sprint policy on roaming

Yes, unfortunatly this is true. Somewhere in the fine print of the contract you signed is a clause that states "if the customer exceeds more than 50% of their usage in roaming, they can be terminated." Well, not you, but your contract!! They haven't gotten that strict yet!!
Every carrier has their deposit requirements. You might want to consider prepay, but it sounds like you are in a really tough area. Why not go back to Altell?? Good luck!!

 

I roam closer to 75% of the time because my Dad was sold a phone they KNEW would be in an area of non coverage. (on their coverage map I'm in a 10 mile wide splotch of gray) And this is for an EMPLOYEE? I'm so over it. If they would terminate the contract I could get with a real carrier.

 

Do you honestly feel that Sprint should let anyone who roams off network 75% or 100% of the time remain customers? Where's the profit in that for them? They would be losing all kinds of money. If someone is roaming that much they shouldn't have chosen Sprint as a provider in the first place. If some salesman wanted to make a sale by giving false or exaggerated information then that is unfortunate. But it still doesn't mean that Sprint's company policies should be made an exception for.

With that said I don't believe they are all that strict on roaming and someone might be able to get away with going over 50% for a long time.

 

Actually, if you consider the amount I pay in roaming charges you'd realize they are making a killing in my area alone.

 

Why are you paying roaming charges?

 

Because they try to ding me for them every single month, roaming is not ALWAYS free, depends on your plan. The latest scoop is this. In speaking with Sprint, they do have a policy of terminating contracts if customer is roaming over 50% of the time. However, termination happens at CUSTOMERS request. Sprint doesn't just suddenly shut you down. If your interested in this you must first send an email to etf_move_out_of_coverage@sprint.com and fax a copy of your bill showing the address the phone is provsioned for to 866-220-6442. They take it from there. Additionally, Sprint does have a buy back program for their phones and you can get more info on that at 866-364-5680

 

Roaming should always be free if you have a modern plan. If you don't have a roaming inlcuded plan I highly recommend you switch to one to avoid roaming charges. Roaming is a thing of the past. This is 2008 not 1998 so nobody should be paying roaming fees these days.

 

They still won't allow you to roam more than 50% of the time :/

 

To be honest when you roam on Sprint you cant use Mobile to Mobile and I know most people use that if you are going to be roaming I would not recomend Sprint for this reason. But if you are not going to use M2M try your luck.

 

If someone needs to roam more than 50% of the time then there's definetly a problem and they shouldnt' be a Sprint customer to begin with.

 

yea but sprint makes you use your anytime minutes when your roaming. so really its not free, you have to burn up anytime minutes which cost $$$

 

When I am roaming, my usage is only deducted from my peak minutes if and only if the usage was during a peak time period. Roaming usage is billed exactly the same as native usage. The only exception is that M2M is not available when you are roaming.

I've heard stories (and personally have experienced) that my roaming usage will show up entirely under my anytime minutes under my usage estimate. Remember that it is only AN ESTIMATE. When the bill is processed everything always comes out okay.

 

What kind of plan are you on? Sprint, as well as most of the carriers, did away with roaming charges years ago. I haven't heard of anyone paying domestic roaming charges in a long time...

 

Yeah I am with you all on this one if you dont have roaming it might be benifical to get a new plan.

 

Funny this topic is brought up now, I was very close to signing up for a Sprint SERO plan with the Touch a couple nights ago until I found this in the small print:

"Sprint may terminate service if (1) more than 800 minutes, (2) a majority of minutes or (3) a majority of data kilobytes in a given month are used while roaming"

With as much time as I spend in rural areas that Sprint doesn't cover, I'm afraid that I might exceed these limits. The good news though, I've heard, is the Sprint at least doesn't charge the ETF if they cancel you. So I'm still strongly considering it and carrying the Touch primarily as a data device in addition to my alltel line. I can always run up minutes and kb when I'm on the Sprint network during the night. It actually works out to be a little less expensive than upgrading my alltel handset since I have 3 lines on my account that don't text which makes alltel's smart choice pack very expensive for my situation. But then again, it would put me in a bad spot if my pda, mainly used for work was cancelled by Sprint, and I'm thinking the CS may not be worth it. So I'm still thinking, but enough about me ...

The bad thing for you, Appalachian is probably a high cost roaming partner for Sprint (judging by the fact they're not free on Alltel's national freedom). If you're forced to sign up with Appalachian Wireless, their website states they reserve the right to smack you with roaming charges at 79 cents/min if you roam more than 50% of your minutes and that sounds quite possible at some point or another.

AT&T is also a provider in Eastern Kentucky that you could check out, though I know from many friends experience as well as the AT&T coverage map that in that area, they have a horrible reputation and far more dead areas in comparison to the coverage provided by Appalachian which other CDMA providers roam on. But you might be lucky enough to be in an area they cover decently well. Being in the cellular band in an area where Appalachian is the only decent carrier, if AT&T just made the investment of having comparable coverage, they could dominate the area with their name recognition and phone selection.

 

Anytime minutes (assuming you are referring to peak hours) are burned up whether you're roaming or not. You can use N&W minutes when roaming all you want and it doesn't cut into your anytime minutes. I don't see how that would be different with any other carrier.

 

This is at least the second time you have posted this...during the day that is true, but at night (7pm-7am) or on a weekend it is not.

And I agree with Larry...anyone that finds themselves regularly roaming over 50% of the time has done a very bad job at picking the carrier that provides them the best coverage, and therefore probably shouldn't be with Sprint in the first place.

 

u dont get your m2m was my point.

 

It's easy to look for and nitpick these things but the vast majority of Sprint customers will never need M2M when roaming because most customers don't roam and even when they do the off peak roaming and surplus of anytime minutes that most people have are usually more than enough to cover roaming situations.

 

Where is the reference to the information you are presenting? May I please see a copy of this official Sprint study?

 

yea..i must agree with Andy, that is quite a broad statement. i have friends that have sprint and they roam very often, many of them at their house. if they cant even call their people in their familyplan for free at all times, it can cause a very big problem from my point of view. i understand you are in SoCal and your coverage there is probably very good. but for many sprint customers, there is a lot of roaming happening.

 

I would say that if you have Sprint and you need to roam alot even though you have a cheap plan I would not get them it is just not benficial for either side I think. If you are in an area that has native coverage and sprint does not your experience will be much better if you use the native coverage as all the network features will work for you.
Anyways I dont see this thread going anywhere positive, I think all the facts or lack there of have been discussed no need to expound on them.

 

well they should at least be made available to people. there are many sprint users that simply dont even know these facts until they have had bill issues and overages. at least this is from what ive seen first hand with people i know.

 

Well most every carrier has the roaming policy listed in thier terms and conditions. So you cant say it is not there. In fact http://forums.wirelessadvisor.com/g...69652-most-all-carriers-roaming-policies.html
Here is sprints roaming policy

 

If customers are not reading the terms of agreement than how is that Sprint's fault?

 

Cute.

Where is the official Sprint study to confirm this? The people you know need to learn to read their contracts. It's not a "bill issue" when the customer is to blame.

The problem would seem to be they chose Sprint when someone else would apparently be a better choice for them.

 

Everything is Sprint's fault. Their customer service sucks.



This thread is going nowhere

 

im not saying customers dont use their due diligence at times.

to be frank, i would never use sprint because of the service in my area. if i was in an area that they supply well, i would consider them.

but my point was simply that there is no m2m and that i have seen people find out the hard way, and many of them have jumped ship for that reason.

 

I've never heard of anyone who had that problem. In major metro areas (which makes up most of Sprint's customer base) I doubt this is ever any big issue.