also, since Sprint doesn't
> >>seem to act unless they get multiple calls about a problem.
> >>
> >
> >
> > There is a lot of wisdom in that. With over 2000 towers (and now the
> > EV-DV upgrade) to keep Sprint's attention, troubleshooting resources go
> > to the squeaky wheels, if you know what I mean.
>
> So was the information I got incorrect? A Sprint reseller rep told me late
last
> year that they would be doing EV-DO...

As I understand it, SPCS is still shooting for EV-DV. They were going to
bypass EV-DO, but determined EV-DV would take an additional year to get in
place, and Verizon would get a leg up, with their EV-DO coming on line right
now. So, SPCS is doing EV-DO just to compete with Verizon and move up to
EV-DV within a year.

Bob

When will the Sprint EV-DO be introduced. If Sprint is too late with the
introduction, it will not matter anyway.

"Bob Smith" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:M%[email protected]...
>
> "Steve Sobol" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> O/Siris wrote:
>> > In article <[email protected]>,
>> > [email protected] says...
>> >
>> >>All had the same symptom, of course, since it was a tower
>> >>problem. I had the other two call in also, since Sprint doesn't
>> >>seem to act unless they get multiple calls about a problem.
>> >>
>> >
>> >
>> > There is a lot of wisdom in that. With over 2000 towers (and now the
>> > EV-DV upgrade) to keep Sprint's attention, troubleshooting resources go
>> > to the squeaky wheels, if you know what I mean.
>>
>> So was the information I got incorrect? A Sprint reseller rep told me
>> late
> last
>> year that they would be doing EV-DO...
>
> As I understand it, SPCS is still shooting for EV-DV. They were going to
> bypass EV-DO, but determined EV-DV would take an additional year to get in
> place, and Verizon would get a leg up, with their EV-DO coming on line
> right
> now. So, SPCS is doing EV-DO just to compete with Verizon and move up to
> EV-DV within a year.
>
> Bob
>
>

"Mij Adyaw" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:_g_Zd.112820$bu.53940@fed1read06...
> When will the Sprint EV-DO be introduced. If Sprint is too late with the
> introduction, it will not matter anyway.

I don't believe they've given a specific date. When they do though, it
should be systemwide, instead of specific markets as Verizon has done.

Bob

Bob Smith wrote:
> I don't believe they've given a specific date. When they do though, it
> should be systemwide, instead of specific markets as Verizon has done.

That's not my understanding.

Paul Miner <[email protected]> wrote:
> between now and then there are cities popping up all over,
> some large and some small, where testing is apparently going on.

I believe this to be true.

> If you have an EV-DO card, give it a try.

Does it make plain old Vision (accessing internet pages
from your SprintPCS cell phone) faster?

ll wrote:

>>If you have an EV-DO card, give it a try.
>
>
> Does it make plain old Vision (accessing internet pages
> from your SprintPCS cell phone) faster?

From the end-user perspective, yes. But technically, it's not the same
interface.

--
E-mail fudged to thwart spammers.
Transpose the c's and a's in my e-mail address to reply.

"ll" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Bob Smith wrote:
> > I don't believe they've given a specific date. When they do though, it
> > should be systemwide, instead of specific markets as Verizon has done.
>
> That's not my understanding.

What then ... is your understanding? When SPCS does an upgrade to their
system, they do it nationwide, as they did when they introduced 3G protocols
to their system.

>
> Paul Miner <[email protected]> wrote:
> > between now and then there are cities popping up all over,
> > some large and some small, where testing is apparently going on.
>
> I believe this to be true.
>
> > If you have an EV-DO card, give it a try.
>
> Does it make plain old Vision (accessing internet pages
> from your SprintPCS cell phone) faster?

EV-DO is suppose to go 384 kbps, so ... if you are in a test market ... yes.

Bob