Overseas Chinese Web Guide

Tag: at&t

  • T-Mobile Simple Choice Plan

    I switched to AT&T when the first iPhone was released and have had no coverage issues for the most part. Of course, if I ventured to the Grand Canyon or another remote part of the United States, all bets were off, but that is to be expected.

    The one thing I did not like about AT&T was whenever I had to travel overseas. Basically, I had to turn off cellular, forward my number to Google Voice, and rely on hotel wi-fi. Being disconnected from electronic devices can be liberating, but sometimes having a phone in hand is essential. Recently, I had a chance to test the T-Mobile Simple Choice Plan when traveling to Peru.

    The plan is supposed to charge $0.20/min for voice, and provide free and unlimited data and text. However, calls to Peru from the United States cost $2.69/min (I later discovered).

    In terms of data and text, I accrued no extra charges. T-Mobile reported that I had used 263MB of data. AT&T charges $30 for 120MB of data with an overage charge of $0.25/MB, and $60 for 300 MB of data with an overage charge of $0.20/MB. On AT&T, it would have cost me $30.00 + $35.75 under their Passport plan or $60 under the Passport Plus. Although the iPhone was displaying the 3G icon, the data speeds were not 3G. It felt more like EDGE with the slow loading maps.

    In terms of voice, the big surprise was the $5.38 charge for a two-minute call to Peru. That was unexpected. However, I had a number of short calls to 800 numbers that were not charged because they were over hotel Wi-Fi. The only long call (65 minutes!) from the airport in Lima back to the United States only cost me $13.00, or $0.20/minute. AT&T charges $1.00/min under Passport and $0.50/min under Passport Plus. $13.00 is better than $32.50 or even $65.00.

    For the most part, I can live without a phone while traveling. However, during this trip, having a phone really saved me. This is the first time that I’ve experienced a flight delay, missed connection and a canceled flight all in one trip. Being able to call back to the United States to re-arrange my flight plans was well worth the $13.00 charge, even if it took over an hour to straighten out.

  • Free Wi-Fi at Starbucks

    I tried out the free wi-fi at Starbucks this morning. It works. The good news is that Starbucks is practically every where. The bad news is that when I usually need wi-fi, I’m not inside a Starbucks. I really need free wi-fi inside Costco, Target, and Ranch 99. Now that would be good.

  • AT&T FamilyTalk Plan is Not Family Friendly

    “Your World. Delivered.” Or, so they say. Anyone try to get a FamilyTalk plan that includes cell phones with phone numbers from different area codes? I think this can be done, but after spending 50 minutes talking to various customer service people within AT&T, I have run out of patience. I don’t need this that badly. I don’t think there’s a technical reason it cannot be done, just a marketing excuse. And that is the lamest reason to turn down a cash-paying customer.

    For some reason, the telecommunications industry is locked into a bizarre old world mentality. Tell me how does forcing an established customer to surrender a long-held phone number breed customer loyalty? It doesn’t. It just reminds me how behind the times your business practices and perspectives are. Sure, AT&T forced us to all have phone numbers from the same area code now, but every time I’m dialing that phone, it reminds me that my world wasn’t delivered. AT&T probably spent some big bucks to come up with their marketing slogan. Instead, I just wished they had hit a few keystrokes (which is probably all it would have taken) to let all of us be on the same FamilyTalk plan with our original phone numbers, even if they were from different area codes.

  • iPhone Phone Book

    So I just received my first wireless phone bill book from AT&T. Talk about not being able to teach an old dog new tricks. Despite all the time AT&T spent working with Apple, none of Apple’s minimalist design philosophy rubbed off. I mean a 35 page bill? I’m waiting for Greenpeace to ding Apple again for selecting such an environmentally unfriendly partner. A big chunk of the bill was the itemized list of all data transfers over the (lagging) EDGE network. Since the iPhone plan provides unlimited domestic data transfers, why itemize it? 8:41 AM – 1 KB. 8:49 AM – 24 KB. 9:08 AM – 23 KB. 9:23 AM – 49 KB. 9:42 AM – 23 KB. 10:00 AM – 31 KB. Talk about worthless information. Save a tree.