Tmobile Service/coverage Pirep?

[AirBaker]

I've been totally happy with Verizon, but a little bummed they do not have the Blackberry(s) that I'm looking at. I'm definitely not going back to cingular, but might consider Tmobile. Any word on how they in regards to customer service or coverage?

 

[wsuffa]

Customer service, excellent.
Coverage, not nearly as good as VZ.

I had a TMo Blackberry for several years and was pretty happy with the service. But it didn't work everywhere. Internationally, it was far better than the alternatives.

 

[AirBaker]

Thanks Bill. Their wi-fi hotspot @ home thing sounds pretty cool. I've got decent internet access at home but lousy cell coverage. Would work out well for me.

 

[ScottM]

Customer service, excellent.
Coverage, not nearly as good as VZ.

I had a TMo Blackberry for several years and was pretty happy with the service. But it didn't work everywhere. Internationally, it was far better than the alternatives.

That may be true but since T-Mobile is using GSM the roaming is superior to any other technology and the price for roaming is not outrageous. Keep in mind that there is far more GSM coverage in the world than there is all other technologies combined.

I travel throughout the US and the world and there are very few spots were I cannot get coverage.

 

[wsuffa]

That may be true but since T-Mobile is using GSM the roaming is superior to any other technology and the price for roaming is not outrageous. Keep in mind that there is far more GSM coverage in the world than there is all other technologies combined.

I travel throughout the US and the world and there are very few spots were I cannot get coverage.

Yeah, but GSM is far better in other countries than it is here.

I've got both a VZ phone (because it still has analog capabilities when I end up at that airport deep in the hills) and a TMo phone. There are significant coverage holes on TMo, though they were working on a roaming deal with that other big GSM carrier.

The nice thing about a BBerry is that it'll download stuff when you get coverage, even for relatively short periods of time, meaning that it works better in some places than voice.

 

[ScottM]

Yeah, but GSM is far better in other countries than it is here.

That is not a GSM phenomenon

In outher countries coverage has been better no matter what tech they used. In the early days most Asian countries put ETACS (an analog cell tech) in the subway tunnels and building elevator chutes to ensure coverage everywhere. The change over to handsets happened very early over here (I am in Asia right now) where as in the US we used car phones until the late 90's. I still US deployments looking to cover roads first, pedestrian areas second, and then in building. That is pretty much the exact way that euro and asian operators approach system deployment.

BTW in the US we have about 70% of the country in cell coverage (all tech combined). Pretty much east of the Mississippi we have better than 80% coverage.

 

[SkyHog]

If you include the domestic roaming agreements, and the areas served by them (which are included without any additional charge on all T-Mobile plans except the regional plans), I'd wager that the service area is almost as good as Verizon (Verizon, being the huge CDMA provider that it is, likely still has a slightly better area). T-Mobile has roaming agreements with both Cingular and Alltel, as well as a bunch of smaller regional mobile operators.

For customer service, I rarely hear complaints, and when I do hear a complaint it is usually followed by at least 10 people saying that complaint is ridiculous. Look around at the forums elsewhere on the internet.

FWIW, I work for T-Mo, and we are trained at all times that courtesy and concern are the most important facets of our jobs. I've worked for many, many, many call centers, and I must say that T-Mo is the ONLY company that has focus on courtesy, and actually follows through on that commitment.

I may be biased. But for those that knew me, I was never this loyal to Comcast.

 

[wsuffa]

That is not a GSM phenomenon

In outher countries coverage has been better no matter what tech they used. ...
..............
BTW in the US we have about 70% of the country in cell coverage (all tech combined). Pretty much east of the Mississippi we have better than 80% coverage.

And much of that better coverage & deployment was driven by the monopolistic control that the country governments held over the (land based) telecom systems. Mobile phones - driven especially by GSM - offered truly competitive service to the state-owned telecom networks. Better pricing, better features, better service. There's a reason that there was much greater penetration of mobile phones in Europe in the early days.

70% is about right nationally. The biggest holes in the east are mountain areas (Adirondacks, Maine, WV, etc). Out west, it's the sparsly populated mountain and plains areas. Heck, there are even some holes where there is no FM radio coverage, much less mobile phones.

Digital phone coverage is even less. While it's pretty good along major highways, there are some pretty significant rural areas where all you get is analog (including a mountain valley near some property I own...). Since I traverse some of those areas "often enough", I do maintain a phone that will revert to analog. And I have used the analog service when picking up a clearance in the airplane more than a few times....

 

[ScottM]

Digital phone coverage is even less. While it's pretty good along major highways, there are some pretty significant rural areas where all you get is analog (including a mountain valley near some property I own...). Since I traverse some of those areas "often enough", I do maintain a phone that will revert to analog. And I have used the analog service when picking up a clearance in the airplane more than a few times....

Well when you no longer get your analog coverage starting in Feb you know who to blame?

That would be me.

As of Feb 2008 the requirement to maintain analog coverage the 800MHz band will go away. Don't expect it to be turned off right away all around the country. But there will be a fairly fast cut over. The current need is for digital capacity.

 

[wsuffa]

Well when you no longer get your analog coverage starting in Feb you know who to blame?

That would be me.

As of Feb 2008 the requirement to maintain analog coverage the 800MHz band will go away. Don't expect it to be turned off right away all around the country. But there will be a fairly fast cut over. The current need is for digital capacity.

Until it disappears, I'll still maintain the phone that has analog rollover. The need for digital capacity is principally in the larger population centers (and where the cell carrier was too cheap to split the cells....) And the rural areas are precisely where the analog feature is valuable.

You're only one of a few to blame. Were I still doing work in the telecom field, I might well have (still) been representing some of the carriers.

 

[AirBaker]

Interesting... I originally had ATT back when they were a TDMA carrier and then moved to the GSM platform. The ATT/Cingular GSM platform just sucked IMO. I've always attributed this to the carrier and not the technology which is why I'm thinking of switching. Verizon has been great and I'm hesitant to give that up. The only place I haven't had service was Kemmerer, WY when stopping for fuel. If they'd just get the cool phones, I'd stay.

 

[ScottM]

You're only one of a few to blame.

Yeah but I wrote the new section and got it on the agenda along with lobbying for the votes to get it passed.

 

[N621j]

In my area (around Augusta, GA), T-Mobile coverage stinks. There are large holes in the coverage if you get away from the interstate. I have to go outside to use my phone at home reliably, and at work I have to sit still in one corner of my office to keep it from droping out. With that said, I still use T-Mobile because they have great phones, plans and their customer service is great.

 

[Ghery]

Yeah but I wrote the new section and got it on the agenda along with lobbying for the votes to get it passed.

You're even more evil than I am. I just chair meetings where we write standards, and then participate in trying to influence regulators. Hope you're not dealing with the BSMI while you're in Taiwan.

 

[ScottM]

You're even more evil than I am. I just chair meetings where we write standards, and then participate in trying to influence regulators. Hope you're not dealing with the BSMI while you're in Taiwan.

Nope not with them at all. It is a WiMAX Forum event and they Taiwanese are nots for the technology. I am on the BoD of the Forum and it is a little like being a rock star when I am at these events. The Taiwanese keep wanting to meet with me. I am at the airport now and will board my flight in less than an hour. Home at last!!

I like doing the regulatory work as well as the standards work. If I went over to full regulatory I would be happy. Part 22 stuff was easy, part 68 was a PIA, ITU stuff, well that is graduate school level politics isn't??!!!

I did a lpot of overseas regulatory stuff. I dealt with what today is now the MPT in China (mainland). I actually got to work with a few long marchers when I started over there and saw the old school commies and not the new freemarket captilist commies that are there now.

 

[iflyatiger]

I changed to T-Mobile last year from old at&t analog.

The main reason I switched was to get the Blackberry Pearl. I love this phone !

T-Mobile customer service has been unbelievably good and it has motivated me to accept some less than perfect signal areas. But since I have had their service they have put in a cell that gives me excellent coverage at work and a new cell is going up that will bring me from 1-2 bars to full bars at my home.

If it is the Pearl that you like Verizon should be getting there version very soon, so you might not need to switch ?

I've been totally happy with Verizon, but a little bummed they do not have the Blackberry(s) that I'm looking at. I'm definitely not going back to cingular, but might consider Tmobile. Any word on how they in regards to customer service or coverage?

 

[wayne]

I had T-Mobile, but switched to Verizon. I liked T-Mobile, but I found myself in more and more places with no coverage. Landed at an untowered airport and couldn't cancel my IFR flightplan.

ATC started calling and got someone there and they found me at the airport.

After that I was done with T-Mobile. My Verizon plan is more expensive, and a few less minutes, but I've been able to have connections everywhere I've been so far. That's a necessity when I'm trying to launch in IMC from a small airport.

 

[sba55]

FWIW, I work for T-Mo, and we are trained at all times that courtesy and concern are the most important facets of our jobs. I've worked for many, many, many call centers, and I must say that T-Mo is the ONLY company that has focus on courtesy, and actually follows through on that commitment.

I may be biased. But for those that knew me, I was never this loyal to Comcast.

T-Mobile's customer services used to be amazing. It's still far better than, say, Verizon's, but it has declined a bit over the last few years.

Is there a good and effective way to relate concerns about complete customer relation failures to T-Mobile? I bought a new phone a few months ago (my old one was falling apart), but when I tried to install GMail on it, it wouldn't let me connect to the internet. It's obvious if you look around online a bit why that is (the gmail app hasn't been signed with the right certificate and T-Mobile modified the stock Samsung firmware to prevent "untrusted" applications from accessing the network).

I called customer service about this because I felt like I had been lied to about the phone's capabilities. Their response - it's Google's problem. It's clearly not since T-Mobile crippled the phone. The guy wouldn't even acknowledge the fact that they shipped the phone with this restrictive firmware, let alone admit that there was a problem with not informing customers about this restriction.

My faith in T-Mobile's customer service is a bit shaken now. I've been a customer for 5 years, so you'd expect not to be treated like an idiot.

-Felix

 

[SkyHog]

T-Mobile's customer services used to be amazing. It's still far better than, say, Verizon's, but it has declined a bit over the last few years.

Is there a good and effective way to relate concerns about complete customer relation failures to T-Mobile? I bought a new phone a few months ago (my old one was falling apart), but when I tried to install GMail on it, it wouldn't let me connect to the internet. It's obvious if you look around online a bit why that is (the gmail app hasn't been signed with the right certificate and T-Mobile modified the stock Samsung firmware to prevent "untrusted" applications from accessing the network).

I called customer service about this because I felt like I had been lied to about the phone's capabilities. Their response - it's Google's problem. It's clearly not since T-Mobile crippled the phone. The guy wouldn't even acknowledge the fact that they shipped the phone with this restrictive firmware, let alone admit that there was a problem with not informing customers about this restriction.

My faith in T-Mobile's customer service is a bit shaken now. I've been a customer for 5 years, so you'd expect not to be treated like an idiot.

-Felix

This is not official support from T-Mobile, however, the problem you are experiencing is easily solved by subscribing to T-Zones Pro (also known as T-Mobile Internet). The gmail app uses GPRS to connect instead of SMS, as most phones which come stock with gmail connectivity. All sites are blocked from access to the internet unless you subscribe to T-Mobile Internet.

Its usually $9.95 per month more to get unlimited access to the entire internet.

The other option you have is using myEmail. This will actually SMS you your Email from gMail.

There are no crippling firmware additions added to any T-Mobile phones. The phones come with the firmware the factory adds, and T-Mobile adds configurations to the phone that allow access to certain internet features like MMS and WAP. The only exception is changes to Motorola devices where menu options are changed around sometimes (the RIZR is a prime example), but other Service Providers do the same thing (Verizon moves the browser on RAZRs into "Office Tools" menu for example).

I hope this helps.

 

[sba55]

This is not official support from T-Mobile, however, the problem you are experiencing is easily solved by subscribing to T-Zones Pro (also known as T-Mobile Internet). The gmail app uses GPRS to connect instead of SMS, as most phones which come stock with gmail connectivity. All sites are blocked from access to the internet unless you subscribe to T-Mobile Internet.

Its usually $9.95 per month more to get unlimited access to the entire internet.

The other option you have is using myEmail. This will actually SMS you your Email from gMail.

There are no crippling firmware additions added to any T-Mobile phones. The phones come with the firmware the factory adds, and T-Mobile adds configurations to the phone that allow access to certain internet features like MMS and WAP. The only exception is changes to Motorola devices where menu options are changed around sometimes (the RIZR is a prime example), but other Service Providers do the same thing (Verizon moves the browser on RAZRs into "Office Tools" menu for example).

I hope this helps.

Thanks!

I already have the 9.99 option. I'm fairly sure that they are in fact messing around with the firmware. A search on google confirms this.

I have the Samsung T629; a friend of mine has the non-branded version of that phone. The Gmail app works on his.

What's also interesting is that the Google Maps application did not used to work, but the most recent version available for download does. What happens is that, in the security settings for the application, the option "Always disallow network access" is selected and, for Gmail, it cannot be changed. The Gmail application also shows up as being an "untrusted application" (Google Maps used to have this problem, but the newest version is "trusted").

It's not a huge issue, as I can get my email by going through T-Zones. That is slower though, so I would have expected them to tell me that I can't use applications they don't like with this phone.

Nothing personal. Thanks for trying to help, I appreciate it!

Best,

-Felix

 

[alaskaflyer]

This is not official support from T-Mobile, however, the problem you are experiencing is easily solved by subscribing to T-Zones Pro (also known as T-Mobile Internet). The gmail app uses GPRS to connect instead of SMS, as most phones which come stock with gmail connectivity. All sites are blocked from access to the internet unless you subscribe to T-Mobile Internet.

Its usually $9.95 per month more to get unlimited access to the entire internet.

The other option you have is using myEmail. This will actually SMS you your Email from gMail.

There are no crippling firmware additions added to any T-Mobile phones. The phones come with the firmware the factory adds, and T-Mobile adds configurations to the phone that allow access to certain internet features like MMS and WAP. The only exception is changes to Motorola devices where menu options are changed around sometimes (the RIZR is a prime example), but other Service Providers do the same thing (Verizon moves the browser on RAZRs into "Office Tools" menu for example).

I hope this helps.

If your phone has an SMS email address e.g. yourmobilephonenumber@dobson.cellularone.net gmail will do that on its own.