Cell Phone Circus

[Vagabound]

One step forward, two steps back ...

In addition to the van shopping shenanigans in Phoenix, I had some "fun" with my cell phone today.  After I landed in Phoenix, the next day I went out to get cell service.  Planned to buy a prepaid SIM and use it with my existing Acer phone.  Turns out, that wasn't easily possible.

Wound up first in a Worst Buy store.  The guy there was pretty knowledgeable, finally sold me on a new, starter Motorola G Play/G4 Play (can't remember) and Verizon Pre-Paid / 2GB / $45 per month.  Then, once the deal was agreed to, he checked stock, and yeah, no phone.  In his words, "I made the classic mistake -- sold something I don't have."  Grrrr.  So, I wandered over to the Target store next door and discovered a similar cell phone department.   They had the same package, but actually in stock.  Bought it, and then simmered in a jet lag/flu daze while the buffoons in that department took literally 1-2 hours to activate a prepaid phone.  Finally, it worked.  I escaped in haste.

Been using it for two weeks, for phone and Internet.  Seemed more or less OK, except the MyVerizon app wouldn't work.  It couldn't even recognize the phone.  After hours of trying, nothing would fix it, neither Target staff, nor Verizon proper staff.  Finally went back and got a refund tonight, also erasing all data in the process, and now no phone.  What fun.  

So, Phone Shopping -- Take 2:

I got Verizon because of all the comments in these forums about Verizon being the best for remote areas.  That said, Verizon's customer service sucks donkey xxxxxxxxxx.  They have been a nightmare of purgatory and ineptitude to deal with.

Two main options in mind at the moment:

Option 1:
My Acer phone from abroad couldn't be used with Verizon -- basic technical incompatibility -- which is what started this whole fiasco.  It is GSM-based, whereas Verizon is CDMA-based.  However, AT&T and T-Mobile both use GSM, like my old phone.  So, I'm considering switching to one of those, prepaid plan, use it with my old Acer phone, and see what happens in terms of coverage.  Good:  Don't need to buy another phone.  Bad:  Less geographical coverage maybe.

Option 2:
Buy a Google Nexus (version?) and combine it with whatever prepaid plan seems best, maybe even dystopian Verizon again.  Good:  Like the reliability and the instant Android updates from Google.  Bad:  Have to buy a phone and I don't like Huawei.

A bit battle-worn, but a bit wiser as well.  

Any evaluation of my two options above?  Other better options?  Suggestions before I head out to the cell phone front lines again?

Vagabound

 

[djkeev]

Old saying is that the cheapest car to own is the one in your driveway.

I'll venture this is true for cell phones too.
Activate the phone you own.
I've had AT&T (or one of it's predecessors) since the 1990's. Whatever company I had gets sold to another, I've had about five carriers but I've never changed.

My cellular works fine, AT&T or Verizon?
Six of one, half a dozen of the other.

Dave

 

[Optimistic Paranoid]

I'd say save your money and go with option 1 - for now at least.  Supposedly, AT&Ts coverage is nearly as good as Verizon's these days.

If you want to really get into it all, I recommend Technomadia's book:

https://www.amazon.com/Mobile-Inter...F8&qid=1478341203&sr=8-1&keywords=Technomadia

 

[BradKW]

I generally feel good about giving tmobile my business, in support of how they single handedly turned cell phone pricing plans and included features upside down across the industry. Except for Verizon of course, who manages to stretch out the old model of conning, bullying, and scaring people into paying far more for equal service.

Which is why I will avoid Verizon unless I don't have a choice...I will invest in range extenders if I find service spotty before throwing in the towel and giving the 800lb gorilla my money.

Anywho...

Explosion risk aside, Samsung makes the best Android phone atm, but 2nd tier companies are turning out really good products for half the price. Huawei's US offerings have been solid phones, but the problems with Nexus 6 can only be pinned on the Google design team. Better off going with a Nexus 5 off ebay, or the new Pixel which is replacing the Nexus line.

Or just stick a new SIM in your old phone for now and see how it works out...costs very little to procrastinate

 

[Optimistic Paranoid]

Interestingly enough, Technomadia has reported that so many RV'ers have Verizon - because of it's reputation for better coverage - that often when you're in a regular campground, Verizon is slow as molasses because there are too many people trying to use it at the same time.  If there's AT&T coverage, it usually screams along because very few people are trying to use it.

 

[LeeRevell]

Since switching from my old cheapo dumbphone on Net10 "pay as you go" plan, to Verizon and my Samsung Galaxy series smartphones, I have been generally pleased, with the occasional "oopsie!" along the way.
Maybe that old situation of "going with the devil you know". Works for me so far.

 

[Almost There]

Just to try to offer some empathy, I went through the exact same thing last fall when I hit the Verizon store on my entry to the US for the winter.

I had been told by at least half a dozen knowledgeable people that my Samsung G4 phone bought from Virgin Mobile here in Canada would work on Verizon in the US, simply swap out the sim cards semi-annually and I'd be good to go!

Not so said Verizon, won't work on our system. I ended up with an HTC phone from Verizon because it was one of the low end price range that had a wifi hotspot on it. I had budgeted $200. for a jetpack so I came out even dollarwise.

After much finagling and stress I ended up with a 'no contract' deal with unlimited talk/text and 3G of data for $45. a month. Don't want a contract because I'm only on Verizon for 6 months.

My first stop Tuesday after clearing customs will be the Verizon store to arm-wrestle them again for this seasons service....

 

[djkeev]

And...... Your Canadian cell service providers seem to be just as unhelpful to American travelers as the American providers are to you.

Maybe it's time for a change seeing as to how we are separated via an imaginary yet very visible clear cut line through the borders forests and an occassional bouy/fence/gate/bridge.



Dave

 

[Vagabound]

Good advice, everybody.  OP:  Like the twist about Verizon in RV parks.  Sort of makes sense.  I am a true believer in off-peak everything.

A supplement to the story for those interested in Verizon prepaid:

I quickly glossed over this part in my first post.  Long story short, when the phone was originally set up by Worst Buy, it was done wrong, but managed to work somehow.  That astonished the Verizon (V) techs because they couldn't understand how the phone would be working at all.  

When I first contacted V, tech support had nothing useful to say or do.  And they also said that they only have Tier 1 and Tier 2 tech support and so no ability to escalate, which I don't believe, but T2 wasn't very good.  Called back later and spoke to another T2 tech.  He at least noticed that a lot of technical info, such as IMEI and ICCID, was missing from my account profile, so no specific handset was associated with my account (though they were charging me on my data allowance).  In an attempt to fix my problem, the nice T2 tech asked for and added all necessary technical info to my account on their end.  He then told me to reboot the phone, activate it when it restarted, and he'd call me back.  

I rebooted the phone, and when it came back up, I pressed the "Continue" button on the Activation screen.  That gave me an error message, something like "This device is incompatible with Verizon ...".  In case it ain't clear, that killed what phone and Internet service I had up to that point.  So, no call back from Verizon as it was impossible at that point.

Overall, I found the Target (store) Mobile department staff, at two different stores, to be wholly incompetent.  The Verizon techs at the 800# only a bit better, but that was after long holds on the phone waiting on them and listening to their recorded sincerity tell me how important my business was to them ... about 492 times.

The other limitation, which caused me to use big box stores to do this in the first place, is that, according to the big box stores anyway, actual Verizon stores don't sell unlocked phones.  I never tried to confirm or debunk that.

One task for today -- check out the prepaid plans with AT&T and T-Mobile.  See if I can get my old phone breathing again.

And I guess Cricket is a possibility now, as it seems to be AT&T wearing different clothes.  Any thoughts on them?

Vagabound

 

[rvwandering]

We've had At&T for years and unlike many of the reports we've found the service coverage to be very good. We travel a lot and spend time both in cities and out in the boondocks. The only place that we have a real problem is in the Pacific Northwest but I've heard complaints from Verizon users about that area too.

 TMobile's unlimited plans have shaken up the industry a bit so after struggling to stay under a 5G cap we finally upgraded to 16Gs with no overages, just a slow down after the 16G are used. It's still expensive but we're getting 11 more gbs for only $40.00 more compared to our old plan where each extra gb over our plan would cost $10.00.
https://www.att.com/shop/wireless/data-plans.html

 

[jimindenver]

My main line is Cricket. I have the 10 gig plan with hotspot for $65 a month. The other half has the unlimited plan with no hotspot for the same monthly cost. I'll likely switch to that since with a blue tooth keyboard and mouse plus mirror casting I don't really need a computer for cruising the net. Cricket does not roam like AT&T so there are areas that the towers are owed by a small networks and Cricket will not work. Cricket does have a unlimited 128k throttled speed once you use up your allotment. It's usable for the basics and even music streaming.

 

[Suanne]

I'd been a decades-long T-Mobile customer for my smart phone. But, a few years back I got a Verizon jetpack because T-Mobile didn't have the coverage I needed on BLM land in the desert SW. Except for Pahrump, NV where I got great T-Mobile data.

Last week I switched my smart phone to Verizon too. I will miss T-Mobile's unlimited data when in Pahrump.

Since my old Nexus 4 doesn't work on the Verizon GSM network, I bought a Moto G4 from amazon. The site said that it would get 4G LTE on Verizon's network. Not so; I only get 3G. I've called Verizon techs, as well as visited a Verizon store yesterday to try a different SIM card. Now I'm in the market for another phone. So, watching this thread for any good ideas (for me, needs to be <= 5.1" and have a decent camera).

Yes, it really is a "Cell Phone Circus" out there

 

[jimindenver]

I will add that if I just needed talk and text on Verizon, that I would get the cheapest Sprint unlimited talk and text plan available. Sprint roams on Verizon for talk and text, just not data.

 

[Vagabound]

Good info.  The first hand accounts really add a lot, in my opinion.

Jim: AT&T also has the 128K throttling after you reach your plan limit.  I was just reading about it on their prepaid GoPhone plan page.

Suanne:  My newest "old" phone, from Target, was a Moto G Play 4.  FWIW, the one thing that phone did right, at least according to the indicator icons on the top of the screen, is LTE.  It did work on the 4G/LTE network in Phoenix by default.  However, someone somewhere along the way in this circus told me that Moto has two phones, nearly identically named, with different features. Never checked that out and don't need to now. If you have the wrong one, that might explain your 4G problems. Hope the thread can help you, too.

Vagabound

 

[jimindenver]

The unlimited throttled data after your allotment is great, especially if you are a low use user. You can get a unlimited talk and text plan with Cricket with one gig of data for $30. The unlimited data after that one gig will keep you on the forums, reading emails and listening to music all month. You can even watch you tube if you pause it and let it load. My T-mobile hotspot has the same but averages 256k where the Cricket is a strict 128k. I believe AT&T and their other MVNO uses a 256k throttle.

 

[KASibson]

We use Ting they've got a stupid name but they're a good company.
They're a pay as you go plan where you pay for what you use. They piggyback on TMobile's towers so they have the same coverage T-Mobile does.
They don't finance out a phone like the subscription services do, you'll either need to bring an unlocked phone that you've already got or purchase one (from them or elsewhere).

Our bill went from about $180 for two people to $30.

 

[Vagabound]

The unlimited throttled data after your allotment is great, especially if you are a low use user. You can get a unlimited talk and text plan with Cricket with one gig of data for $30. The unlimited data after that one gig will keep you on the forums, reading emails and listening to music all month. You can even watch you tube if you pause it and let it load. My T-mobile hotspot has the same but averages 256k where the Cricket is a strict 128k. I believe AT&T and their other MVNO uses a 256k throttle.

Read 128K on AT&T's GoPhone page today.  Footnote # 2 at the following link:

http://www.att.com/shop/wireless/gophone-plans.html

After my Verizon fiasco, this last week, I decided to sign up with AT&T today -- prepaid GoPhone account using my old phone. Clean, quick, professional activation, done at an AT&T store. Won't ever try to buy a phone plus service in a big box department store again. Reminds me of an old saying -- "Everytime you make something idiot-proof, somebody makes a better idiot."

So far, so good.  $40 a month on auto-pay got me 4GB of data.  Not bad, relatively speaking. Also, they do roll over unused data for one month only. Not truly cumulative. Goes to the _end_ of the next month's data allotment, so you never get to use your rolled-over data allowance unless you exhaust the new month's data first.

That said, I've barely started dipping my toe in the Hotspot Swamp. Another battle for another day.

Vagabound

 

[akrvbob]

There is no way in hell I will ever have anyone but Verizon. Had a friend travel with us through Oregon boondocking in National Forests. She never once had service on ATT while we never had less than 3 bars of 4G.

I recently drive I-84 across Oregon and I-15 across Utah to Nevada. Then drove across Nevada on I-80, one of the least populated places in the country--NO ONE IS THERE! I specifically checked it for Verizon signal the whole way, and I mean I checked it often.

I never once saw less than 1 bar of 4g, and most of the time it's 3-5 bars--I couldn't believe how many towers there are. Every evening I started watching for a campsite in the desert close to a tower. All three nights all three nights on the freeway I went to sleep literally looking right at the tower with 5 bars of 4g.

No way in hell will I ever go with anyone but Verizon.

 

[Spacedredd]

Vagabond,

I feel your pain.  I use to me a Telecom manager in the USAF.  I had to manage our wireless services.  I consolidated a number of different carriers, cell phones, and even pagers.  This was about 20 years ago and the best carrier even in those days was Verizon.  So fast forward  to 2009-10, I was an OTR Long Haul Truck driver.  I had an AT&T prepaid and my co-driver had Verizon.  He always had connectivity.  So in 2012 I had to upgrade to a smart phone.  The two years b4 I had Verizon prepaid Voice/TXT.  It was a steady $45 a month. I wanted to keep my same ph# from my flip phone to a new smartphone. I was able to do it but it took the Verizon store over 3 hours to setup my smartphone for a prepaid and keep my old ph#.

Verizon really doesn't like the prepaid plans.  They want everyone to have a contract.  It easier that way for them.  Their training and marketing and business model is based upon the contract.  I really do feel your pain in this cell phone circus. I finally in 2015 bit the bullet and upgrade my phone to a Samsung S5 and started the contract.  My bill is about $85 every month w/rollover for the data.  I really hope everything will work for you in your cell phone dilemma..

Dredd

 

[jimindenver]

Verizon has pre paid and there are secondary sellers like page plus or straight talk. None roame and the MVNO's are limited to 5 Mbps. I have not idea yet of hotspot use, etc.