AT&T Questions

ok i dont know all of these but ill try.

1. you can have one for away from the phone, and one for on the phone. im not sure if you can have more from there. but its easy to change.

2. im not sure about the forwarding, you would have to try it and see, but i have a feeling you would get the m2m

3. more than 60% roaming (talking) is grounds for termination, but its over months and months of it. data roaming is possible but its not desirable to be honest. the main roaming partner with att is Alltel GSM and its slower than EDGE.

4. the unlimited family text is unlimited text/vid/pics/and im to anyone on any network at anytime. there is no hidden charges.

5. unlimited PDA/Blackberry data is 30$ a month for unlimited.unlimited data on a flip or slider is $15 for unlimited. there is no cap. as i said, data roaming is possible but its not good. espically in comparison to EDGE or 3G, there is no comparison.

6. yes you can use voice and data simultaneously when on 3G. it is the only technology capable of this currently.

7. flip phones i like the CU515 and the v9. both are really nice, 3G, speaker, etc. depends how much you wanto spend also. for sliders, the LG Shine and the Moto Z9 and samsung 737 are very nice also. about flips again, the new samsung SLM and Sony z750a both look nice and have good cameras and features. all the phones i mentioned can do speaker, music, bluetooth, etc etc

for PDA's i am a blackberry nut so that is my number one recommendation. espically the 8820 bc of its wifi and gps, the only downfall to the 8820 is no camera. if camera is a must, then look at the Curve or the new pearl as they both have 2.0 cameras.

the treo 750 and Tilt are both really nice also, espically is you like touchscreens. and dont forget about the iPhone..

8. yes you can port in your numbers at any time. so if you wanto have 2 sets of phones for awhile just to test it out you certainly can. the fact that its a dobson area doesnt matter anymore afaik. they have integrated almost all of dobson and att from what ive read online.

 

3. Roaming
Voice.
Off-net Usage: If your minutes of use (including unlimited services) on other carrier networks ("off-net usage") during any two consecutive months exceeds your off-net usage allowance, AT&T may at its option terminate your service, deny your continued use of other carriers' coverage, or change your plan to one imposing usage charges for off-net usage. Your off-net usage allowance is equal to the lesser of 750 minutes or 40% of the Anytime Minutes included with your plan. AT&T will provide notice that it intends to take any of the above actions, and you may terminate the agreement.

Data & Messaging
Off-net usage: Except as expressly modified here, the terms set out in your rate plan and the terms of service control. If your usage of the services (including unlimited data and messaging plans) on other carrier's networks ("offnet usage") during any two consecutive months exceeds your offnet usage allowance, AT&T may at its option terminate your wireless service or access to data services, deny your continued use of other carriers' coverage, or change your plan to one imposing usage charges for offnet usage. Your offnet usage allowance is equal to the lesser of 6 megabytes or 20% of the kilobytes included with your plan, and for messaging plans the lesser of 3000 messages or 50% of the messages included with your plan.


8. If you purchase your phones from a third party such as Amazon, this type of porting is prohibited by their T&C and some additional charges may apply. Unless you're buying from AT&T directly, read the fine print very carefully.

 

considering hes in an area that there isnt even roaming, its nothing to worry about it.

im in an area where we have roaming, and it doesnt even ever come into use, when it does, it is very crappy and doesnt last long before it goes back to att or no service if in a real bad spot.

 

yea your gonna wanna port the numbers through an ATT retail store IMO. that way you know it is done correctly and they will give you a new sim card as well.

 

The issue is not where to port, the issue is only with "buy now, port later" scenario. If you buy and port at the same time, you can go through anybody — and you'll still get a new SIM card.

 

1. yes

2. yes if you buy and return to a corporate store

3. yes as long as its a corporate store

if you arent sure if they are corporate, just ask or you can call 611 and ask them for the nearest one.

 

Wirelessly posted (Treo 750: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows CE; IEMobile 7.6) UP.Link/6.3.1.17.0)

2. Yes you can, but if there is a difference in the percentage of sales tax then it makes a little difficult for the store, specially if you are returning to a higher sales tax area; which I think Chicago is.

If you are returning it to a lower tax area then you just lose the difference in taxes.

All the stores are setup to compute purchase & return based on local tax structure & thus the problem.

 

Gamer, sometimes the store will give you more than you had actually spent, sometimes they will manually reduce the the price of the phone to match up with the purchase receipt, sometimes they will not accept the the return.

If i were you I would time the purchase such that you can return it it if necessary to where you bought it from.

Makes sense?

 

Gamer, although the coverage in the major cities in Nebraska is excellent, it is not always native at&t. I think just out side Lincoln is where at&t starts roaming. Your sister should make sure that not only does at&t work work where she needs it but that it is native at&t and not roaming.

As dmapr explained earlier at&t does "ding" you for off-net usage of voice & data.

Good luck with whoever you decide to go with.

 

att doesnt let you control roaming so its always set to ATT. if your roaming, sometimes you can tell, it depends on the phone.

 

Its a Motorola, it should be able to be hacked to allow the display of the network name, instead of displaying AT&T all the time. I know on my older Motorola phones I've done this.

-Jay

 

Unfortunately no at&t phones tell you when it is roaming without some sort of hacking. It reads the network off the SIM card and so it always says "at&t". For a while there, you could request to have the right code activated on your account so it would show "Cingular Extend", I don't know if this option is still available. Since your sister is away in college it might be possible to have this done for her.

The Motorolas are easy to modify to read the actual network, on my WM5 devices I have the Field Test Menu and I get the MNC codes from that. I think she will be fine if Lincoln is the farthwest west she goes.

 

yea they are right, its hard to tell. i can tell on my blackberry, but only bc instead of saying EDGE, it says GSM, but both ways it says att

 

LOL. I remember that... I think that must have been the longest distance seem edit ever... You emailed me the seems, I edited & emailed them back...

-Jay

 

The feature code is 4EON — it may make it easier for the CS person to look it up.

LOL, I had once done a coast-to-coast seem edit (for a New Yorker)

 

Yes....4EON. I have this on both my phone lines....this way when we roam, the display shows "Off Network". When I know that...then I can dial and find out who I am on.

If you tell the CS rep that your sister is in Nebraska and you want to know if she is roaming so you don't get into trouble, a good rep will know this and add it...like they did for me. If they don't know, just tell them its the 4EON code....I think it means "for extended off network" something or another.

I miss my motorolas

 

You got us beat then... Our edit was only about 1,000 miles.

-Jay

 

In email terms the difference is negligible. Now if we were shipping the edits on CDs using USPS, it would've been worth the bragging rights

 

Yes sir...the code is free. I guess it is considered more of a function then an actual "feature".

No problem Erik! Good luck with it all!

 

I've never heard of any limitation with regards to number of lines that can have 4EON on them, so you should be fine as long as they still add this feature. As Shizam has already answered, there's no fee for it.

 

LOL, if shipping was to be involved I just tell people to ship me the phone, $30, and what they want done to it.

-Jay