Well i just bought my new phone (tm506) yesterday. I really liked it untill today. When i was at school i had "Emergency Calls Only". I couldn't send texts or make phone calls. What i don't get is other people at my school has AT&T, Sprint, or Verizon. They all have 3-5 bars. I don't understand why i don't. One of the teachers at the school also had T-mobile and she has bars. Edit - I also will have full bars at the time. Im not very smart with phones so please don't question me if i sound stupid. All help appreciated.
You are probably in an area where TMobile does not allow roaming on other systems. In my area, for example, I cannot roam onto AT&T because TMobile and AT&T does not have a roaming agreement in my area. Is your teacher able to make/receive calls? If the teacher is able to make calls, then your phone could be the culprit. Or it could be the plan. If you're on prepaid and the other person is on a monthly plan... the prepaid user may not be able to make calls. The coverage areas for prepaid and postpaid are almost the same, so the plan may not be the problem.
Take your phone back, it shouldn't be doing that but you may replace your sim as this is a 3g phone and if your previous phone was not 3g there are some known issues with the sony ericson having this error a new sim will probably resolve it but remember you only have 14 days to return the phone
Yes quint, my teacher can make/recieve calls and make texts. I just cleaned my sim card and I will find out tomorrow if it does anything, Me and my dad looked on T-mobile and AT&T's site and both had horrible coverage it showed at school. But what i don't understand with that, is my friend with AT&T has full bars to. I wont not take my phone back unless my parents will get mad because this has happened with my past 3 phones. I have a plan, yet i do not have a contract so i think its a 35$ activation fee to activate the other sim card. My mom said she thinks the newer phones have more horrible reception, but im not sure to believe her. About 3-4 times a day i will have 1-2 bars when i can send a text, but when i start typing a text right when i sent i get full bars, with "Emergency calls only." I do not have a contract, yet i have a plan with t-mobile still, could that also be a problem? But i will reply and tell you if it works tomorrow. Thanks for the help, Josh.
Maybe what tmobileman said... maybe it could be the SIM. If it's the SIM, TMobile will replace that at no charge... or if you have a new, unused SIM, CS should be able to move the account info onto the new SIM for you without a fee. The prepaid plans don't normally have activation fees, so you are likely on a monthly plan (without a contract). If the coverage is bad for you, there's nothing that can be done unless T-Mobile allows you to roam on the other GSM system. Do you have another phone lying around? If so, I would see what happens if you place the SIM into the new phone... Also, bars don't always reveal the full answer... bad connections can happen with "full" reception". Plan types often play little role on TMobile in terms of coverage. The coverage areas are virtually the same prepaid or postpaid... So it's going to be an "all or nothing" situation.
Is it just when you are at school that you are getting bad reception and the emergency calls only message? If so then I would say it may be the phone/antenna and not the sim card, as a bad sim card shouldn't really work anywhere. But I would definetly take it back and have a tech take a look at it and soon so that you do not miss your 14 day return period. As a T-mobile dealer I have sold a couple of the t-506 and not had any problems yet, but with any electronic devices there can always be a bad apple.
Perhaps the teacher has a postpaid plan, and you have a prepaid phone? Prepaid plans don't usually allow roaming (therefore, emergency only); postpaid plans do allow roaming (her phone has bars). COtech
Well i don't know if she has a postpaid plan, and im not sure if i have a prepaid phone or not, i have a plan just not a contract. To lone, no i don't just get it at school, i also get it at home in my basement.
plan but no contract sounds like flexpay but even so they should still get postpaid coverage.....T-Mobile doesnt really do the whole Emergency Only thing do they? the phones are programmed to just drop out and if an emergency call is attempted then it goes to emergency mode
With tmobile if your phone says SOS only or emergency calls only, its one of two things, a network issue in the area, or your phone has no signal.
i had T-Mobile for three years and the phone always said what network i was on......but there was a time when i was traveling in western PA and service droppped out.....there were no bars no message on the screen.....but my AT&T cousin had service......i was using a Motorola v185
My Motorola V195s does this as well whenever the phone "sees" the forbidden network. Too bad Motorola doesnt allow the phone to display "911 only" or something like that. Placing the SIM into my SE z310a, the phone would display the no service icon with the signal bars (meaning that its on the forbidden signal)
Hey Look at this FCC Rule. FCC 20.12 as of April 2, 2009 - hallikainen.com It seams to me that AT&T and T-Mobile are in violation of these rules and they should be offering "manual roaming" when validation fails. All of the CDMA carriers offer "manual roaming" when validation fails. If they are offering 911 only service than they should be offering the same mobiles manual roaming. Does anyone else read this FCC rule differently?
If I take the SIM card out of my phone, its technically not tied to a network. I can manually search for a network but when I try to register on either AT&T or T-Mobile, it doesn't allow me to do so. If I dial 911, then it will just pick the strongest single and attempt to make the call. That's the way its been with any phone i've messed with. I think then both T-mobile and AT&T are compliant with the rule.
I don't think your reading this correctly, look at this 20.12 "(c) Manual Roaming. Each carrier subject to this section must provide mobile radio service upon request to all subscribers in good standing to the services of any carrier subject to this section, including roamers, while such subscribers are located within any portion of the licensee's licensed service area where facilities have been constructed and service to subscribers has commenced, if such subscribers are using mobile equipment that is technically compatible with the licensee's base stations. To Summarize: Carrier must provide service to all subscribers in good standing where mobile equipment is technically compatible with the base stations. Simply allowing access to 911 does not constiture providing service.
If you read the topic you would find out that T-Mobile prepaid offers virtually the same roaming as postpaid..
