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over35mom
Posts: 23 |
 
Fri Jul 13, 2007 8:34 pm |
Hi all, I am a nextel customer currently without a contract. I told them I was thinking of leaving nextel because there are 2 other companies out there willing to give me 3 camera phones for free. After numerous calls, being hung up on at least 5 times when I finally started counting. never to be called back. I was told to talk to tele sales and they told me to talk to the account management dept, who told me to hold they couldnt help me but since I was a customer for 4 years they would put me through the dept that could. this went on for 3 hours today. bottom line? ended back at cancellations to be told that the best I was allowed on the 3 phones, ic902's, was $75.00 off on each one because I received 3 new phones for free last year. end of story. needless to say i feel like they couldnt care less if they keep me as a customer or not. does anyone know if this is as far as I can go? is there any dept that can get me the phones for less or free even? I apologize for the typo's but I have my 4 month old on my lap right now.
thanks,
over35mom
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McGirk
Posts: 2394
Phone Model:
AX380 Wave
Service Provider:
Alltel |
Sat Jul 14, 2007 1:34 pm |
Yes this is true.
Sprint Nextel (recently rebranded as just plain Sprint) has a two year upgrade frequency policy. What this means is, you're allowed to upgrade for the full $150 off once every two years. Since you just got phones for free last year, that means you would still need to finish or nearly finish the two years before you are eligible for the full $150 discount. Now the even better news is, the cheapest Nextel even with the full two year discount is the i850 at 149.99. Not exactly free, and not exactly competitive either.
As for the ic902, I would strongly recommend against any phone beginning with 'ic' as this is the indicator that it is a 'hybrid' phone. In plain english, this phone only uses Nextel towers for the walkie- talkie, and only uses Sprint towers for the phone. The phone rarely roams as the phone only works on the 1900mhz frequency, while most of Sprints roaming agreements are over the 800mhz frequency. Consequently the phone doesn't even work in half the places a Sprint phone would work. And the phone and walkie-talkie work off of different systems. At any given time the phone may or may not work, or the walkie-talkie may or may not work, and on many occasions you will not have both, but one or the other. Because of this, the battery life on them seems to be extra short. Maintaining, or attempting to maintain a connection with two different systems at the same time drains the battery much quicker.
In conclusion, no you can't get the phones cheaper, especially if you are still under contract, and even if you weren't, phones would be cheaper ANYWHERE then they are with Nextel, it's been that way for years, Sprint Nextel seems to be totally content with the situation.
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rico915
Posts: 9 |
Thu Jul 19, 2007 1:56 pm |
| McGirk wrote: | Yes this is true.
Sprint Nextel (recently rebranded as just plain Sprint) has a two year upgrade frequency policy. What this means is, you're allowed to upgrade for the full $150 off once every two years. Since you just got phones for free last year, that means you would still need to finish or nearly finish the two years before you are eligible for the full $150 discount. Now the even better news is, the cheapest Nextel even with the full two year discount is the i850 at 149.99. Not exactly free, and not exactly competitive either.
As for the ic902, I would strongly recommend against any phone beginning with 'ic' as this is the indicator that it is a 'hybrid' phone. In plain english, this phone only uses Nextel towers for the walkie- talkie, and only uses Sprint towers for the phone. The phone rarely roams as the phone only works on the 1900mhz frequency, while most of Sprints roaming agreements are over the 800mhz frequency. Consequently the phone doesn't even work in half the places a Sprint phone would work. And the phone and walkie-talkie work off of different systems. At any given time the phone may or may not work, or the walkie-talkie may or may not work, and on many occasions you will not have both, but one or the other. Because of this, the battery life on them seems to be extra short. Maintaining, or attempting to maintain a connection with two different systems at the same time drains the battery much quicker.
In conclusion, no you can't get the phones cheaper, especially if you are still under contract, and even if you weren't, phones would be cheaper ANYWHERE then they are with Nextel, it's been that way for years, Sprint Nextel seems to be totally content with the situation. |
Actually the cheapest NON hybrid phone you can get, and it does not include a camera, is the 265i, free with the $150, or $104.99 with $75. The next in line is the i670, $49.99 with $150, or $124.99 with $75.
Now as for the ic902, contrary to what I read above, I have never heard any complaints about it. People enjoy the fact they have Sprint service where they dont have Nextel, and vice versa. Of course as with any new technology, they have their ups and downs, but its not horrible. Unfortunately the ic902 is $339.99 with $150, and has a $100 mail in rebate. with $75 it will be 414.99. The phone comes equipped with EVDO high-speed data, iDEN Push-To-Talk, memory card slot, stereo Bluetooth, and a 2 megapixel camera. MP3 music player, camcorder, Battery Life: Talk time: 3.20 hours (192 minutes)
Standby time: 147 hours (6.1 days)
So yeah. If you want a hybrid phone with not too many crazy features, you also have the opt of choosing the ic402 and the ic502. both reasonably priced.
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McGirk
Posts: 2394
Phone Model:
AX380 Wave
Service Provider:
Alltel |
Fri Jul 20, 2007 3:08 pm |
Oh yeah, there are cheaper Nextel phones, but she was asking about Camera phones and the cheapest Nextel with a camera in it since the i275 got discontinued is the i850. . .
. . . and if you haven't received a lot of complaints about the Hybrid phones then you live in one of those precious few areas where both parts of the phone work. Take a look at the coverage map on Sprint.com, the coverage for that phone is terrible. Those are the facts. More facts? The Hybrid phones are a cheap fix for Sprint. The more people they get on the Hybrid the less people that will be using their overstrained Nextel system. That's the reason why a few months ago Sprint was allowing people with straight Nextels to upgrade no matter how long they had the phone. Almost every customer that purchased a Hybrid phone that used to have Nextel has returned it or attempted to return it because they found there phone not working in all the places it used to. In fact it's fairly common knowledge now that the Hybrid and straight Nextel phones both a planned to be replaced by an all CDMA phone called (for now) QChat. This technology that this phone uses is supposed to be able to instantaneously connect in the same way Nextel's Direct Connect does, and will also be able to conned to ReadyLink phones, and possibly others. This phone is at least a couple of years out, but that right there marks the end of Nextel's IDen and Sprint's bastard child Hybrid phone.
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over35mom
Posts: 23 |
Fri Jul 20, 2007 7:52 pm |
"In conclusion, no you can't get the phones cheaper, especially if you are still under contract, and even if you weren't, phones would be cheaper ANYWHERE then they are with Nextel, it's been that way for years, Sprint Nextel seems to be totally content with the situation. "
See thats the thing, I DONT have a contract anymore. It ran out in June. So the fact that not only will they not give me a better price on THREE phones, lied to me, transferred me all over the place for over 3 hours, disconnected me, etc etc. just amazes me. Why not just come right out and say "hey we are Nextel (sprint) and we are king and dont need your puny business of 3 phone lines" Right now they are supposed to be sending me an email with an offer for my cellular plan but they insist the only thing I can get is $75.00 off of the retail price of each phone I buy. I want to get rid of them so badly but my husband uses them for work and if we left nextel for verizon our phone bill would be over minutes all the time because all his co-workers are on nextel. But seriously I dont think Nextel could care less if I stay or go.
Anyway thanks for answering my question, as for hte ic902 there is no way in heck I will spend 400 on a phone ever. How come last year they gave me 3 i850's for free? I didnt have to pay anything for them. and I got 3 of them. I had been a customer for 2+ years at that point nd only got phones fro them once which was when we first signed up for a 1 yr contract. sorry, I didnt mean to make this so long.
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McGirk
Posts: 2394
Phone Model:
AX380 Wave
Service Provider:
Alltel |
Sat Jul 21, 2007 12:13 pm |
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Okay, you got a heck of a deal if you got 3 i850's free. With full discount those are still 149.99. Usually they only give those away free if you threaten to leave them. But you already have camera phones, why are you trying to get new ones? The pictures would be no better or worse then any other companies 'free' camera phones.
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over35mom
Posts: 23 |
Sat Jul 21, 2007 12:27 pm |
| McGirk wrote: | | Okay, you got a heck of a deal if you got 3 i850's free. With full discount those are still 149.99. Usually they only give those away free if you threaten to leave them. But you already have camera phones, why are you trying to get new ones? The pictures would be no better or worse then any other companies 'free' camera phones. |
It all started because of the amount of dropped calls. but we use the direct connect feature a lot. thats when the representitive told me about the ic902, keep the direct connect, camera, and supposedly get better cellular service. He also told me becuase of all my troubles and for being a customer for 4 yrs I could probably get them for $150.00 each. thats when all the transferring, disconections, etc started. After all of this I figure if I switch 2 of us to sprint and my husband keeps nextel maybe that would work. still not sure what I am going to do.
thanks,
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McGirk
Posts: 2394
Phone Model:
AX380 Wave
Service Provider:
Alltel |
Sat Jul 21, 2007 4:29 pm |
As soon as anyone mentions dropped calls, Hybrid is usually mentioned. Oddly enough customers that I hace talked to have stated that the Hybrids drop more calls then their Nextels did. I'm not saying all, but I have heard it frequently.
That is a good idea about some with Sprint and your husband with Nextel. They probably won't be able to be on the same shared plan, as Sprint and Nextel plans are subtley different in the included features. But the Sprint phones will included mobile to mobile, which includes Sprint, Nextel and currently Boost customers, and add it to your husbands phone for $5 a month. Under that solution you could get cheaper phones that worked in more places, and could continue to talk to your husband without using minutes, and he could save on minutes by keeping the Direct Connect feature for his work, and the mobile to mobile while talking to you.
PowerPack 450 individual plan + mobile to mobile, without any other features would run you approximately $50 a month, although depending on the job, the Total Equipment Protection would likely be adviseable.
The other two phones could be under the PowerPack for Families with 550 included minutes and would run you approximately $70 a month without and addons.
I'm not sure how this compares with what you've got, but it is definitely one solution.
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