Mobile Phone Rant

[Griffin NoName]

The codes are the same across all providers as I understand it. Like they seem to be "standard" "global" codes. Maybe not Japan.

Except now there's New Voicemail with extra bits in the codes........   

I'm afraid age and tenacity does not include bothering to find out why New Voicemail has extra bits in the codes.

[Sibling Chatty]

Bob,

We HATESES the AT&T.

I want Cingulair back.

AT&T said they DID NOT cut a single tower when they took over. Hmmm? Before, I could drive here to Brenham or Bryan, and talk the whole way. from the day they took over--nope!

It's a little better now, though. They took down a tower near the south end of the lake--no houses, not a lot 'visible' out there. Except the drilling rig with 95 plus people ALL using that tower's communications capability. No landlines out there. Oh, and the 20 or so homes that are semi-subterranean, with grass roofs. No, they didn't even check the usage records for the towers, just the geography--and no topography. That AT&T tower over the BIG hill was supposed to cover that area...yeah, right.

AT&T sucks.

Oh, and 1/3 of ALL my calls go directly to VM, and it doesn't notify, and it only tells you about it half the time after that. You go to check the one VM you think is there, and there may be three...

I'm almost desperate enough to get a land-line again.

[Griffin NoName]

That's not a service. That's a disservice.

[Sibling Chatty]

I keep tellin' 'em that...

On the plus side, the AT&T customer service people are now so sure that I'm a scary Evil Beeyoch that I can probably get them to Fix It quickly, whatever It is.

After they denied that we lost signal between here and Brenham, I drove it, stopping every mile to call in (one poor soul gave me a direct to his desk number) and report. I warned him that for every stop I made and had NO SIGNAL, he'd get a double chewing out for lying to me about the towers taken off line.

3 calls/7 miles later, he admitted that nobody had accounted for the topography or the lake. (Sprint customers here actually get a lot of their coverage from bounce-back of signals off the lake. AT&T's towers are in the wrong place for it to work for them.)

I've told him I will do the same for the Bryan drive when I have an accomplice to help, since it's a 2 lane road. I think I made him cry.

[pieces o nine]

Sometimes, evil can be used for good...

[Griffin NoName]

You could make him cry by sending in your bill for mapping their territory for them.

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

I'm almost desperate enough to get a land-line again.

If you have broadband you may wanna try something like Vonage or any other VOIP provider. It is significantly cheaper and works quite well (as long as your internet connection works well).

I hated Bell South/Cingular and dropped them for incompetence with my DSL service first, and cell phone later. T-Mobile is by no means perfect but they are not as abusive as BS/Cingular/ATT.

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

Bob,

We HATESES the AT&T.

I'll echo that sentiment, and in spades.

Way back when cell phones were new-ish (1999) I started out with AT&T, who didn't really own any towers-- they leased access from the likes of T-mobile and so forth.

Had good coverage, then.

Along comes Cingular a few years later, and buys the customers from AT&T (which is what basically happened).   Oh, AT&T had actually built some towers of their own elsewhere, but 'round here, they mostly leased 'em from someone else's network.

Now, I'm a Cingular customer.  Imagine that?

Later still, I'm back to AT&T but after they trimmed all the "extra" towers from their service.... supposedly this was a cost reduction thing?  I dunno.  What I do know is that I experience many of the same things you do:  frequent direct-to-voicemail calls, frequent dropped calls (if they are lengthy).

In fact, I can count on a dropped call at or around 9pm daily.  Doesn't matter the length, either-- at 9-ish, my call will drop. Period.  (If I'm at home.)  I strongly suspect it has to do with a sudden increase in traffic-- but geesh.  Shouldn't a person already on the phone get priority?

Apparently not....

I may just have to start reporting my troubles.  I know, when I worked for Cing, they had a special que just for dropped calls-- the regular reps were supposed to fill out a dropped-call ticket.  (whether they did this or not?  Unknown.... I suppose a 2nd call to confirm?  No-- now that I recall, it'd just be a crap-shoot if the 2nd call rep filled one out or not.....gotta keep that Almighty Call Time Down-- No Matter What.....bleah....iswhyIdon'tworkforthemanymore... conflicting "goals")

But, the "official" policy at Cingular (now AT&T-- same bunch, different name*) is that you (as a customer) should report ALL dropped calls so the rep writes up a trouble ticket.

You may wish to start doing this, Chatty.  It's the ONLY way they have to learn there's problems.


__________________________

<sub>* somewhat amusing, the cycle of events.  AT&T had a large pool of lease agreements with other cell carriers for their customer's usage.  This was prior to Cingular buying them out.   They owned a few towers of their own, mostly in the West. The rest were lease-exchange agreements.  AT&T decides it needs to "trim the fat" and sells this customer-base and the owned towers to Cingular, for an undisclosed amount.  Cingular is not a public company, but is wholly owned by several Baby Bells, back East, mainly Southwestern Bell, or SWBC. (and Cingular was built out of a collaboration of any number of small, regional cell companies, but that's another story.)   Fast forward a coupl'a years, and AT&T, now with more cash after dumping it's profit-loosing branches, decides to re-purchase ownership of those Baby Bells.   It does so, and as result, acquires ownership of the Assets of those companies-- including Cingular.

Now a savvy person would say that all this was the Long Term Plans of AT&T all along.

Except that US companies RARELY have Long Term Plans-- if it ain't about Next Quarter, They Ain't Interested.

You may decide this for yourself....</sub>