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So you are actually paying 17cents a minute if you buy less than $100 worth of prepaid minutes. I have come to the conclusion that there is no good cell phone companies out there. Tmobile advertises 10cents a minute, and says you get a 15% discount if you purchase over $100, but what they don't say is that the 15% is included in the 10 cents a minute rate.so in other words you think you are getting 1000 minutes for $100, plus another 150 minutes but you are not.you get only the 1000 which they say includes the discount. Also the customer care has been a joke.just like AT&T which may actually be worse.sitting on hold, getting bumped from one person to the next, repeating all the info you just gave to the previous person, etc. Every company I have dealt with lately appears to be out to screw you.
Overall, I love the phone, for the basic fact that it works. This is a dual band phone, so don't plan on taking it outside of the states. It also has an awkward menu system, but is usable. Voice quality is good, and I get cellphone reception where as most other carriers constantly drop calls at my house (from excessive coverage). T-mobile service is good in metropolitan areas, and T-mobile stores are a helpful and easy way of fixing problems.
I didn't quite understand the instructions that came with the packaging, and it took an hour of being on the phone with customer service to realize that I had everything I needed and was just doing something wrong. The phone isn't as easy to use as the three previous cell phones I've used, but once I learned the important features I was fine with it. I was a disgruntled Verizon customer who spent a lot of money to cancel two Verizon contracts (family plan) before the contract was up, and I needed a cell phone for occasional use. That was a frustrating experience, but all the customer service people were at least very nice about it.
It's perfect for me, and I think I'm getting a good value. I did a lot of research on pre-paid plans before choosing T-Mobile and buying this phone, and I found that no one was really happy with their service or phone. The customer service people weren't all very helpful but they were all nice and apologetic about the situation, which I appreciated. Now that I'm "verified" I should be able to order refills with no problem.Overall I'd recommend this phone and this plan to people who don't use their cell phones constantly, don't need a lot of fancy features, and who don't get frustrated when learning unfamiliar gadgets. The reception & coverage are not as good as Verizon's in DC, but I don't need perfect coverage, I only need adequate.
Then when I bought minutes online they couldn't activate them right away because they needed to verify my identity, and for some reason they had trouble doing that over the phone so I ended up going to a store. I would also suggest checking with people you know in your area to make sure that T-Mobile service is adequate there. I chose T-Mobile because the price scheme seemed to make the most sense, and I knew people who had it in my area (Washington DC) and thought it got OK coverage.After 4 months, I really like my phone and the service. And I suppose I should mention that they were all bona fide native speakers of Standard American English- I didn't speak with any call centers in India, which I've heard is an issue with cell phone companies. Everything works fine.
And the best part is, this phone has really good battery life- something that has plagued me in the past.The one bad thing was that setting up the phone initially was difficult. When I had to refill my minutes they were able to verify my identity pretty quickly, so I guess the problem from the first time was just a momentary hiccup. If no one has T-Mobile, then chances are there's a reason for that.
I had them years ago and had problems with coverage, billing and customer service, so I guess it's my fault for trying them again. I bought this prepaid phone from their web site as a gift for my grandparents. Wanted to set everything up for them so it would be easy to use: well the activation process requires calling an automated system from a different phone and entering 15 minutes worth of information, then it bounced me to customer (non) service, which bounced me around and cut me off for an HOUR AND A HALF before telling me that they had printed the wrong activation code on my paperwork and would send me a new number in the postal mail so that I could start the process over again next week some time. I pointed out that I ordered it online so they should be able to email it to me at which point the un-service woman became belligerent with me.I am sending it back, and by the way in my neighborhood it only showed 2 bars of service, my ATT phone always gets 4.what a waste.
I have use it in NH, MA & RI with very good reception. I have had T-Mobil pay as you go plan for about two years. Maybe the previous review was a problem with the phone and not the service. I love it. My phone is a Siemens. Before this I did have a Nokia phone and their pay as you go plan. I changed.
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