In Season of Hurricanes, Test Men Report Verizon Wireless Network Outperforms the Com

Re: In Season of Hurricanes, Test Men Report Verizon Wireless Network Outperforms the

This is a very informative post. I live in Florida and I'm Happy to say that T-Mobile is performing Extremely well during this Hurricane. My friend called me from northern Georgia during the storm's impact and I had a perfectly clear 15 to 20 min. conversation with him. So Verizon has nothing on us. This message is sent from my Treo 600. T-Mobile Rocks Get More From Life.

 

Re: In Season of Hurricanes, Test Men Report Verizon Wireless Network Outperforms the

Gee...imagine that! Verizon tested their own network and found it to be the best. I'm sure they were very fair and objective though. They tested the Frances region 4 days after landfall. I wonder what the results would have been the next day? Maybe Verizon is quicker to get repairs done (that's good) but the tone of the press release (this is not a "news" story) is that the network survived the storms better than others. Their testing on Sept 16 is interesting since that is the same day Ivan made landfall. I'd be curious to know what time of day they made their test drive.

Also, how did Verizon perform in Orlando? Tampa? Jax/Daytona? Gainesville/Ocala? Panama City? North of Pensacola in FL/AL? Driving along I-10 and I-95 and the Turnpike (which are essentially parallel roads a couple miles apart in the affected areas) is all well and good, but how many of the millions impacted by the storms live within a mile of those roads? They must have tested almost everywhere, yet chose only to report on two specific test areas. I wonder why?

Bottom line, while it is certainly possible the numbers are 100% accurate, I bet they aren't. This PR was obviously intended to make Verizon look good, and it should since Verizon put out the story. Honestly, I wouldn't put much stock in such a press release coming from any company. Verizon seems motivated by the opportunity to use natural disasters for their financial gain.

 

Re: In Season of Hurricanes, Test Men Report Verizon Wireless Network Outperforms the

I agree with you. It doesn't seem the tests were accurate and I can vouch for the Daytona area not being up to par in my opinion with all my dropped calls while I was down there.

I use Verizon and for the most part they are good, but it seems to me that they like to pat themselves on the back a little too much about claiming to have the best network and all. That's just my opinion.

 

Can you explain what those Results of those Test really mean?
How do we know that test test were Honest.
I can conduct a Test where a Building is Bocking your Cell site and give u a Bad score.

If Carrier E has 1 Bar does it get 3%
and carrer A hace 3 bars does get 67%

Where u r testing also matters, right?

If u r testing under a VZW cell site the competitor cell farthest away will get the worst grade.

 

The test vehicles are equiped with phones from the other major carriers, the equipment automatically places calls while the vehicle is traveling, and then all that data is compliled into the report.

In the markets they server Verizon does a very good job of making sure they have great coverage.

They have a huge staff of Network Tech's that do the work in the field. Sure they invest Billions of Dollars into their network every year, but the biggest thing that keeps their network the best is their people.

Many carriers have cut cost by eliminating field techs, but Verizon keeps adding positions.

 

Other carriers also have these and are doing the same.
And according to them their Network is Better.

 

I would think those numbers are a little inflated also, there are factors that are out of the carriers control that could affect those numbers. I think that a 96% call success rate after those major hurricanes are a little far fetched, I dont doubt they did well, but not that good.


Oh, and the one that did the worst, that had to be Nextel, their network suffered the most, or so I have read and heard from coworkers that live there......

 

Re: In Season of Hurricanes, Test Men Report Verizon Wireless Network Outperforms the

They have to be inflated numbers unless Verizon got around to fixing things faster than anyone else. If that is the case they deserve credit for that. If not, I don't see how the numbers can be accurate. Most cell towers that cover interstates have 2-3 (or more) providers located on the same tower. It seems odd that Verizon would do so much better considering that they likely share towers with other companies.

Another thing that could have made some companies look worse is network sharing. After the hurricanes T-Mobile, ATT, and Cingular removed all roaming restrictions to allow for people to make calls. Imagine if the only working tower on a given stretch of highway was an ATT tower...you may have the users of three companies trying to make use of those resources. This scenario could be repeated over and over again. It's not really fair to rate down one carrier if they suffered capacity issues as a result of their netowrk sharing though I realize in the end not being able to make a call is all that matters. Still, it is one variable Verizon wouldn't have had to deal with.

Also, I still think it's funny they only released the results from two tests when surely Verizon tested all over the impacted regions of FL/GA/AL/MS.

 

I wish VZW would come to Mississippi so I'd have a choice other than Cingular and Alltel :-(

 

VZW does not have a license where ALLTEL is.

 

In Mississippi that might be true (I don't know if it is or not), but it is not true elsewhere.

 

Re: In Season of Hurricanes, Test Men Report Verizon Wireless Network Outperforms the

That's what I suspect, and that's what makes it funny. I can't say that I blame them for not reporting areas where they might have performed poorly though.

 

Verizon serves Mississippi in De Soto County, and very well!

COtech

 

Many carriers will have service with other carriers but few will put those in a vehicle and consistantly test their servcie against the competitors month in and month out. For most carriers it's a more subjective test.

I've worked with many other carriers, and the amount of money Verizon Spends on Network Test equipment is huge. Many carriers (especially those regional in nature) have put your Network testing on the back burner. If a carrier is not in a position to be adding new cellsites or locations they usually do not have a beefed up Network department. They will keep the bare minimum to take care of any problems, or they will outsource that to third parties.

For example in my area Verizon has one outside sales rep that has a territory of six counties, across that same six counties there are three different Network Technicians.

 

Re: In Season of Hurricanes, Test Men Report Verizon Wireless Network Outperforms the

In my experience, travelling throughout the state of Florida, Verizon leads the way in connectivity.

On my most recent trip, from northeast Florida to several areas in east-central, central, and west-central Florida, T-Mobile's and Verizon's signals were, as usual, very reliable. However, I experienced several significant Nextel outages in areas usually well covered by Nextel. In one area, I-95 north of Daytona Beach, I had "No Service" on my Nextel for about 20 or 30 miles.

When I got home, I called Nextel's customer service, telling them about my experiences. I also mentioned that more and more of my callers were complaining that they were hearing the "Please wait while the Nextel customer you have called is located" message when they called me. I explained that my callers were getting that message during times when I was NOT travellling, but right in my office. The CS rep's response was that the hurricanes had given them problems. However, I was experiencing these problems three weeks after the most recent hurricane in those areas.

As a result, I have given up my Nextel service to use Verizon (for voice) and T-Mobile (for my Blackberry) exclusively.

 

in reply to the previous post...yes tmobile quite good in florida,very reliable. i also a have Tmobile phone and when i was visiting the west coast of florida(tampa bay) where i stayed tmobile was the only one that work well for me(4 bars compared to 1 bar with verizon).

 

The bottom line is, there is no real reliable unbiased source of information when it comes to network comparability. Take this statement from Verizon for instance, do you actually think they would rate another carrier better then there own network, you and I both know that this is probably completely inaccurate and fabricated.

When I read this it's kinda reminds me of Kerry and Bush campaign ad's, nothing but complete BS

 

Actually it does happen from time to time, with the network test...of course they aren't going to do a press release on it, but you better believe that the network teams who get those rankings are working their butts off to fix the problem...One thing Verizon does to it's employees is make them accountable. If you don't want to work hard, you had better not apply to work there.

Although Verizon Wireless is not a "publicly traded company" it's parent company Verizon is, which means that Verizon Wireless has to look at corporate Compliance issues when making press releases etc. (and that's no game after Enron and MCI messes a few years back.) So when a press release comes out sure it's all about PR, but you had better believe there are some facts to back it up. Verizon Wireless managers and Executives are not going to go to prison for anyone.

 

Oooooookay :lmao:

 

Actually there is a company that does drive testing comparing all the companies in a market. It's called Telephia and most of the companies use their results. One of the problems they had for a while was the drive test gear that they used (they don't any more) that had a bad tendency to skew the results (it didn't properly record signal levels and a few other things that engineers like to look at).I know Verizon likes to brag about being the best based on their testing but in un-biased testing they don't always come out the best just like all their competitors. :browani:

 

Actually I believe that verizon has invested more emergency equipment into their network. Well before the storms, last summer up here in Michigan, Verizon made the news. The news story had explained how Verizon added emergency diesel generators to every cell site to suppliment the battery back-up. Even before this, Verizon and Cingular were the only cell phones to stay on the air here in Detroit during the black-out. Obviousely, the competitors did not have the same emergency equipment in place, so I believe them.