Reception problems: T-Mobile was of NO help!!

Ok, I have been a T-Mobile customer since October 2005 when I changed
from Sprint.

I was happy with my plan and service. I hardly use my phone for more
than making calls, receiving calls, and the occasional SMS.

In December 2006 I moved places.

Now where I moved, reception is perfect. I go to work, to the grocery
store, WHEREVER, I get perfect reception.

However, as soon as I drive halfway down the street I live in, I lose
all reception.

The street I live in has, for our proposes, 2 halves. When I drive to
the half where my place is located at the coverage disappears. And yes
I did try to manually search for a network. And according to their
coverage map, my street is supposed to have service.

I have tried both Verizon and Sprint phones in that location, and both
work 100% fine.

It is not even an "indoor" problem. It's just as soon as I drive
to the second part of the street I live in!

In December I go to a T-Mobile store, explain the situation and told
that a Nokia phone should fix it. I expended my contract, got the free
phone, but still the same thing. So I returned the phone and had the
contract reversed.

Soon after I called T-Mobile about the problem, they said they would
send engineers to the towers and get back to me via email by the end of
the week. I'm asked for my email and give it to them.

Sure enough, the week expires and NO word from them.

So I call again and I'm told there will be no converge "for the
rest of the year" and to call back in 2007. That sounded reasonable
enough to me. Close to Christmas, lots happening, etc. So I play the
waiting game.

Now it's early 2007. I call and explain the situation and I'm told
the same thing (rest of the year). I was upset but I figured it was too
early for the case to be updated so I waited a bit longer. I was also
given 200 free minutes for this inconvenience (like that makes me feel
so much better).

Anyhow fast forward and I call again. I talked to them, explained
again. At this point I also stated I'd have to switch providers and I
would also vent on forums. They said they'd give me a status update
by text message. And I'm given more free minutes (yay!). I'm also
told that if I switched it would cost me $150 to withdraw from the
contract. But I correct this person saying that my contract actually
expired last October so I'm free to pull out anytime.

Sure enough, 3 days go by and NO word from them. Maybe they're hoping
I forget about it.

So I call back again! I give my case number (given in the last call).
I'm told that there's "no planned reception for now" but that
T-mobile is upgrading nationwide service during this year. I'm also
given free minutes (wohooo!).

Then I'm told that I should try another phone before deciding to
switch providers. They suggest the Nokia which has the best reception
and I said I tried that. Then they suggest a Motorola phone that I
could get for $50 with a 2 year contract extension. So I say I would
give this one more shot before switching and venting in forums.

I go to a T-Mobile store again and I get a new phone. Not a free Nokia
but the slim Motorola that cost me $$$.

Again, that didn't help me, back to the store, and contract reversed.


Well, I really did like my plan and I truly exhausted all means to
solve the problem. Now I could understand if the place I lived in had
NO coverage in which case it would not the easiest thing for them to
simply add coverage to a whole new location. However there IS coverage
everywhere! It is truly disgusting that they can't look into what's
wrong on a small chunk of a street in a place they actually DO have
coverage! And even worse they say "we'll email you" or "we'll
text you" only to ignore me as if I'm job seeking! And let's not
forget the hassle and effort I went through to try and solve this.

Now I have to switch to Verizon or live with no coverage whenever I'm
home! I do have my skype account where I can make calls and receive
calls, but still!

At 22 Jan 2007 11:35:08 -0800 starwars2099@hotmail.com wrote:


> However, as soon as I drive halfway down the street I live in, I lose
> all reception.
>
> The street I live in has, for our proposes, 2 halves. When I drive to
> the half where my place is located at the coverage disappears. And yes
> I did try to manually search for a network. And according to their
> coverage map, my street is supposed to have service.
>
> I have tried both Verizon and Sprint phones in that location, and both
> work 100% fine.


When I first started reading your post, I was sure it was going to ed
"now I want to cancel and T-Mo won't let me out of my contract." I was
surprised with your "twist" ending.

> Now I have to switch to Verizon or live with no coverage whenever I'm
> home! I do have my skype account where I can make calls and receive
> calls, but still!
>

But still what? You're upset because T-Mo doesn't cover your street
forcing you to change providers? Sure that stinks, but get over it- for
whatever reasons, T-Mo's coverage misses your block so you have to decide
whether home coverage is important enough to switch to a higher priced
provider. I live in a similar "hole" here in Denver where Cingular and
Verizon don't work, but T-Mo and Sprint do. The first thing I had to do
when I moved was switch my Cingular phones to T-Mo.

If you really want to stay with T-Mo, since it works everywhere except
your street and Skype works ok for you, why not set your phone forward
your T-Mo phone to your Skype-in number "when unavailable." This means
it will automatically forward when your phone is off or if you're in a no-
signal area.

If you don't have a Skype-in number, get a free Stanaphone or Voicestick
account (they give free incoming numbers you can forward to, and then
either pay $0.02/minute for outgoing, or use Skype for outgoing calls
from home.)

Sure it's a hassle, but if keeping T-Mo's inexpensive service (compared
to Sprint or Verizon) is worth it to you, you do have options. Sadly,
getting T-Mo to realign their towers or change the laws of physics to
cover your neighborhood isn't one of those options...

starwars2099@hotmail.com spake thusly and wrote:

>The street I live in has, for our proposes, 2 halves. When I drive to
>the half where my place is located at the coverage disappears. And yes
>I did try to manually search for a network. And according to their
>coverage map, my street is supposed to have service.

A lot of the cellular providers kid a lot about their coverage
areas. It is all in good fun though. If you somehow didn't see
the good natured humor of it all felt cheated by their kidding;
sometimes state public utility commissions have opinions about
such matters and will do mean things to the cellular providers.

State attorneys sometimes are interested in knowing when
advertising is well... exaggerated. Their marketing dept
is just probably suffering from too much optimism....

Steve
--
www.sellcom.com for firewood splitters, ergonomic chairs,
office phone systems, "non-mov" surge protection, Exabyte,
CA, Minuteman, Brave Products, Fisch, TMC, Panasonic and more
http://www.phonelabs.biz cellphone docking now here!

Todd Allcock wrote:

>
> But still what? You're upset because T-Mo doesn't cover your street
> forcing you to change providers? Sure that stinks, but get over it- for
> whatever reasons, T-Mo's coverage misses your block so you have to decide
> whether home coverage is important enough to switch to a higher priced
> provider. I live in a similar "hole" here in Denver where Cingular and
> Verizon don't work, but T-Mo and Sprint do. The first thing I had to do
> when I moved was switch my Cingular phones to T-Mo.
>

How does one set the phone to forward to another number? Is it in the
phone's options?

In article <1169532006.229799.105060@q2g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>, starwars2099@hotmail.com wrote:
>
> Todd Allcock wrote:
>
>>
>> But still what? You're upset because T-Mo doesn't cover your street
>> forcing you to change providers? Sure that stinks, but get over it- for
>> whatever reasons, T-Mo's coverage misses your block so you have to decide
>> whether home coverage is important enough to switch to a higher priced
>> provider. I live in a similar "hole" here in Denver where Cingular and
>> Verizon don't work, but T-Mo and Sprint do. The first thing I had to do
>> when I moved was switch my Cingular phones to T-Mo.
>>
>
> How does one set the phone to forward to another number? Is it in the
> phone's options?

Yes, on T-Mo GSM phones it is. In my experience, on Sprint and Verizon
CDMA phones there is no setting on the phone; you dial a feature code.

You'll want to confirm exactly what costs are involved in forwarding
calls before you actually forward them.


--
Steve Sobol, Professional Geek ** Java/VB/VC/PHP/Perl ** Linux/*BSD/Windows
Victorville, California PGP:0xE3AE35ED

It's all fun and games until someone starts a bonfire in the living room.

At 22 Jan 2007 22:00:09 -0800 starwars2099@hotmail.com wrote:

> How does one set the phone to forward to another number? Is it in the
> phone's options?

Depends on the phone, but somewhere in the myriad of menus there's a
forwarding option, with different types of forwarding- forward all calls,
forward if busy, forward if unavailable, etc. On my Nokias "Forwarding"
was one of the menu items. On my Pocket PC Phone it's listed under
"Services" in the Phone's options menu.

There's also a way to do it with "star codes" (i.e. dial *72 1-xxx-yyy-
zzzz then hit send) but I don't remember the codes offhand.

The only "catch" with forwarding if unavailable is that your voicemails
will go to the forwarding number as well.

At 23 Jan 2007 07:18:12 +0000 Steven J. Sobol wrote:

> You'll want to confirm exactly what costs are involved in forwarding
> calls before you actually forward them.
>

T-Mo has always had "no-cost" forwarding (to a point). If you forward
unconditionally (forward all calls) it comes out of your minutes, as if
you were using the T-Mo phone. "Conditional" forwarding (if unavailable,
if busy, if not answered, etc.) comes out of a separate "conditional
forwarding" bucket of minutes. Mine is 500 minutes. You can check your
number of forwarding minutes on line or in the "my account" info on the
phone's browser.

In article <ep4gnc$qb3$2@aioe.org>, Todd Allcock wrote:
> At 23 Jan 2007 07:18:12 +0000 Steven J. Sobol wrote:
>
>> You'll want to confirm exactly what costs are involved in forwarding
>> calls before you actually forward them.
>>
>
> T-Mo has always had "no-cost" forwarding (to a point). If you forward
> unconditionally (forward all calls) it comes out of your minutes, as if
> you were using the T-Mo phone. "Conditional" forwarding (if unavailable,
> if busy, if not answered, etc.) comes out of a separate "conditional
> forwarding" bucket of minutes. Mine is 500 minutes. You can check your
> number of forwarding minutes on line or in the "my account" info on the
> phone's browser.

What I was told was that I have 500 conditional (no-answer or busy)
forwarding minutes per month, and that unconditional forwarding costs
$0.15 per minute. I'm on a nationwide Family Talk plan.

--
Steve Sobol, Professional Geek ** Java/VB/VC/PHP/Perl ** Linux/*BSD/Windows
Victorville, California PGP:0xE3AE35ED

It's all fun and games until someone starts a bonfire in the living room.

At 23 Jan 2007 14:53:19 +0000 Steven J. Sobol wrote:
> In article <ep4gnc$qb3$2@ai
> What I was told was that I have 500 conditional (no-answer or busy)
> forwarding minutes per month, and that unconditional forwarding costs
> $0.15 per minute. I'm on a nationwide Family Talk plan.

Ouch! Things must have changed since I got my $39.99/month 1000 minute
plan a few years ago. Thanks for the heads up. Personally I've only
used conditional forwarding- I set it up to "forward when unavailable" to
a prepaid Beyond Wireless phone when I'm traveling to areas with little
or no T-Mo coverage.

I found no forwarding option in my menus.

At 23 Jan 2007 08:54:35 -0800 starwars2099@hotmail.com wrote:
> I found no forwarding option in my menus.

What model of phone do you have? (This might be a good time to mention T-
Mo doesn't allow forwarding on pre-paid accounts currently.)


Either way, a quick Google search turned these up from a post on Howard
Forums about T-Mobile "star codes":


> CallForwardingStarCodes:
> * # 21# - Check status of CallForwarding Unconditional
> * * 61* number # - Activate CallForwarding if No Reply to number
> # # 61# - Cancel CallForwarding if No Reply
> * # 61 # - Check status of CallForwarding if No Reply
> * * 62 * number # - Activate CallForwarding if Not Reachable
> # # 62 # Cancel CallForwarding if Not Reachable
> * # 62 # - Check status of CallForwarding if Not Reachable
> * * 67 * number # - Activate CallForwarding if Busy
> # # 67 # - Cancel CallForwarding if Busy
> * # 67 # - Check Status of CallForwarding if Busy
> # # 004 # - Cancel all CallForwarding
> * * 004 * number # - Provision all CallForwarding types
> **61*1-backdoor number**seconds# - (For example, 5, 10, 15, etc.)
> Change CallForwarding Delay (5-30seconds)
> Call Waiting StarCodes:
> *43# - Activate Call Waiting
> #43# - Deactivate Call Waiting
> *#43# - Check status of Call Waiting


I just tested the Call Foward if Unreachable (Unavailable) code and it
worked fine. Just enter the forwarding number where the code says
"number", i.e. foward if unreachable to 123-555-1212 would be:

**62*1235551212# (send) to activate, and ##62# (send) to cancel.

Good luck.

It's a Samsung SGH-X495

Todd Allcock wrote:
> At 23 Jan 2007 08:54:35 -0800 starwars2099@hotmail.com wrote:
> > I found no forwarding option in my menus.
>
> What model of phone do you have? (This might be a good time to mention T-
> Mo doesn't allow forwarding on pre-paid accounts currently.)
>
>
> Either way, a quick Google search turned these up from a post on Howard
> Forums about T-Mobile "star codes":
>
>
> > CallForwardingStarCodes:
> > * # 21# - Check status of CallForwarding Unconditional
> > * * 61* number # - Activate CallForwarding if No Reply to number
> > # # 61# - Cancel CallForwarding if No Reply
> > * # 61 # - Check status of CallForwarding if No Reply
> > * * 62 * number # - Activate CallForwarding if Not Reachable
> > # # 62 # Cancel CallForwarding if Not Reachable
> > * # 62 # - Check status of CallForwarding if Not Reachable
> > * * 67 * number # - Activate CallForwarding if Busy
> > # # 67 # - Cancel CallForwarding if Busy
> > * # 67 # - Check Status of CallForwarding if Busy
> > # # 004 # - Cancel all CallForwarding
> > * * 004 * number # - Provision all CallForwarding types
> > **61*1-backdoor number**seconds# - (For example, 5, 10, 15, etc.)
> > Change CallForwarding Delay (5-30seconds)
> > Call Waiting StarCodes:
> > *43# - Activate Call Waiting
> > #43# - Deactivate Call Waiting
> > *#43# - Check status of Call Waiting
>
>
> I just tested the Call Foward if Unreachable (Unavailable) code and it
> worked fine. Just enter the forwarding number where the code says
> "number", i.e. foward if unreachable to 123-555-1212 would be:
>
> **62*1235551212# (send) to activate, and ##62# (send) to cancel.
>
> Good luck.

At 23 Jan 2007 11:19:54 -0800 starwars2099@hotmail.com wrote:
> It's a Samsung SGH-X495

According to the X-495's owner's manual on T-Mobile.com, it's Phone
Settings > Network Services > Call Forwarding...

Thanks for the info. So if I do conditional forwarding whenever I'm
home it would divert to another number and take out of my minutes plan,
right?

On Jan 23, 4:21 pm, Todd Allcock <eleccon...@AmericaOnLine.com> wrote:
> At 23 Jan 2007 11:19:54 -0800 starwars2...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
> > It's a Samsung SGH-X495According to the X-495's owner's manual on T-Mobile.com, it's Phone
> Settings > Network Services > Call Forwarding...

At 24 Jan 2007 18:50:42 -0800 starwars2099@hotmail.com wrote:
> Thanks for the info. So if I do conditional forwarding whenever I'm
> home it would divert to another number and take out of my minutes plan,
> right?

Actually, conditional forwarding comes out of a separate "bucket" of 500
minutes, and leaves your "real" minutes alone.