kmersh

I bought a Prepaid Kit from Walmart (as a test) and it basically worked everywhere except oddly in the Physicians parking lot of the hospital where I work, but fine inside the building, still scratching my head on that one (I would have thought that it would have been the opposite).

I need to talk it over with my wife one more time before doing anything, but I have a sense from my reading here it is easy and straightforward.

Oddly, I would think the T-Mobile employee would want to sign up a customer rather than turn one off and maybe away from T-Mobile, but what do I know? He was really really insistant on making me buy new phones which I had and have no interest in doing.

nkedel

Cell-phone retail store employees are not exactly known for being geniuses, and he may have:
A) been paid in part based on how many new phones he sold
B) hit one irate customer who brought in a barely compatible phone and had a bad experience, and thus couldn't be arsed to actually keep track of what's compatible.

CatJo

As others have said, the iPhone 6 (and 6 Plus) work just fine and support both Wi-Fi Calling and VoLTE. I recently switched from Verizon, and the family's iPhone 6's and my 6 Plus all worked perfectly with just a SIM card replacement.

I'd recommend you consider selling your wife's AT&T iPhone 6 Plus (maybe on Swappa or similar) and get a T-Mobile iPhone 6 Plus on Jump on Demand before September 8, then upgrade to the new iPhone (6S Plus?) next month - mainly because there's a high likelihood of it supporting Band 12 LTE where a lot of T-Mobile's network expansion has been taking place. If you're in such an area, you'll have a much better coverage experience with the new iPhone. You'll also save $216 off full retail after the 18 months of payments with the current promotion.

BigFlyer

The new Moto X will be out probably next week.

Base price will be $399. It is supposed to have Band 12, although given Motorola's past give and take on this we won't know for sure until it's launched.

One cool thing about this phone - it has CDMA and is supposed to work on Verizon and perhaps Sprint, as well as the GSM carriers.

So if the OP decides he wants to dump Tmobile and go to Verizon, he can take his phone.

Another strategy - by a cheap Verizon Tracfone SIM. and put some minutes and data on it. Carry that SIM for those occasions that you are out of Tmobile range but within range of a Verizon tower.

The ironic thing about Tmobile's coverage is that it is better in the free roaming countries than the US, as you generally have your choice of multiple carriers, so in that sense you have more coverage than the locals. While the coverage is wide, the data is still slows to 2G speeds (some folks get confused when they see the 4G icon - you may well be connecting using 4G technology, but your speeds are still throttled to 2G levels.

Plus ping times are horrible when abroad.

kmersh

We bought it unlocked directly from Apple, not at&t.

I like you idea in theory regarding going with Jump saving $216 off full retain after 18 months, but after the fiasco with Audi I am leery to start any sort of new financing scheme were something could go wrong (even though I admit it probably won't).

I financed my last car (against my better judgement) and even though I made my payment in full like clockwork somehow Audi didn't apply five payments and it has been a mess to get corrected. Each time Audi saying that will get it corrected only to get the next months bill which shows that Audi failed to do so.

My at&t billing fiasco which I alluded to earlier has also been a headache but in a very different way.

Regardless I talked it over with my Wife and if the Prepaid phones works at her office than we will sign up with T-Mobile probably via their Website tonight.

CatJo

Do you know if Band 12 LTE has been deployed in your area? If so, you'd have a significantly better coverage experience with a phone that supports it, and it's likely that the iPhone 6S will - so worth making sure you can easily upgrade to that if you do switch (and stay with an iPhone for her). The Jump on Demand is probably the best way to ensure that, so that's why I thought I'd point out the promotion.

The Nexus 6 and LG G4 are other considerations with Band 12/VoLTE support on the Android side.

BigFlyer

The LG Leon is a low end Android phone which has Band 12 and great reception, with or without Band 12. I can put it side by side with my Nexus 5 and it will pull in a better signal.

Of course, that might be because it has Band 12, and there is no way to tell if you are on Band 12 or some other LTE Band. However, I have seen a number of posts that it just has a very good radio. It also has wif calling and Volte.

The Leon is only $69.85 at Best Buy, and is worth getting as an interim phone until the phone you really want comes out with Band 12. My guess is that one could use a Leon for a few months and then sell it on ebay/Swappa for not that much less than you paid for it.

Of course, you might just stick with the Leon, as other than the crappy camera it works just fine.

CatJo

The LG Leon is an excellent phone for the money (it's on promotion directly from T-Mobile right now for $50, heckuva deal!) - I bought it from Best Buy last month and used it with the $30 "Walmart" prepaid plan (5Gb LTE data, 100 minutes) for a month to evaluate T-Mobile service in my area and during a trip.

FWIW, you can enter the Leon's Engineering mode by dialing 277634#*# which allows you to see a bunch of interesting stuff, most notably which LTE Band you're connected to and the actual RSSI signal strength in dbM.

I agree with you that it has incredibly good radios, typically beats my iPhone 6 Plus.

BigFlyer

Thanks for the engineering mode tip.

However, I just did that and I'm not seeing where I find the LTE band - where exactly is that?

CatJo

Choose the Engineering section, then find the LTE Tab (you'll have to press "Next" several times to go through 2G, HSPDA, etc.).

There's a lot more information on those tabs, I don't know what most of it means, was just interested in the Band (and bandwidth) along with the RSSI signal strength info.

kmersh

I did some reading on Band 12 and I do agree it could make a difference and I will talk it over with her, she might just buy it from Apple outright when it become available factory unlocked or maybe she might use Jump, it will be her call, she seemed more open to financing than I am.

My Nexus 6 is running well and I do like it, I have no idea what the new Nexi (is that a word?) be it Huawei or LG are like and will hold off judgement until they are released and are in people's pockets for a bit.

dtsm

Thanks for the tip, my son needs a replacement phone, low end but good radio is all he wants.

BigFlyer

I did a little experiment at lunch time.

I ate in a nearby department store basement. My Nexus 5 could not acquire a signal, my LG Leon got an LTE signal.

I looked at the engineering mode screen and saw I was on Band 4. So, even without Band 12 the Leon gets better reception than the Nexus 5.

kmersh

Update:

I was talking with a neighbor yesterday and he recommended another T-Mobile store a little farther away saying that they are really Customer Service Oriented there.

In fact, he said that one of the sales people took over an hour to help his 86 year old Father understand the different choices and then took even more time to setup his iPhone and teach him the basics on how to use it. My neighbor brought over a Starbucks Giftcard for that specific sales person and she said that her Manager makes Customer Service a priority but also she has older Grandparents and understands that they didn't grown up with technology and she hoped that if in reverse someone would help her Grandparents like she helped my neighbor's Father.

Anyway, my Wife and I went over to that T-Mobile Store with our phones and after the credit check and choosing the right plan, we both choose the Unlimited Plan, the SIMs were activated and my Nexus 6 worked without issue.

Her iPhone 6 Plus didn't seem to want to cooperate and the Salesperson (the same one who helped my neighbor and his Father) was rather upset as she likes to have her customers leave the store with their phones working without issue.

She checked a whole bunch of settings, called a Support Number and worked with someone over the phone for over 20 minutes trying to get my Wife's phone to work. Oddly, it would make phone calls, but refused to make any sort of DATA connection and when they finally got it to register on the DATA network, it would only register on the edge (whatever that is).

The Salesperson suggested buying a new iPhone 6 Plus on JUMP and then getting the new one when it comes out as a way to get my Wife working that night. She said I know that you said that you didn't want to purchase a phone today, but I am at a loss at the moment and want your experience to be good with T-Mobile.

Well after some thinking, we went ahead of got a new 6 Plus for my Wife and will upgrade it in the future when/if she wants.

I am impressed over all and to date beyond the Physician's parking lot at the hospital I yet to find a place where T-Mobile is materially inferior to at&t.

CatJo

That is a great story of good customer service, nice to hear. And believe it or not, even though you didn't want to purchase a new iPhone, that Jump (I hope you did the Jump on Demand, $19/month for the iPhone 6 Plus right?) is a good deal and as I'd said, it will be very beneficial to upgrade to the iPhone 6S Plus next month for the same monthly payment and hopefully get a superior Band 12 experience to boot.

As far as customer service goes, I've been having a strange occasional issue where my phone will not be able to make/receive calls but data continues to work - a toggle of Airplane mode fixes this. Happens to several iPhone 6's in our family and my 6 Plus as well, was doing it when we used our Verizon iPhones when we first switched, and now with the T-Mobile iPhones as well.

I'd opened a few trouble tickets through their social media support (TForce), and when it looked like things weren't getting better, I sent an email to the CEO John Legere (who, as you may know, is very active on Twitter and apparently does read and sometimes respond to direct emails). I then tweeted him a couple of days later saying I'd sent an email. Since then, I've had three different people call me - a VP of Customer Service, a TForce Manager and tech liaison, and then someone from the office of the CEO. Very impressive, all super helpful and assuring that they will get to the bottom of this and make things right. Every one of them seemed genuinely concerned that my T-Mobile experience wasn't as good as it could be, and I have to say I'm very impressed by the contact. Almost certainly wouldn't have this with Verizon or AT&T.