T-Mobile Blackberry and myTouch 3g Fiasco

In March of 2009 I bought a Blackberry 8220 flip phone from a local T-Mobile store.  I chose that model because I liked its compact size and incognito look.  I did not like the other Blackberry models since the keys seemed so cramped and the phones looked so wide.   The keypad on the 8220 was surprisingly spacious and it had a comfortable feel.  It was my first "smart phone" and a major upgrade from my previous Nokia.  For someone who is in the tech industry it was about time I stepped up my phone.

I was not happy that I had to carry a Blackberry data plan for an extra $25 a month but that is typical.  To soften the blow, T-Mobile gave me a $100 Visa gift card. No complaints there.

Since I am with T-Mobile, an IPhone was not an option and the Sidekick's keyboard felt clunky.  I chose a Blackberry because I wanted to experiment with Blackberry app development. I believe cellphone apps are the future of software platforms and that is being proven more everyday.  After reading a little bit about Blackberry development, I was turned off by the complexities of it and I never really got into it.

I found the Blackberry app store to be pretty lacking and I never downloaded many apps.  The only two apps I ever downloaded were Opera and a weather app.  Opera was awesome and a great replacement for the sluggish Blackberry browser, especially when configured for mobile mode.  The weather app never quite worked right but I left it installed.

Fast forward about a year later.  My Blackberry kept getting an "App Error 200" and had to be reset.  This happened a couple of times a day.  I went to the local T-Mobile store and they couldn't help me.  They told me to call 611 or RIM.

I called 611 and they suggested I use the Blackberry Desktop Manager to remove all the applications and then reload them with the same utility.  I asked the rep if I should back up my data first, and she gave an oops, and told me that would be a good idea.  I backed up my data and reinstalled the phone, and the problem went away for a little while.

A few days later, the phone started to reboot for no reason.  No more "App Error 200", just spontaneous reboots.   This happened maybe once a day.  It was a nuisance but I could deal with it, knowing that T-Mobile will just read from their script and tell me to reload the apps again.

This problem progressively got worse until one Saturday when the phone kept rebooting in a seemingly endless cycle.  I would get the white reboot screen with the clock icon and that would sometimes stay on the screen for 1/2 hour.  This was not acceptable; neither was reloading the apps to get another couple of days of normalcy.

Back to calling T-Mobile.  I spoke to a rep who was not able to offer any assistance other than telling me to wipe out the phone again.  Oh, by the way, my warranty apparently ran out a week ago.  No matter that I first reported the problem when it was under warranty.   I asked if they had a phone number for RIM since they may be able to offer more advanced support.  The rep offered to transfer me to RIM, and I waited on hold.

The person who answered from RIM was basically a message taker and told me that it would cost $49 just to speak to a technician.  She also told me that T-Mobile should have transferred me, stayed on the line and given their carrier code so I would not have to pay.  She wasn't surprised they just dumped me into the system since it happens all the time.  So I had to call T-Mobile again, and go through the story again.

Would you believe they did it AGAIN?  I was dropped blindly into RIM's system and was told I would have to pay $49 to talk to a tecnician.  Yes, I had to call T-Mobile a third time and go through the same saga!  I was really starting to get steamed and the night had just begun.

I finally got through to a technician at RIM.  What did he want me to do?  Yes, wipe out the phone again... this time with an updated version of Blackberry's Desktop Manager.  He had me open a WebEx session so he could watch my screen.  Desktop Manager would not launch and he had me go to a command line and run the utility with a -nojvm flag.  I hate JAVA.

During the wipeout, my phone kept rebooting and each reboot would take several minutes.  While the phone is booting, the computer can not communicate with it and it took a couple of HOURS for Desktop Manager to do its thing.  When it was done, the phone rebooted again and the welcome screen never appeared.  I had to do a battery pull and hope for it to boot again.  It never booted to the login screen and the technician put me on hold.

When he came back on the line, he had another rep with him on three way.  This rep confirmed that my warranty had just run out and gave me a couple of options:

1. 1.  Send the phone to them and pay $150 for them to repair it.
2. 2.  Pay $250 for a refurbished phone.

Neither one of those options were acceptable to me, considering I originally reported the problem when the phone was under warranty.  I was also not going to pay for a refurbished old phone.  This rep recommended I call T-Mobile again to see if they can do anything for me.
So back to T-Mobile where I sang my song again, exhausted and frustrated by this point.   The T-Mobile rep told me that I was eligible for a phone upgrade, but would have to pay $150 for it.  I calmly asked for him to speak to a manager considering the situation, since I did originally report the issue while under warranty.  I waited on hold for a couple of minutes and when he came back he had some good news.

Since I originally reported my issue while the phone was under warranty and because I was such a valued customer, he can offer me a free upgrade to the myTouch 3g.  Not being that much of a phone geek, I was not very familiar with it, but I knew it was an Android phone.  I am not a fan of touchscreen phones but it was the only acceptable option they offered me, so I accepted.  He told me that the Motorola Cliq is comparable to the Mytouch but it also has a hardware keyboard.  Unfortunately, that phone was out of stock.  If I wanted the myTouch, I would need to renew my contract for 2 more years, and I would have a 14 day buyer's remorse period.  If I did not like the phone, I can return it.  Fair enough.

After a few days, the phone arrived and I dug in.  Pretty nice screen, good web browser, lots of free downloadable apps to play with.  I did not find the phone to be very fast while browsing.  Opera on the Blackberry felt faster to me.  So much for all the 3g hype.

I was really not comfortable with the touchscreen keyboard.  I found that I was able to type reasonably fast on an IPhone, but this keyboard was not as accurate for some reason.  I then discovered the phone had Swype which is just plain awesome.   It makes typing on the touchscreen pretty quick and quite pleasurable.  I highly recommend this app.  Check it out on Youtube:



Even though I accepted touchscreen typing, there were still a few things that were really annoying me about the myTouch:

• You must tie the phone to a Gmail address.  Once you do this, you can not add another Gmail address to the Gmail app. Most people I know have lots of email addresses and this restriction is just too limiting.  I understand the latest Android update allows for more than one address, but T-Mobile doesn't know when that update is coming.
• Their notification sounds and vibrations are short and only play once.  You can not configure them to repeat.  If you happen to miss the first chirp, you are out of luck.
• There is no way to configure email filtering, similar to how you can with Blackberry.  This means that the phone keeps feeding me spam, bacn, and automated emails I would rather not receive on my phone.  The best solution I have found for this is at this link: http://androidforums.com/htc-hero/33457-best-email-configuration.html In quick summary, you consolidate all your email boxes into one, filter there, and then configure the Android to pull emails from that account via the Work Email app.  Doing so will cause it receive emails via push and that should help battery life.  This is a creative solution, but I don't think someone should have to go through all this and it still does not solve the need to use Gmail services with multiple accounts. 
• You can not change the from address from the default Email app.  To get this feature, you need to download another app called K-9.     
• The battery life was terrible.  Even with Wifi, GPS and email polling disabled, I was lucky to get about 20 hours out of a lightly used device.  This seems pretty weak to me.  What is the point of having a phone with all these features if you have to cripple them to supposedly save the battery?
• There was no support for WMA music files that I had ripped from my CDs.  Yeah yeah, I know... evil Microsoft and their proprietary technology.  But the Blackberry handled these files fine. 
• The phone was always covered with fingerprints.  There is no way around this with a touch screen device, and this is a pet peeve of mine.

This is not to say that the Blackberry is a perfect phone - far from it.  If it was perfect, I would not have had the Android in my hands to begin with.  I am just used to certain, basic things that my older Blackberry did well.  Complain all you want about its slower web browser, Blackberry is a mature messaging device and that is mostly what I use the phone for.

A search of the phone geek sites shows lots of people with the same Android complaints.  I find it amazing how the largest software companies leave basic features out of their products and go silent when customers ask for them.  I honestly think it is just a way to have you come back every year and buy their latest model.  They give you incrimental improvements, and leave you hanging on for the next version.

So after playing with the Mytouch for about a week, I decided it was not for me and called T-Mobile to see what my return options were.  They do not make any Blackberry flip phones anymore.  I guess it bombed.  From the research I did, it sounds like the Blackberry 9700 would be a strong choice.  The biggest expected weakness is the web browser once again, but I would probably use Opera anyway.  I have also read complaints from several people about the phone freezing, resetting, being forced to do battery pulls, etc.   Some things never change.

I was told that I could return the myTouch and get a Blackberry 9700 instead.  Perfect.  The rep told me I can go to the local Blackberry store to make the exchange.  I asked her to verify this so I do not waste my time going there.  I was placed on hold and when the rep returned, she reassured me that I can do this.  Sounds good.  Off to the T-Mobile store I trek...

I had a feeling this would not be an easy exchange.   The rep cut me off and told me they could not accept the return of a phone that was sent through the T-Mobile corporate warehouse.  He looked up my account and saw that I was indeed told by a customer service rep to go to the store and exchange the phone, but told me he would not able to honor that.  He then asked the manager and she told me the same story.  I don't appreciate having my time wasted.  I was pretty steamed and asked him to call customer service for me and see if they can override, considering the fact that I was just following their instructions!

He called in front of me and went through my story.  He then handed the phone to me and all the phone rep can tell me was that he was sorry that I was given the wrong information.  He told me to go to a UPS store, ship back the myTouch and return to the store with the tracking number.  Once they have that in their system then I can get the Blackberry from the store.  One problem: the UPS store was closed and T-Mobile was closing soon as well.   I slammed the phone down so hard the other customers looked at me.  I think there was steam coming out of my eyes, I was so furious.  I stormed out of there grumbling every curse I could think of.  Nothing peeves me worse than incompetence and this saga is full of it.

Now it was time to go home and go another round with T-Mobile.  I fought my way through the IVR and got connected to a woman.  I swear this is the one I talked to earlier who told me to go the store to exchange the phone.  I told her my story and that I was very angry and want to know what I need to do to exchange this phone.  She put me "on hold", and then disconnected me!


You have got to be kidding me!

I called them back, refraining from screaming, and had to tell my story again.  This rep was pretty helpful and took my home phone number just in case we get disconnected.  (A great customer service move that all companies should employ!)   She told me that my best bet would be to send the old phone back to them and they will send me the Blackberry 9700.  She can tell I was annoyed by the whole situation and put me on hold to see if there was anything she could do to speed up the delivery of the 9700.

When she came back on the line she told me that she can have the 9700 sent to me even BEFORE I send the myTouch back to them due to all of the hassle I have been through, I just need to make sure I send them the myTouch or I will be charged for both phones.

The next day, I did a factory reset on the myTouch, and sent it back to them.  A day later, I received a text message from T-Mobile with a UPS tracking number for the 9700.  It was supposed to be delivered on Monday, but as of Friday morning the
status was “Out for Delivery.”  Three of my favorite words. 

So the phone arrived and I have been playing with it for the last day.  It has an updated OS from my old Blackberry Flip but most of the options and menus are the same.  The phone is fast and the screen is razor sharp with outstanding colors and depth.  I knew the browser would be weak going into it, but it's not horrible.  My biggest complaint?  They keyboard feels way too cramped.  After all this mess, I think I like the touchscreen with Swype much better. :)