Sprint charging for number portability

"DavyDe" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:<[email protected]>...
> It may not be ethical, but it is not illegal.
>
> "Bob Barker" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> > My dad is using Sprint, and on his bill they are charging him xx dollars
> > a month for number portability. Is this legal since we cant change his
> > number yet? He wants to switch to either att or tmobile whenever he
> > can, but he wants to keep his number.
> >
> > [posted via phonescoop.com - free web access to the alt.cellular groups]

Yeah, in the sense that I paid for the charge (at least for the past
two months, but probably for the entire contract, I haven't checked my
bills) and I will not be able to use that service, it seems a little
unethical. Of course, I could ride out the poor service for another
two months and then switch providers, but just think of all the
parties I'm missing because I get my friend's voice mail about the 11
girl oil wrestling tournament/beer-a-thon on Sunday morning

---

› See More: Sprint charging for number portability

Yes, Sprint PCS covers more square miles and more cities than
verizon. Also more than att.

justin wrote:

> "O/Siris" <robjvargas@sprîntpcs.com> wrote in message news:<Z_%0b.160153$cF.56197@rwcrnsc53>...
>
>>Phillipe wrote:
>>
>>>In article <[email protected]>,
>>> [email protected] (Bob Barker) wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>My dad is using Sprint, and on his bill they are charging him xx
>>>>dollars a month for number portability. Is this legal since we cant
>>>>change his number yet? He wants to switch to either att or tmobile
>>>>whenever he can, but he wants to keep his number.
>>>
>>>Sorry the other are insulting instead of helping you.
>>>
>>>1. Apparently they can charge now. They claim its to recover their
>>>costs to implemnt Number Portability.
>>
>>That's exactly what it is.
>>
>>
>>>2. A lawsuit saying that fee is a violation of contract and people
>>>should be allowed to quit withour penalty resulted in a CA judge
>>>giving an injunction to allow that until Auguest 31.
>>
>>That's not what it says. It says our contract lets people out for
>>implementing it.
>>
>>
>>>3. Number portabilty takes effect on November 23, although Sprint may
>>>charge a fee for that, on top of the monthly fee.
>>
>>As may Verizon, Nextel, AT&T...
>>
>>
>>>4. As bad a Sprint Customer Service is, AT&T and TMobile aren't much
>>>better, and in most places their cellular coverage has more holes in
>>>it than Sprint's does.
>>
>>Our network is the largest (in square miles covered) in the country. But
>>one should seek out others in their area with Sprint coverage to find out if
>>that leads to coverage at home.
>
>
> The largest? I have a friend who explained (or tried to explain) that
> the older companies such as Verizon and Nextel had much larger
> networds in terms of the square miles covered.

Sprint and SprintPCS are both older companies than Verizon.

Nobody actually knows how much Native coverage Verizon has since they
see fit to only put "Licensed area" maps on their website, not actual
"Coverage" maps.


--
Dan W.
North Texas
hominid7 "AT" hotmail "DOT" com
Provider: ATTWS-TDMA



[email protected] (justin) wrote in article

> The largest? I have a friend who explained (or tried to explain) that
> the older companies such as Verizon and Nextel had much larger
> networds in terms of the square miles covered.

[posted via phonescoop.com - free web access to the alt.cellular groups]

"justin" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> The largest? I have a friend who explained (or tried to explain) that
> the older companies such as Verizon and Nextel had much larger
> networds in terms of the square miles covered.

It depends on one's definition of "largest." The most common, and generally the
most practical, definition of wireless network size is "pops": the number of
people who are covered (i.e., whose residence is covered) by the network. One
could, of course, also use a literal definition based on square mileage. And of
course, one could take into account *penetration*: the ability (or lack) to
provide service inside buildings.

It also depends on one's definition of "network." One could include only the
infrastructure actually owned by the carrier; or one could include affiliates,
who rely on the carrier for marketing and even for radio spectrum. One could
even include roaming partners, at least for service plans that include some
degree of roaming at no extra incremental cost.

My own understanding--others can correct me--is that:

1) Sprint and its affiliates cover more pops than any other
carrier-plus-affiliates network, if one ignores the penetration issue. Sprint
has made a goal of covering virtually every reasonably-sized city in the United
States, whereas Verizon historically derives from regional carriers who even
today, put together, do not really cover the entire country (but rather rely on
roaming partners to fill in the gaping holes).

2) Sprint and its roaming partners provide more coverage (by almost any
definition) under the Free&Clear America plan than any other carrier service
plan.

On the other hand:

1) Sprint's building penetration is generally worse than the historical 800MHz
carriers such as Verizon.

2) The historical 800MHz carriers may indeed cover more square mileage than
Sprint, partly because the old 800MHz analog service was designed to cover as
much physical territory as possible. Back in the '80s, nationwide coverage was
a more pressing concern than urban overload.

I think you are correct.... Just to clarify, while yes the 800 mhz TDMA
carriers do cover more land than anyone else, there is no SINGLE carrier
that has an edge. So when you want "coverage" at any cost, TDMA is
king, but when you want to know "which" carrier has the most native
digital coverage, i think Sprint wins!

Verizon's "national" network relies heavily on Sprint and Western
Wireless for roaming. In my experience Sprint has the best analog
roaming agreements, as far as billing is concerned, than anyone. I
couldn't get my AT&T TDMA phone to work in analog if my life depended on
it, but my Sprint phone will work in analog anytime i ask it to.

--
Dan W.
North Texas
hominid7 "AT" hotmail "DOT" com
Provider: ATTWS-TDMA



"Lawrence G. Mayka" <[email protected]> wrote in article
<o641b.10538>
> My own understanding--others can correct me--is that:
>
> 1) Sprint and its affiliates cover more pops than any other
> carrier-plus-affiliates network, if one ignores the penetration issue. Sprint
> has made a goal of covering virtually every reasonably-sized city in the United
> States, whereas Verizon historically derives from regional carriers who even
> today, put together, do not really cover the entire country (but rather rely on
> roaming partners to fill in the gaping holes).
>
> 2) Sprint and its roaming partners provide more coverage (by almost any
> definition) under the Free&Clear America plan than any other carrier service
> plan.
>
> On the other hand:
>
> 1) Sprint's building penetration is generally worse than the historical 800MHz
> carriers such as Verizon.
>
> 2) The historical 800MHz carriers may indeed cover more square mileage than
> Sprint, partly because the old 800MHz analog service was designed to cover as
> much physical territory as possible. Back in the '80s, nationwide coverage was
> a more pressing concern than urban overload.
>
>

[posted via phonescoop.com - free web access to the alt.cellular groups]

"Lawrence G. Mayka" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:<[email protected]>...
> "justin" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> > The largest? I have a friend who explained (or tried to explain) that
> > the older companies such as Verizon and Nextel had much larger
> > networds in terms of the square miles covered.
>
> It depends on one's definition of "largest." The most common, and generally the
> most practical, definition of wireless network size is "pops": the number of
> people who are covered (i.e., whose residence is covered) by the network. One
> could, of course, also use a literal definition based on square mileage. And of
> course, one could take into account *penetration*: the ability (or lack) to
> provide service inside buildings.
>
> It also depends on one's definition of "network." One could include only the
> infrastructure actually owned by the carrier; or one could include affiliates,
> who rely on the carrier for marketing and even for radio spectrum. One could
> even include roaming partners, at least for service plans that include some
> degree of roaming at no extra incremental cost.
>
> My own understanding--others can correct me--is that:
>
> 1) Sprint and its affiliates cover more pops than any other
> carrier-plus-affiliates network, if one ignores the penetration issue. Sprint
> has made a goal of covering virtually every reasonably-sized city in the United
> States, whereas Verizon historically derives from regional carriers who even
> today, put together, do not really cover the entire country (but rather rely on
> roaming partners to fill in the gaping holes).
>
> 2) Sprint and its roaming partners provide more coverage (by almost any
> definition) under the Free&Clear America plan than any other carrier service
> plan.
>
> On the other hand:
>
> 1) Sprint's building penetration is generally worse than the historical 800MHz
> carriers such as Verizon.
>
> 2) The historical 800MHz carriers may indeed cover more square mileage than
> Sprint, partly because the old 800MHz analog service was designed to cover as
> much physical territory as possible. Back in the '80s, nationwide coverage was
> a more pressing concern than urban overload.


Thanks for the info, guys! I'm relatively ignorant when it comes to
cell phones. The reason I was wondering was because I was thinking
about switching to Verizon for my area, since, as you well know, I've
had issues with Sprint's signals in my area.

"justin" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Thanks for the info, guys! I'm relatively ignorant when it comes to
> cell phones. The reason I was wondering was because I was thinking
> about switching to Verizon for my area, since, as you well know, I've
> had issues with Sprint's signals in my area.

On the bright side, 800 MHz signal should travel further than the 1900 MHz
PCS signal. I believe it will go about 4 times as far, if the inverse
square law applies. Certainly, the signal will penetrate most buildings
better than what you had with Sprint PCS. If you do indeed try out Verizon,
please post back here with the results.

Tom Veldhouse

SprintPCS Tech <[email protected]> wrote:
> But its OK for the other companies to lie?

Of course not, but other companies' lying isn't a reason for Sprint to lie
either. I realize Sprint's marketing department probably doesn't view it as
'lying' at all -- more like, 'Well, the boundaries of cell phone coverage
are soft anyway, so if we just connect together a few areas that might be
borderline service areas (even though we could probably find out for certain
whether or not there was coverage at all if we really wanted to by getting
some of our own internal technical reports), it'll look better, it's still
'pretty' accurate, and all the other companies are doing it anyway, so that
must make it acceptable, right?'

Given 'corporate ethics' these days, I don't see this changing unless the
government starts mandating that real coverage maps are provided. The whole
issue is a small enough nuisance that that's unlikely that will happen
either.

Where I think people get screwed is when they move from one city to another
and -- while the city they're moving to is listed as part of Sprint's
coverage -- they end up in a dead zone at their new residence and can't use
their phone. This happened to me, and Sprint customer service was
completely unsympathetic about letting me get out of my contract without the
full cancellation fee. I wasn't amused.

---Joel Kolstad

I do not know of any places that have tdma but not CDMA coverage,
for sure not in WI.

Dan W. wrote:

> I think you are correct.... Just to clarify, while yes the 800 mhz TDMA
> carriers do cover more land than anyone else, there is no SINGLE carrier
> that has an edge. So when you want "coverage" at any cost, TDMA is
> king, but when you want to know "which" carrier has the most native
> digital coverage, i think Sprint wins!
>
> Verizon's "national" network relies heavily on Sprint and Western
> Wireless for roaming. In my experience Sprint has the best analog
> roaming agreements, as far as billing is concerned, than anyone. I
> couldn't get my AT&T TDMA phone to work in analog if my life depended on
> it, but my Sprint phone will work in analog anytime i ask it to.
>

Large chunks of Oklahoma, and Louisiana to name a couple.

--
Dan W.
North Texas
hominid7 "AT" hotmail "DOT" com
Provider: ATTWS-TDMA



Jerome Zelinske <[email protected]> wrote in article
<[email protected]>:
> I do not know of any places that have tdma but not CDMA coverage,
> for sure not in WI.
>


[posted via phonescoop.com - free web access to the alt.cellular groups]

Both cellular carriers in those states are tdma?

Dan W. wrote:
> Large chunks of Oklahoma, and Louisiana to name a couple.
>

Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Texas have pretty much every kind of
wireless-voice technology there is. However, the vast majority of it
is, as you guessed, TDMA. The small Northern-Louisiana city (Pop 5000)
that my aunt and uncle live in has two choices...AT&T 1900 TDMA/GSM or
AllTell Analog. They are in the process of setting up CDMA there i
believe (ON Alltell), but due to the size of the town, it's just slow
going.

In Oklahoma, the main highways are covered with CDMA and GSM, but a good
chunk of I-35 from the Texas border to Norman, OK has NO AT&T TDMA/GSM
coverage, yet plenty of TDMA, CDMA, GSM, iDEN, AMPS from other carriers.
Apparently AT&T does not care if it's GSM customers actually drive
between cities=) Until they get it built out, which i know takes time,
they could at the very least provide GSM roaming agreements with T-Mob
in the area, which they fail to see the necessity to do.

My main problem with AT&T GSM at this point is that AT&T failed to
create a massive roaming agreement with T-Mobile. Instead they created
a piece-meal one with coverage in some places, but not others. I dont
know if that was AT&T's doing or T-Mob's but my guess is T-Mob would
love the roaming fees, and AT&T wanted to protect their bottom line.

Here in North Texas the carriers with the most robust coverage are, dare
i say, Cingular and Sprint, and for the record I'd use a sprint phone
anyday of the week before i'd use a cingular one=)

My parents took a trip to Fredricksburg, TX (West of Austin) this week.
I called my Dad's AT&T GSM phone, no service, yet my Mom's Sprint phone
worked like a charm. Granted this is an isolated example, and thats the
main reason they have phones from different carriers, complete coverage
on their travels from small town Texas to Austria. It would just be
nice if one could get complete coverage, via romaing agreements and
multiple function handsets, wherever you go.

While Sprint has rubbed me wrong more than once over the years, (Can you
say ****, err, i mean short mail?) i will say if i was going on a cross
country trip, into no-mans land, i would take a sprint phone. Why?
Because of thier complete and well integrated roaming agreements and
ability to force the phone into analog. No credit card calls, no
holding your hand over the antenna to try to get the phone to work in
analog, etc.... My AT&T TDMA phone works great and has by far the most
digital coverage of anything i've used, but it's inability to work in
margional singla areas, and the inability to manually switch from TDMA
to AMPS limits it's use in many situations.

--
Dan W.
North Texas
hominid7 "AT" hotmail "DOT" com
Provider: ATTWS-TDMA&GSM/SPCS (I'm deciding)



Jerome Zelinske <[email protected]> wrote in article
<[email protected]>:
> Both cellular carriers in those states are tdma?
>
> Dan W. wrote:
> > Large chunks of Oklahoma, and Louisiana to name a couple.
> >
>

[posted via phonescoop.com - free web access to the alt.cellular groups]

They only have one cellular carrier? I thought almost everywhere
had two. I did not know there were any 1900 Mhz tdma carriers. It is
my understanding that alltel would be going cdma for their digital as
they like to make agreements with verizon.


Dan W. wrote:

> Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Texas have pretty much every kind of
> wireless-voice technology there is. However, the vast majority of it
> is, as you guessed, TDMA. The small Northern-Louisiana city (Pop 5000)
> that my aunt and uncle live in has two choices...AT&T 1900 TDMA/GSM or
> AllTell Analog. They are in the process of setting up CDMA there i
> believe (ON Alltell), but due to the size of the town, it's just slow
> going.
>
> In Oklahoma, the main highways are covered with CDMA and GSM, but a good
> chunk of I-35 from the Texas border to Norman, OK has NO AT&T TDMA/GSM
> coverage, yet plenty of TDMA, CDMA, GSM, iDEN, AMPS from other carriers.
> Apparently AT&T does not care if it's GSM customers actually drive
> between cities=) Until they get it built out, which i know takes time,
> they could at the very least provide GSM roaming agreements with T-Mob
> in the area, which they fail to see the necessity to do.
>
> My main problem with AT&T GSM at this point is that AT&T failed to
> create a massive roaming agreement with T-Mobile. Instead they created
> a piece-meal one with coverage in some places, but not others. I dont
> know if that was AT&T's doing or T-Mob's but my guess is T-Mob would
> love the roaming fees, and AT&T wanted to protect their bottom line.
>
> Here in North Texas the carriers with the most robust coverage are, dare
> i say, Cingular and Sprint, and for the record I'd use a sprint phone
> anyday of the week before i'd use a cingular one=)
>
> My parents took a trip to Fredricksburg, TX (West of Austin) this week.
> I called my Dad's AT&T GSM phone, no service, yet my Mom's Sprint phone
> worked like a charm. Granted this is an isolated example, and thats the
> main reason they have phones from different carriers, complete coverage
> on their travels from small town Texas to Austria. It would just be
> nice if one could get complete coverage, via romaing agreements and
> multiple function handsets, wherever you go.
>
> While Sprint has rubbed me wrong more than once over the years, (Can you
> say ****, err, i mean short mail?) i will say if i was going on a cross
> country trip, into no-mans land, i would take a sprint phone. Why?
> Because of thier complete and well integrated roaming agreements and
> ability to force the phone into analog. No credit card calls, no
> holding your hand over the antenna to try to get the phone to work in
> analog, etc.... My AT&T TDMA phone works great and has by far the most
> digital coverage of anything i've used, but it's inability to work in
> margional singla areas, and the inability to manually switch from TDMA
> to AMPS limits it's use in many situations.
>

No 1900 TDMA? Why do you think all AT&T TDMA phones have 1900 TDMA =)
--
Dan W.
North Texas
hominid7 "AT" hotmail "DOT" com
Provider: ATTWS-TDMA



Jerome Zelinske <[email protected]> wrote in article
<[email protected]>:
> They only have one cellular carrier? I thought almost everywhere
> had two. I did not know there were any 1900 Mhz tdma carriers. It is
> my understanding that alltel would be going cdma for their digital as
> they like to make agreements with verizon.
>
>
> Dan W. wrote:
>
> > Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Texas have pretty much every kind of
> > wireless-voice technology there is. However, the vast majority of it
> > is, as you guessed, TDMA. The small Northern-Louisiana city (Pop 5000)
> > that my aunt and uncle live in has two choices...AT&T 1900 TDMA/GSM or
> > AllTell Analog. They are in the process of setting up CDMA there i
> > believe (ON Alltell), but due to the size of the town, it's just slow
> > going.
> >
> > In Oklahoma, the main highways are covered with CDMA and GSM, but a good
> > chunk of I-35 from the Texas border to Norman, OK has NO AT&T TDMA/GSM
> > coverage, yet plenty of TDMA, CDMA, GSM, iDEN, AMPS from other carriers.
> > Apparently AT&T does not care if it's GSM customers actually drive
> > between cities=) Until they get it built out, which i know takes time,
> > they could at the very least provide GSM roaming agreements with T-Mob
> > in the area, which they fail to see the necessity to do.
> >
> > My main problem with AT&T GSM at this point is that AT&T failed to
> > create a massive roaming agreement with T-Mobile. Instead they created
> > a piece-meal one with coverage in some places, but not others. I dont
> > know if that was AT&T's doing or T-Mob's but my guess is T-Mob would
> > love the roaming fees, and AT&T wanted to protect their bottom line.
> >
> > Here in North Texas the carriers with the most robust coverage are, dare
> > i say, Cingular and Sprint, and for the record I'd use a sprint phone
> > anyday of the week before i'd use a cingular one=)
> >
> > My parents took a trip to Fredricksburg, TX (West of Austin) this week.
> > I called my Dad's AT&T GSM phone, no service, yet my Mom's Sprint phone
> > worked like a charm. Granted this is an isolated example, and thats the
> > main reason they have phones from different carriers, complete coverage
> > on their travels from small town Texas to Austria. It would just be
> > nice if one could get complete coverage, via romaing agreements and
> > multiple function handsets, wherever you go.
> >
> > While Sprint has rubbed me wrong more than once over the years, (Can you
> > say ****, err, i mean short mail?) i will say if i was going on a cross
> > country trip, into no-mans land, i would take a sprint phone. Why?
> > Because of thier complete and well integrated roaming agreements and
> > ability to force the phone into analog. No credit card calls, no
> > holding your hand over the antenna to try to get the phone to work in
> > analog, etc.... My AT&T TDMA phone works great and has by far the most
> > digital coverage of anything i've used, but it's inability to work in
> > margional singla areas, and the inability to manually switch from TDMA
> > to AMPS limits it's use in many situations.
> >
>

[posted via phonescoop.com - free web access to the alt.cellular groups]

I think we are both correct=) I just meant the corp. entity, which is
Verizon, is pretty new. Like you said, made up of other companies. In
my area a combination of GTE and PrimeCo.



--
Dan W.
North Texas
hominid7 "AT" hotmail "DOT" com
Provider: ATTWS-TDMA



"Bob Smith" <[email protected]> wrote in article
<[email protected]>:
>
> "Dan W." <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> > Sprint and SprintPCS are both older companies than Verizon.
>
> Not entirely correct Dan ... Prior to signing on with SPCS (when it became
> first available in Charlotte), I had coverage through Bell Atlantic Mobile
> (BAM), which later because Verizon. The only thing with makes Verizon newer
> is their name, which consolidated all their purchases across the country
> into one name ... Verizon.
>
> Bob
>
>

[posted via phonescoop.com - free web access to the alt.cellular groups]