Carry On My Wayward One (sung to the tune of the Kansas song)

Or We’ll get back to you 3

My Adsense account was cancelled because of “no spend”. And here I was under the impression that it was supposed to be bringing in money, not require me to spend money. I guess Google is taking a page from the other arm of their Empire, YouTube, and the demonetization of the Youtubers who built them but didn’t quite cut the mustard as far as number of subscribers. So long and thanks for all the views, no money for you

This is not a story about that

This is my ongoing trials and tribulations with Freedom Mobile cell phone so-called-service.

I asked about some of the solutions I had put forward, them setting up calling over wifi on my model of phone (which would have helped countless others), exchanging my phone for a phone that they support wifi calling on, loaning me a Weboost or other signal booster (like American ISP’s do), them using the 700Mhz range in my area to penetrate my apartment as I apparently live in a 

Faraday cage. Offering me a better plan. They didn’t. 

You might say “Buyer beware” or “Carpe Jugulum” or some Latin sounding thing for “it’s your own damned fault for getting stuck with a service that sucks”, but I had done the research. Their coverage map with orange indicating “LTE high speed like you wouldn’t believe *may not work until a few months down the road **and then some”, covered my area like there was a two for one paint sale at Home Depot.  

I paid off my “Tab” in preparation to move to a provider that could get me a strong enough signal in my own home so I could actually call and receive calls. It was a small amount.

All of a sudden they were offering me a better plan. X number of dollars and NO OVERAGES. I can call long distance in Canada and the States and it won’t cost more. I can text all over the place and my bill doesn’t go up. Home network, Away network, doesn’t matter. Same price. 

The sneaky thing is their tech support told me to change my phones settings to only use the Home network.

  No chance of ending up on the Away or Roaming networks.

Is the service any better? I have tried recently to dial out when I was in a mall parking lot out in the open and the phone showing Home and full bars. It did not connect.  I tried from my work in the city. Would not connect. Tonight in my apartment it says Home and one bar. It connected. Nice surprise but reliability over astonishment is preferred.

And the bill since getting the better plan?

Not what they promised but I expected there would be a discrepancy during the switch from the old plan. Still, the cheapest bill in months. We’ll see what next month brings.

Here is something we sell on Zazzle. We also sell it on Amazon but it is harder to find there. 

I Tried to be Good but There Was Bonfire & Beer T T-Shirt
by ladybuglane

We’ll Get Back to You 2

Or be careful what you wish for

When we last left our hero he was embroiled in a battle to unlock his phone and get decent cell service from his provider Freedom Mobile.

Much later than the promised (but not expected) 10 days later, someone did get back to me and the gist of the communication was that I needed to go to one of their stores and their tech support could help with the unlocking. 

   I went
             They couldn’t

In fact they said I had to go to their store in another city. Only 20 or 30 minutes away but another city all the same. 

        I went

The tech guy said he couldn’t do it due to confidentiality and security reasons but he could tell me how to get the information I needed and then I could unlock the phone myself.

At this point I forget all the convoluted steps he said I had to do to open the secret specific hidden screen on my phone. It may have involved a bag full of chicken feathers and standing on one leg. 

I have the bag of feathers but my balance is not so good so I just Googled YouTube for instructions on how to get to the secret specific hidden screen. Two minutes later I was the proud owner of my own unlocked phone. The service was still lousy but it was unlocked and lousy.

Back to the coverage issue

Tenacious as I was in unlocking the phone, I decided to let things slide for a while. Then I heard that there was a 700MHz band that some cell providers have. 

This band, for some reason, can penetrate trees, walls and neighbours more easily than whatever Freedom is using so I inquired of their helpdesk if and when they would be using that band. Their answer was a less than satisfying,           “We don’t know”

I was seriously thinking that I would start looking at which of the mobile providers was the lesser of several evils when my phone rang. At my home

I checked the cell towers with an app called OpenSignal. There was a new tower near my home. 

Not only could I now hear from recruiters but I could order pizza without walking to the field across the street.

             The end of my cell phone woes?

Remember the beginning of this post when I said be careful what you wish for?

I am receiving calls. According to one caller, if I don’t contact a certain number within a short time, Revenue Canada will issue a warrant for my arrest. I talked to the real Revenue Canada. They said they couldn’t be bothered. Not sure if I am relieved or insulted.

The other call I get might be in Mandarin. I recorded the lady who calls and talks to me in Chinese, ran it through Google Translate and I may be in trouble with the Chinese Embassy. Or there is a two for one on General Tao Chicken. I’m hoping for the latter.

After all that a drink might be in order. I'm more of a Bacardi guy but...

This Might Be Wine

This might be wine Two-Tone coffee mug
by ladybuglane

We’ll Get Back to You

a little more wordy than my last post

I have opined about cell phone companies and the service I received in the past. It is hard not to.

After my experiences with Robbers and Hell, Telus and Virgin (I know, I am slacking and have not come up with any pet name for the last two), I decided to try one of the underdogs, Freedom Mobile.

The service is bad

Sometimes it is good, but it is very dependent on your location.

Driving around in BC from POCO to Vancouver there are a lot of places that have blazing LTE speed. Sometimes it is only 4G or even 3G but still I can connect.

The problems start at home. In spite of being in the orange section on the Freedom Mobile coverage map, I experience many states of connectivity all while sitting still with my phone, sitting untouched, on the table beside me.

One minute LTE.

Then next Roaming or 4G or 3G.

Then the inexplicable Home AND Away.

And my favourite, EMERGENCY CALLS ONLY.

WTF?

I have not moved. The phone has not moved and the house is more or less stationary. Ok, it is really stationary.

They said service would be better once they finished the network expansion in my area this Fall.

They were wrong

“Is this a problem Dave”?

I suppose not really if you don’t mind putting on shoes and a coat, walking down the road and across the street and standing in the field to check voicemail and return calls. It was chilly talking to loved ones back home over the holiday season.

I used to be miffed at the $40 or $50 dollars a month it to cost to have a hard wired phone in one room of my house but the damned phone rang every time. There was no call display. You picked up the phone and dealt with the consequences. But you could call out and most of the time someone would answer.

In the early days there were no cordless phones and if you had to poop while on the phone, you needed a really long cord. But, you rarely heard “Please leave a message…”, or “Your call can not be completed”.

In these days of instant communication (unless you are with Freedom Mobile), you expect something positive and quick.

I contacted Freedom and mentioned that I live in a dead zone (as far as their cell service is concerned) and that cell providers in the states sometimes offered the loan of a cell booster so their customers could actually make and receive calls in their own home. Kinda handy if you are looking for work or in case of emergency. 

Their response, when it finally came was “No, we don’t do that”. “Buy your own”. I checked on the cost of a cell booster and the price made Robbers and Hell look attractive. Since Freedom’s service is so spotty, you’d think they would be able to get a bulk discount on cell boosters.

Not helpful

The focus of this post is actually the speed of communication with Freedom.

You can respond to them on Messenger and feel less than satisfied very quickly. For example, they finally sent me a message on Messenger, days after I sent an inquiry through their website.

They magnanimously offer phone unlocking for free (ever since it became a legal requirement) but it did not work. The instructions on their website were to phone #06# and you would receive a code to unlock your phone or maybe instructions or something. I tried it many times and it said communication problems or invalid code. Par for the course with Freedom so I looked at their other method. Get a code from the battery in the phone. 

I Googled a YouTube video on how to open the Samsung S7. 12 minutes long. Apply heat (what could go wrong?) with a hot plate (are you kidding?) or hair dryer and pry the glass case off without breaking it. Remove forty twelve screws and some plastic bits and read the required number.

Being the intelligent lad I am, I looked on the original Samsung box the phone came in and the number was on the label.

In spite of the number being labeled as the correct number, when Freedom finally answered my query days later, they said that they did not have the number for the brand new phone they sold me in their database.

Did they sell me some black market unregistered knock-off phone?

They said they passed my complaint on to their Back End. I can expect to hear from them in 10 days.

To be continued…but don’t hold your breath. 

I Don’t Like Sports

I Don’t Dislike Them

When I was younger and the NHL had fewer teams than a carton had eggs, we would gather with friends from down the lane and watch Hockey Night In Canada. I even played some sports.

It was fun.

Years on, when people gather for the Big Game, I don’t.

Whether it is the Grey Cup, the Super Bowl, the Gravy Boat or any other serving piece, I am not watching.

Sure I’ll gaze at the screens in Burger World as I anticipate my food. Usually sports is playing, but I watch the commercials with the same level of interest.

Here is Where I Make the Leap

I don’t want to make you any more paranoid than you already are but you are being watched.

Every time you buy something with a retailer’s “Loyalty” card, that information is recorded.

Sometimes this is good. The retailers know what to stock and when to stock it.

Sometimes it is just weird.

You start noticing that ads for (insert product here) that you bought in a real store start showing up on your Facebook feed and your Google-ing.

Seems a little creepy

I am not upset that “They” have the ability to connect the purchases I make in a bricks and mortar store to my online presence.

What bothers me is...

They Don’t Use the Info

My cable provider lists around 500 channels and tells me that I am getting a deal by them bundling a bunch of stuff I never watch.

I watch 13 channels and some of those rarely.
So their offering does not reflect my wants as a consumer. 

You know, one of the people who keep them in business. 

They even had a robo-telemarketer call me and it spoke French. I didn’t mind the language but as they had asked me to choose my preferred language in the profile they keep on customers, you’d think they’d use the information.
(Now I am paranoid. Yesterday I emailed the cable company about the mandatory March 1^st 2016 (tomorrow) basic cable offering, and now none of my channels are working, just a “ONE MOMENT PLEASE This channel should be available shortly”. Still no reply to the email).

The other place the data is not being used is on my news feed in Facebook. It is not Facebook’s fault that Yahoo fills my page with sports stories but Yahoo should certainly take an interest in what their viewers want although the way Yahoo is going, it may not matter.

In Closing:

If you collect the data, use it. 

If you want to remain relevant, collect the data.

Amazon – I am no longer looking for that laptop battery.

Cable company – I do not watch sports, 99% of reality TV, any programming that is not English (except some Kung Fu movies) nor do I care about HD or 4K or 3D TV.

Yahoo – No sports please and good luck.

You can buy a sun flowery mug for your Maxwell House or Tetley tea here...

Sunflowers Two-Tone Coffee Mug by ladybuglane
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