A word of caution to those buying the nexus (subsidised or not).

Rusty Shackelford

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Oct 20, 2009
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I want to issue a warning to any and all who may buy this masterpiece of a phone.

To be clear up front, this phone is amazing in every way and I have never owned another phone like it. Also, I am not a stranger to unlocked devices, but this made me really question my knowledge of the cell phone realm.

This warning it to be cautious when dealing with the likely misinformed T-mobile reps. Do not misunderstand I love the customer service I have received from T-mobile, but it took me 3 calls totaling about 2.5 hours. Do not let this happen to you!

I purchased the nexus retail for an after tag price tag of 565 bones. I was on a Bold 9700 and before that the mytouch. I got my phone in all its glory and promptly called customer service to change the provisioning so that the unlimited web I had tied to my family plan would work with my new baby.

I was met with a friendly gal who told me that would be "no problem", but than proceeded to ask me if I remember reading the "terms and conditions" when I purchased the phone. The answer is no. I selected it, entered my card info, and approved the purchase.

She proceeded to tell me that "in order to use this phone, google requires you to be on a specific calling plan for 45 days and it must be an individual plan". Somewhat shocked and very confused at how someone could require such a thing for an unlocked device, I allowed her to split my lines from a family plan to two separate lines, thereby increasing my monthly bill by 30$. I said to myself "its only for 45 days, small price to pay".

This bothered me as I thought of it more. I asked myself "what do they do for people on ATT that buy the phone?" This not being my first unlocked device I just couldn't understand, so the next day I got on the online chat. I explained my confusion to yet another rep who after hearing my concerns proceeded to tell me that the previous rep put me on the wrong plan, and that he didn't know how to put me on the right plan because I was on a plan that is not alterable. He than expressed that in buying the phone I had agreed to a two year ETF. WTF?

This pissed me off to the point of calling tech support yet again. After laying out the whole picture, I demanded to speak with a supervisor, as nothing was adding up. After speaking with the supervisor, I was given an apology, restored and backdated to my original family plan and told that the reps are simply not fully educated on how to deal with this "anomaly" in there system.

Turns out every rep assumed I had purchased the phone subsidized and treated my situation as such, even though each time I explained that I had bought it retail.

Just a shout out to all those buying full retail and the reps who deal with these as the calls come in:

THE SAME GOVERNING RULES DO NOT APPLY TO THOSE WHO BUY IT UNLOCKED!!!

If you buy it unlocked, it is yours free and clear with no strings attached. Period!

That is all.
Enjoy your new powerhouse of a phone.
 

hawonjung

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Jan 23, 2009
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that is BS if your purchased outright.
You are bind to have certain plan if you subsidized but your case it is not.
I got one and used with at&t for 2 weeks, then switched to t-mobile and within i switched plans twice. joined family plan and now on individual plan. they can't lock you in if you are not subsidized.
 

Rusty Shackelford

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Oct 20, 2009
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I know! that is what was so stupid about the whole thing. I knew it was all screwed up all along. Just a huge sigh of relief after. I really do love tmobile, but this was all kinds of ridiculous.
 

inrelief

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Jan 6, 2010
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Haha, I expected this post to be trollbait, but was pleasantly surprised.

I had a lousy experience w/T-Mobile support trying to figure out if there's any way for me to establish my current # of fwd'd calls without calling in:
3 hours later, we established it's not possible.

::sighs::
 

Rusty Shackelford

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Oct 20, 2009
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Nope, no trolls here. Just trying to help others that could have confusion in there future purchase to be informed beforehand. I love this phone. I tucked it into bed last night!...........but seriously.......I did.
 

big_time2

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Jan 13, 2010
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That is why you shouldn't have called customer service in the first place.

I went through the same problem when I bought an unlocked storm. Called Tmo and told them, thinking they would have to know that, the rep said I had to get be on a different plan which would not affect me at all. When I got my bill it was 1 more than it usually was, then called back and it took me a few months to change it back. Each month after I called they changed it to something else.

With that experience I learned not to call Tmo to tell them if I get an unlocked phone. Now I have a Nexus One (had Bold 9700 too) and didn't bother calling Tmo and my bill has not changed at all.
 

Rusty Shackelford

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Oct 20, 2009
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I wish I had that luck. Unfortunately the network recognized I was not on a blackberry and my data was halted. The bummer is that there is nothing to fix this short of calling them. I don't think even the in store reps can make provisioning changes. What a pain. Glad its over.
 

Joene

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Jan 31, 2010
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they can't lock you in if you are not subsidized.

Welcome to Belgium-style freedom: I switch plans, phones and carriers whenever I want and the carriers are obliged by law to transfer my number free of charge (and within a certain time-frame)...:D Downside is that since carriers cannot lure you into consumer-unfriendly contracts with state-of the art devices, they don't try hard enough to provide you with the most recent devices.
 

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