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Carrier Sprint is pathetic

Black Magic said:
I'm in a Texas city that is a first round market for Sprint LTE that is apparently 95% done. Major gaps in coverage all around the city that leaves a lot to be desired. S4GRU says it 95% but sure as hell doesn't feel like 95% coverage.

The kicker is if you go to the NBA game in this city and you bring your Sprint phone, you will have no data service period. I find that crap unacceptable. I will say that the arena has AT&T in the name, so I'm curious if there is some cock blocking going on there?
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What I hate is Dan Hesse's characterization of all of this as "pardon our dust." This isn't a minor inconvenience. This isn't having to walk around construction to get to the front door of a business or ignoring the clear plastic hanging inside the shop to keep dust away from the customers.

This is we give Sprint money and get no service. Or get degraded service. I think if Dan Hesse actually had to spend a few moments experiencing this crap he'd choose his words more carefully. But then, when you're the CEO of a cell carrier, you don't have to worry whether a place has your service or not because that's taken care of for you I guess.
 
eyoungren said:
This is we give Sprint money and get no service. Or get degraded service. I think if Dan Hesse actually had to spend a few moments experiencing this crap he'd choose his words more carefully. But then, when you're the CEO of a cell carrier, you don't have to worry whether a place has your service or not because that's taken care of for you I guess.
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I've always thought that execs from all carriers should test each other's networks.

If Sprint's execs carried around a VZW/AT&T device and used it, I have a feeling some of their marketing BS would be toned down :D
 
AutoUnion39 said:
AT&T runs a DAS system at AT&T Center. It's up to the carriers (ROI, etc) to also sign up.

TD Gardens (where the Celtics play) got an AT&T DAS back in 2012. VZW signed up a few months later. During Celtics/Bruins game days, only the two have working data. Pretty ironic because Sprint is a huge NBA sponsor.

http://pocketnow.com/2012/05/21/this-is-how-att-covers-19000-people-under-one-roof


-It's a very similar situation in our MBTA (subway) tunnels/stations. T-Mobile/AT&T share a DAS underground. A few months later, VZW came on board. Sprint refused. The work-around is to roam on VZW underground with your Sprint device.

-Similar situation at Fenway, where the Red Sox play. AT&T/VZW share a DAS. Sprint barely works in that area. No LTE at all, even though the maps say so. T-Mobile gets HSPA sometimes. Mostly EDGE if there's too many people.

-I don't think the name has to do anything with it. At VZ Center (Wizards play there), AT&T has a indoor DAS.

-Barclay's Center (BKN Nets) has a DAS that is shared between VZW/MetroPCS/Sprint/AT&T.

side note,
(Tim Duncan is one of my favorite players. Go SAS!) :D
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Ah ok. That makes sense. I was at the Knicks game last night and not only was I pissed that the Spurs lost in a great game, but the Sprint coverage was horrible data wise. I'm talking not even 3G coverage. I just need to hang in there a few more months.

Oh and in regards to Dan using a competitors cell phone, I'm wagering that he is. There is no way he would be able to get anything done relying on his own network data wise. Then again, I'm sure Sprint's home town has the best coverage they have to offer.
 
Black Magic said:
Ah ok. That makes sense. I was at the Knicks game last night and not only was I pissed that the Spurs lost in a great game,
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Haha, yesterday was a terrible day for basketball. Both scrub level NY teams beat elite level West teams (SAS and OKC). They must have been hung over from New Years :D

Oh and in regards to Dan using a competitors cell phone, I'm wagering that he is. There is no way he would be able to get anything done relying on his own network data wise. Then again, I'm sure Sprint's home town has the best coverage they have to offer.
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http://www.rootmetrics.com/compare-carriers/united-states/kansas-city/kansas-city-mo-july-2013/

68zkP.png


Better than other areas!
 
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New plans coming to Sprint. Seem like a decent deal.

Framily

https://now.sprint.com/framily/

http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/7/5284718/sprint-framily-plans-share-mobile-price

Sprint will soon launch a competitive new way for you to save on your monthly phone bill. According to a source familiar with the service, the new option will be called a ‘Framily’ plan — no, that’s not a typo — and it lets you share an account ID with up to ten of your friends (get it?) who are also on Sprint, while still being billed separately. The plans will start at $55 per month for an individual line, which gets you 1GB of data and unlimited talk and texting. Data hungry users can bump that up to 3GB for an extra $10 or to unlimited data for an extra $20 monthly.

What makes Sprint's Framily plans interesting is that the more lines there are on your account, the lower the prices get. Each line added to the account cuts $5 off, all the way down to $25 a month, provided you can find seven or more willing friends who are also on Sprint. It bears repeating that despite the family implication and shared account ID, everyone will still be billed separately.

The plans do not have a two-year contract or offer a device subsidy, so unless you want to use Sprint’s One-Up annual trade-in plan, you have to pay full retail price for your phone. Users who have the unlimited data add-on will also be able to do a device trade-in after one year.

T-Mobile has been very aggressive in offering lower cost rate plans, but this new option from Sprint will be different than anything else available from US carriers. Sprint and T-Mobile occupy a distant third and fourth place behind market leaders Verizon and AT&T, so it's not a surprise to see that they are the ones coming out with innovative wireless plans that cost less than traditional options. We expect Sprint to announce the new Framily plans in the very near future, and it will be interesting to see what T-Mobile will announce at its press conference tomorrow.

A Sprint representative declined to comment on the rumored new plans.

Dan Seifert contributed to this report

Thanks, tipster!

Update: Sprint CEO Dan Hesse just confirmed that the Framily plans will be coming to Sprint during an investor conference. The plans will be available to both new and existing customers starting on January 10th. Current customers that are on a traditional Sprint plan with a contract can sign up for the new Framily plan, but there will be a $15 per month surcharge until their contract is satisfied.
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AutoUnion39 said:
New plans coming to Sprint. Seem like a decent deal.

Framily

https://now.sprint.com/framily/

http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/7/5284718/sprint-framily-plans-share-mobile-price
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Reading this made me LOL... Imagine how pissed your friends and family are going to be after you persuade them to switch to Sprint to save a few bucks.

If they offered a decent service they wouldn't have to get so creative with their marketing and plans. Sprint is like the exact opposite of Apple, I take that back, they are like Apple in the mid 90s but without all the good time memories of the Mac.
 
Haven't really done any intensive reading on this, but my understanding is that no matter how many lines each line is billed separately. So, with my wife I'd be getting two bills and not the one.

Still seems like a gimmick to get me to move off my Everything Data 1500 plan.
 
AutoUnion39 said:
New plans coming to Sprint. Seem like a decent deal.

Framily

https://now.sprint.com/framily/

http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/7/5284718/sprint-framily-plans-share-mobile-price
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The nation's soon to be number 4 carrier is desperately trying everything they can to add anyone. I still don't see how this pathetic carrier is even around in 2014??? Their deals are not bad, its just the horrible network. I can't understand for the life in me how people use smartphones on this network? They are behind in building out their LTE network. Their LTE speeds are CRAP! Then their customers are stuck on their "3G" network which T-Mobile's EDGE network runs miles around.
 
MattMJB0188 said:
The nation's soon to be number 4 carrier is desperately trying everything they can to add anyone. I still don't see how this pathetic carrier is even around in 2014??? Their deals are not bad, its just the horrible network. I can't understand for the life in me how people use smartphones on this network? They are behind in building out their LTE network. Their LTE speeds are CRAP! Then their customers are stuck on their "3G" network which T-Mobile's EDGE network runs miles around.
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Are you done?
 
i went to sprint store in downtown NYC today to test out SPARK on a NOTE 3.
They had only 3G on the phone.. i asked the rep and she said "spark whaaa?"

at that point i said thank you and left.
 
Zaft said:
i went to sprint store in downtown NYC today to test out SPARK on a NOTE 3.
They had only 3G on the phone.. i asked the rep and she said "spark whaaa?"

at that point i said thank you and left.
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I'm of the opinion that Sprint is aware of the awful, awful lack of information/service that their CSRs have. But aren't going to do anything about it at the moment.

I say that because Sprint is already aware that they are bleeding customers because of the delays in the rollout and all the problems that causes. Sprint isn't offering anything to retain it's customers and months ago instructed their CSRs to that effect.

Dan Hesse has publicly said (not is so many words) that advertising is not being done because right now Sprint does not have the network to back up the advertising.

So, my guess is that Sprint is doing nothing about their reps lack of knowledge because there is no point.

Let's assume for the moment that that rep had known what you were talking about. If you'd been told that Spark was not available in your area you'd still probably have left right? How about telling you Spark was coming, establishing service and then finding out you had to wait a year for it?

Nah, I'm starting to think that Sprint isn't educating it's people because the effort both physically and financially right now just isn't justified. Just my speculation, I don't know anything.

Third party stores are even worse because while they carry the Sprint name, Sprint actually treats it's customers better than they treat their vendors! So whatever training goes to those employees only comes from the owner/manager of the store.
 
eyoungren said:
I'm of the opinion that Sprint is aware of the awful, awful lack of information/service that their CSRs have. But aren't going to do anything about it at the moment.

I say that because Sprint is already aware that they are bleeding customers because of the delays in the rollout and all the problems that causes. Sprint isn't offering anything to retain it's customers and months ago instructed their CSRs to that effect.

Dan Hesse has publicly said (not is so many words) that advertising is not being done because right now Sprint does not have the network to back up the advertising.

So, my guess is that Sprint is doing nothing about their reps lack of knowledge because there is no point.

Let's assume for the moment that that rep had known what you were talking about. If you'd been told that Spark was not available in your area you'd still probably have left right? How about telling you Spark was coming, establishing service and then finding out you had to wait a year for it?

Nah, I'm starting to think that Sprint isn't educating it's people because the effort both physically and financially right now just isn't justified. Just my speculation, I don't know anything.

Third party stores are even worse because while they carry the Sprint name, Sprint actually treats it's customers better than they treat their vendors! So whatever training goes to those employees only comes from the owner/manager of the store.
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im getting pretty sick of sprint. LTE is fine where i live, but in downtown NYC, where i work its non existent. yet T mobile has all of nyc covered already with LTE.

Tmobile will pay for my EFT now which was great news. Now just have to convince the others on my family plan...
 
I've heard Sprint has launched Spark in a few markets. Anyone in one of those areas have some speed tests to show what the speeds are like?
 
MattMJB0188 said:
The nation's soon to be number 4 carrier is desperately trying everything they can to add anyone. I still don't see how this pathetic carrier is even around in 2014??? Their deals are not bad, its just the horrible network. I can't understand for the life in me how people use smartphones on this network? They are behind in building out their LTE network. Their LTE speeds are CRAP! Then their customers are stuck on their "3G" network which T-Mobile's EDGE network runs miles around.
Click to expand...

My 5S works just fine on Sprint's "horrible" network. I wouldn't define the speeds I typically see on LTE (4-20 Mbps) as "crap" either, but that's just me. My only complaint is that LTE isn't as ubiquitous as would've liked, it's only available about half of the time, which is inexcusable at this point.

And T-Mobile's EDGE doesn't run miles around anything.
 
Need a bit of advice here..

Yesterday I went ahead and bought a 5S using my Sprint upgrade. My 4 served it's purpose for 2.5 years and I figured it was time for a change.

So far it seems my data has taken a severe turn for the worse. Don't know if it is iOS 7 related (I was running 6.0.1 on the 4) but I'm having data trouble in places I never did before and at times my service switches from 3G to 1x which I never ever had happen before.

LTE is almost never active and I expected it to not be. I don't care about this so much.

I'm thinking of just returning the 5S and ditching Sprint. Will I be able to return it and get out of the agreement I just signed into?

It's just to the point where I don't want to give Sprint any more money.

Thanks much in advance.
 
mccjim12 said:
Need a bit of advice here..

Yesterday I went ahead and bought a 5S using my Sprint upgrade. My 4 served it's purpose for 2.5 years and I figured it was time for a change.

So far it seems my data has taken a severe turn for the worse. Don't know if it is iOS 7 related (I was running 6.0.1 on the 4) but I'm having data trouble in places I never did before and at times my service switches from 3G to 1x which I never ever had happen before.

LTE is almost never active and I expected it to not be. I don't care about this so much.

I'm thinking of just returning the 5S and ditching Sprint. Will I be able to return it and get out of the agreement I just signed into?

It's just to the point where I don't want to give Sprint any more money.

Thanks much in advance.
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Did you get it at a Sprint store? I think you have 3 business to get out of the contract. I know at BestBuy you have 14 days.
 
mccjim12 said:
Need a bit of advice here..

Yesterday I went ahead and bought a 5S using my Sprint upgrade. My 4 served it's purpose for 2.5 years and I figured it was time for a change.

So far it seems my data has taken a severe turn for the worse. Don't know if it is iOS 7 related (I was running 6.0.1 on the 4) but I'm having data trouble in places I never did before and at times my service switches from 3G to 1x which I never ever had happen before.

LTE is almost never active and I expected it to not be. I don't care about this so much.

I'm thinking of just returning the 5S and ditching Sprint. Will I be able to return it and get out of the agreement I just signed into?

It's just to the point where I don't want to give Sprint any more money.

Thanks much in advance.
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You could probably do a "RESET NETWORK SETTINGS" to see if that resolves the issue. As for getting out of the contract you just signed, probably if you are within a window of 14 days. Not sure though.
 
jamezr said:
Did you get it at a Sprint store? I think you have 3 business to get out of the contract. I know at BestBuy you have 14 days.
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I got it at the Apple Store. I thought it said 30 days for a return but I'm not sure. Thanks.

Thanks Black Magic. I'll give it a try.
 
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Thanks. Yeah, I most likely will return it and shop around for a better deal. Verizon is too expensive relative to what I pay now ($80, Unlimited My Way). AT&T I can get 4 GB a month for $70. I've also thought of Virgin Mobile and just buying the phone outright. I'd cut my monthly bill in half. The problem is they use the Sprint towers.
 
eyoungren said:
What I hate is Dan Hesse's characterization of all of this as "pardon our dust." This isn't a minor inconvenience. This isn't having to walk around construction to get to the front door of a business or ignoring the clear plastic hanging inside the shop to keep dust away from the customers.
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Quoting myself because I found this today!

Posted on Jan 8., but I LOVE CTO Neville Ray's characterization of "Pardon our dust" as this ---> "My goodness, 'Pardon our dust?' It's a shi*storm!"

Someone other than a customer, but an actuall carrier exec said it! Dang time Dan Hesse got told exactly what it is!
 
AutoUnion39 said:
Since Chicago is basically the only city with NV complete, I just checked Rootmetrics.

http://www.rootmetrics.com/compare-carriers/united-states/chicago/chicago-il-october-2013/

Image

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Where's that VZW-killer we were promised S4GRU? ;)

----------

Atlanta is the 2nd market that is almost done.

http://www.rootmetrics.com/compare-carriers/united-states/atlanta/atlanta-ga-september-2013/

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That's flawed data in Atlanta.

All over atlanta, my wife and I have the same issues, I'm in t-mobile and my data will randomly just GO OUT and she's on Verizon and she has perfect signal (she should, Verizon is the second most expensive network) , but in the same places my data would go out, calls fail, or just drop overall with t-mobile, sprint wouldn't give me a problem at all. In fact, only thing wrong with sprint is data speed! Only thing wring with t-mobile is RELIABILITY
 
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