As a postscript to yesterday’s post bemoaning the state of Westminster Council’s ‘pay by mobile’ parking system, I got a surprising text from Virgin Vie today about an order for some home furnishings.

“Your VIRGIN VIE AT HOME parcel will be delivered today.  If you need your delivery on an alternative date reply to this text 1= 28th Feb 2=29th Feb 3=3rd Mar”

Genius!  A one character reply to re-schedule… On the actual day of delivery when I know if I’m available!  I might just buy some more stuff, I’m so impressed.

Why can’t every delivery be like this? Very normob-friendly

Sony Ericsson, Broca, and T-Mobile UK have all gotten together to attempt to solve a common problem - how to measure customer satisfaction following a handset repair. The three have teamed up and decided to use Broca’s cool technology to deliver a satisfaction survey - via SMS - to the customer’s handset after a pre-set period of time.

The coolest thing about Broca’s technology is that customers don’t simply get a boring form which requires them to use their phone’s keypad to type in a response. The system will use Broca’s Acquire data-capture product to deliver a graphical form-based questionaire, which customers can complete by selecting responses from convenient drop-down lists. Somehow, this ONLY uses SMS, without needing GPRS or 3G data connections.

The system also provides Sony Ericsson with the information via a secure web tool, so that they can quickly and effectively use the feedback for future services.

I think this is phenomenal and really shows that Sony Ericsson and T-Mobile UK are concerned for the customer experience are willing to take steps to improve that experience on an otherwise bad experience (the need to have your handset repaired in the first place). Broca’s technology certainly makes this possible, and in a very user-friendly format.

Bravo to all three.

I have been sending transatlantic and transpacific text messages of goodwill and cheer over the past 24 hours and not one message was delayed or arrived late, as far as I can tell. That’s good news. I was hoping that our network operators around the globe had put the right equipment in place to finally dispel the delays that have often beset New Year’s Eve.

I was only sending text messages. Anecdotally, at least, both Sprint and AT&T were perfectly fine throughout the New Year Eve — no drop in signal, no delays, all good.

How was it for you?

Yesterday Ewan blogged about the E61i, and how he was contemplating getting one offline from the Nokia Store for the bargain (!) price of £299.

SMS Text News reader Robert Gale dropped us a line, with his experiences of using the store.

- - - -

At the time that I bought mine, I think the Nokia Store was the only place to buy an E61i and appeared to be far cheaper than the pre-order prices on other sites. I placed my order online at 9am, received a confirmation call around lunchtime and then the phone was delivered the next morning.

When they call they check a ton of information such as what was ordered, the email and phone number used, the delivery option and the type of card used. It was reassuring that they took the time to check out the details.

- - - -

Thanks Robert! You can check out his blog - A Welsh View - at http://xo.typepad.com 

Link: fring » Twitter inside!

I’ve been waxing lyrically about Fring to my mates after finding it a couple of weeks ago. If you don’t know about Fring, go to their website and check it out - or alternatively wait a day or two longer til I get my arse in gear and finish off the review I’ve been slaving over for this very blog

Anyway, some great news - Fring have just added Twitter support. This means I can use just one application for Twitter, MSN, Skype, SIP, and Google Talk. If you’ve already got Fring, you don’t have to upgrade the software - just go to Settings > Configure Services and scroll down, where you should see Twitter.

Fring have even made a nice video and put it on their blog to show you how to add Twitter.

Ooh my.

Eckoh have certainly got a roasting in today’s Sun newspaper. If you’re into serving clients who deal with consumers, it’s the sort of press you don’t really want. Pulling the sensation apart from the facts (if any), well, that’s rather difficult.

Here’s the article: http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2007100754,00.html.

VIEWERS are losing out DAILY as computers handling hit ITV phone-in votes crash, a whistleblower revealed yesterday.

The worker from ITV’s quiz operator Eckoh said shows including I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here! Soapstar Superstar and Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? were involved.

She told how thousands of viewers’ votes are not all counted because computers regularly go down at peak times — but the callers are still charged

Now, ‘regularly go down at peak times’ could be dramatic license. It’s not unheard of for systems to crash, but if they’re doing it regularly, the IT guy either needs more money, more support or a good kick to fix it.

She said the computer server could go down for up to five minutes at peak times — and thousands of calls could be lost.

During quieter periods — when there were fewer technical staff on hand — it could go down for up to 30 minutes.

The operative word there is ‘could’.

After the shocker, they’ve put in the obligatory quote from the company:

A spokeswoman insisted the system could cope. She said: “Eckoh can handle 500,000 calls per hour. It uses 300 computers and there are occasional crashes, as with any system.

“But issues are identified and addressed immediately. Any isolated computer crash would have no impact on vote registration.”

The moment The Sun gets hold of anything, there’s usually an issue. Particularly because so many people read it — in terms of copies sold and in terms of copies being handed around the office.

To the right of the main article, you’ll see a header, ‘Suspect line-up who are quids in’:

Suspect line-up who are quids in

A STRING of shows are caught up in the phone lines scandal. Here are the main culprits.

Richard and Judy (Channel 4, weeknights at 5pm). Fans were encouraged to ring in for You Say, We Pay at £1 a time AFTER the winner had been picked. Production firm Cactus also tried to rig the National Telly Awards.

X Factor (ITV1, off air, but was Sat 7pm). More than 1.3million viewers ripped off to the tune of £200,000. Every live show of last series was affected. Fans who pressed their remote’s red button were charged 50p instead of 35p.

… and there’s a ton more of those.

This isn’t good for the telecoms industry at all. It’s creating a climate of mistrust. A few more splashes like this and continued headlines for 2-3 weeks and it won’t be long before the public automatically assume that they are ‘being ripped off’. How many of us do the calculations when the TV presenter squeezes with delight at telling everyone ‘we received over ONE POINT FIIIIIIIIIIIVE MILLLLLLLL-YIN VOTES THIS EVENING’…. (”Ok, 1.5m x 0.50? Geez that’s a lot of cash”). We’ve all been doing the calculations already. Some of us, no doubt, have already thought it’s a bit of a swizz — the whole concept.

It is, however, a really fun thing to do. If the programme makers have done their job, they’ll have created an air of excitement and expectation — and an air of ‘It’s up to you, Mr & Mrs Viewer’. You’ll have your favourite soapstar or contestant and you’ll want to see them do well… and, you know, what’s 50p (plus the cost of a standard text), when you’re supporting your favourite? And away you go, text, text, text. It’s exciting. But if there’s any doubt that my text or call won’t be counted? If there’s any hint that I might be getting screwed? Oh dear.

If you’re sat there with your family watching the TV — as a lot of people often are — and the daughter takes out her phone to vote for her boyband — all it needs now, is her ‘informed reader of The Sun’ father to calmly explain to her that she’s blowing her credit on nothing. If she takes that as the informed viewpoint, and you extrapolate this kind of behaviour across the nation, that’s not good. Not good at all.

Got this text message yesterday from my brother:

I’m in Phones4U. The customer next to me spends 20 a week on Vodafone, so they’ve suggested putting her on a 70 a month tariff and charged her for a shit Nokia. But if her partner also takes out a phone, then they will get the handset free. What a load of shit.

Isn’t that annoying, when you’re in a phone shop and you overhear someone getting what you perceive to be less than stellar advice?

Sometimes I cna’t help it and I will interrupt and actually suggest alternatives It’s not good though, when you find that you seem to know more than the sales person does.

Have you ever experienced this?

I’m working on a summary of 2006. While I am doing this, I was moved to wonder how many times I had used the word ’shit’ in a blog post.

I rarely use the word — I’m always concerned about finding myself standing in front of a board of directors and someone asking, before they award me a £3m consulting contract, if I could explain why I referred to their company, product, or a particular decision as ‘being shit’ on SMS Text News. Or something like that

Now and again I just can’t stand reading or hearing about particular news about the mobile industry. Most of the time I use the phrase ‘arse’ or, on occasion, ‘absolute arse’ / ‘total arse’.

But sometimes that just won’t do, and I have to delve deeper — all the way past ‘neolithic incompetence’ right down to the base four letter word of ’shit’.

I reckoned I’d used the word about four times.

Nope.

Do a search yourself, you’ll see that, in fact, there are four pages worth of blog posts thrown up by the search function for the word. Heh.

It was an enlightening experience. ‘Ah yes!!’ I whispered under my breath as I flicked through the posts, remembering some of the industry’s stupidest decisions or announcements.

Here are some of the SMS Text News blog posts that caught my eye:

February 8th 2006
Survey: MMS Use still disappointing
In-Stat’s recent survey reporting that less than a third of cameraphone owners share pictures with their friends.

BUT NOT at GBP £0.50 per shitty picture.

May 16th 2006
Motorola need to get with it
I was really annoyed that despite buying the SLVR L7 in early 2006, almost half a year later, Motorola hadn’t bothered updating the handset software. I see there’s FINALLY an update available for download!

I don’t want to think that my SLVR is actually a defunct piece of shit that Motorola have moved on from years ago. I’d like to see more stuff to add to it. At the very LEAST I’d like to see an operating system update or some funky little toy I could download to the phone.

June 22nd 2006
Jo & Nat Redux - Vodafone ARPU issues
My ‘normob’ (normal mobile user) friend Jo had a problem with her Vodafone handset and got a temporary handset sent out to her. The issue here was that since Vodafone gave her a crap handset to use, she didn’t use it as much — decreasing her ARPU (by my calculations) by at least £3 a day for about 2 months.

Style is exceptionally important. Style and functionality. If you recall, Jo is a sporadic text and picture messager. Well, the ‘totally shit Nokia’ that they gave her short term must have reduced Vodafone’s revenues by about £3 a day. She was still texting her boyfriend, but recently they’ve been whacking each other picture messages all day.

June 22nd 2006
Vodafone deactivates service in CM12 postcode area
Another Vodafone story, this time about them deactivating service in the CM12 postcode area for months because they had a problem with a transmitter. My dad was hopping mad. Still, it meant he got peace and quiet when he returned home — and about 10 voicemails every morning from colleagues who’d been trying to reach him when he got back into a signal area.
I found dad stood at the master bedroom window. He was standing on a stool and had the phone handset half out the window.

He was screaming into the handset: ‘YES ITS A SHIT SIGNAL, SORRY, SAY AGAIN..’

June 23 2006
Vonage, VOIP, realities
Not necessarily about Vonage, this post was more about the abysmal state of the country’s broadband infrastructure.

In fact I’ve seen countless bullshit presentations from British Telecom senior executives over the years — most recently a few months ago — telling me about their massive bandwidth pipes and strategies. Absolute nonsense. There’s a key difference between talking and delivering. Every time someone from BT or a broadband ‘telco’ like Bulldog tells me about their capabilities, I just ask them why I’m still stuck on 100 odd kilobytes a second.

Their first response is ‘Ah, get a business broadband connection’.

‘It is’. Their face drops a little bit. We continue to play the game for a few minutes longer until they finally admit that, behind the press releases and the grand visions, we’re nowhere near as advanced from a broadband perspective as we should be.

July 27th 2006
Too geeky it hurts
This is me outraged by a total geek poncing about with his Vodafone 3g card in a hotel lobby.

What the hell are you doing with that piece of shit laptop?

July 31st 2006
Prince Harry pictured with bog standard Vodafone Nokia
I was also annoyed to see Prince Harry kitted out with a crap handset:

When Prince Harry walks into the local Vodafone shop, don’t give him the shittest one in your range. Offer him a N70 or a N91 or something…anything better than a Christmas Cracker phone.

2nd August 2006
Orange launches unlimited plan. Kind of.
ABSOLUTELY RIDICULOUS. If you want a reminder about how SHIT the mobile industry has been in 2006, check out Orange’s UNLIMITED (’off peak’) data plan offering. What’s even worse though, is that some of you reading this are STILL using Orange and STILL paying a few quid a meg for data. Heh. Some people don’t believe me when I tell them that Orange seriously launched a plan that gave you unlimited off-peak data.

It’s not good. It’s nothing short of appalling that any mobile professional in the UK should feel constrained by their data usage because they’ve got a shit service plan from a smart operator charging them through the nose.

9th August 2006
Gomobo.com launches pizza delivery via mobile
I’ve nothing but the highest regard for Gomobo - however in this post I was lamenting the absolute arse it is having to TELEPHONE my local pizza place to make an order.

It’s a total arse for me sat in Shitsville (my affectionate name) here in the UK having to use 1900s technology to make my pizza order. Hurry up and launch in London, Noah! No pressure!

22nd August 2006
Marks & Spencer launch MVNO
I was not impressed.

Put a few cardboard boxes of our shit Nokias on the stand. Array them casually — we want to show the customer that we’re hip, cool.

22nd August 2006
Ewan gets stuffed by Vodafone
Say no more.

5th October 2006
Getting hosted by UK mobile networks
I can’t take the fact I’m billed 36p a minute to talk to another UK mobile user.

I have a huge problem paying 36p a minute for such a shite bog standard commodity.

12th October 2006
Vodafone Treo 750 MicrosoftHell
This has to be one of the most commented posts on SMS Text News. There’s ’shit’ words all over the place in this post!

Steve isn’t having a good month. If you recall, he recently had a whale of a time trying to get his new Blackberry operational via Carphone Warehouse.

Well the phone bug bit him last week and he impulse bought a Vodafone Palm Treo 750. Here’s his experience.

28th October 2006
Three UK: £0.99 for a music track, £3.49 for a realtune???
I didn’t react positively to discovering this reality.

This is outrageous. Ridiculous. Stupid. Pathetic. And you know what, it tells you everything you need to know about how shit the mobile industry still is. They just never seem to get it.

6th November 2006
Is it me or is Fresh Mobile the shittest UK MVNO?
Yes.

13th November 2006
Mobile Data: Genius stratey and why you’re screwing up the mobile industry
THREE POUNDS PER MEG?

8th December 2006
Property Boards - we’re almost in 2007 - has it come to this?
Oh don’t et me started…

Look at this rubbish. Has it come to this? I was walking down one of the back streets in Covent Garden yesterday and saw this Winkworth for-sale sign. The ‘2 bed’ shitty little sub-label attached to the sign really, really winds me up.

And thus ends the 2006 SMS Text News whirlwind!

Link: The Betty

One of the girls at work just stopped by my desk to show me a picture of her hamster on her mobile phone.

I used to follow The Betty’s blog in a previous incarnation. From what I can gather, she’s a fit twenty-something with a healthy physical appetite. Good news.

Now and again she alludes to mobile phone usage — I find any mentions of how ‘real people’ (i.e. not mobile geeks) use their mobiles fascinating.

In the above linked post, she describes how a work colleague came up to her and showed her a picture of her hamster on her mobile phone. Heh. Betty doesn’t react that well to this obviously.

What’s rather interesting is how mobile users have so quickly adapted to using their camera-enabled mobile handsets as photo albums.

The frustrating thing for me is that this girl in question has probably never thought of uploading her hamster pictures to a moblogging service. Even if she did consider doing this, her price plan would probably charge her £3 a meg anyway. Ah well. At least people are using their handsets…

An enduring problem for a lot of mobile users is transferring their few hundred photos from old to new handset. I know that my friends have got over this problem by using bluetooth to transfer pictures when they get a new phone. But it’s a total arse. Some handsets can’t transfer multiple images so a few friends I know have literally spent hours bluetoothing images to their new handset… or, well let’s be precise, they’re viewing their handset as a photo album. A destination. They show images to people physically. They were conditioned to do this because it was far too difficult and expensive to send pictures when they first got their camera phones.

Ah well. I can feel a Friday-night rant coming on so I’ll stop there.

Oh, just in case you wondered what a Betty is:

The term Betty refers to a hot chick. One that is attractive, stylish and self confident. A Betty is typically a looker.

A Super Betty is one step above that. She is very hot in all areas. Denise Richards and Carmen Electra are examples of Super Bettys.

Check this user-story from Jim Black, head honcho at MX Alliance.

My wife sent me a picture that my daughter had sent her. My wife is on Voda and my daughter is on T-Mobile. So my wife sent it on to me over at T-mobile, and when I tried to retrieve it I received an error message about not being able to locate the remote server etc, etc.

Oh dear – six years after launching MMS it’s still hit and miss. Now we don’t use picture messaging as such, but as a family we might now that our twin daughters are at university. But I doubt if we will now.

Absolutely shocking. Shocking.

For a long time I’ve been aware of Good Mobile Messaging. But I’ve never tried it, not up until recently. Good was never on my radar because I’m Blackberry through-and-through. Ever since Blackberry launched in the UK about 4 years ago (from memory), I’ve been a user.

With this in mind, if you’re even a tiny bit interested in what Good has to offer, this post should be worth reading. It’s a long one.

From being a BlackBerry user for 4 years, let’s fast forward to 5 weeks ago.

Good’s representatives phoned up and asked if I’ve be interested in testing their service out.

‘Mehh,’ I felt. You know, I felt ’so-so’. I didn’t *really* want to take much of a look at Good because I’ve spent so much time being failed by other services. I didn’t want to do a half hearted ‘er, it’s ok’ review.

‘Will it work on my N90?’ I ask the chap.

‘Well it works on the Symbian platform, but you should really try it on a Nokia E61,’ he says.

‘I’m, errr..,’ I begin, gazing at my new 8700 Blackberry with Google Talk running, ‘I’m err, really quite ok with the Blackberry actually.’

‘We’ll send you out the E61 with Good on it, will you take a look at it?’ the chap asks.

‘Sure,’ I say, ‘I’m a huge Blackberry fan though,’ I warn.

I arrange to meet the representative and I’m passively excited to see the Nokia E61 box in his hands. Moments beforehand, whilst stuck on the bus in traffic on High Holborn, I’d just bought VirtualReach’s brilliant RSS reader for the Blackberry. I was actually content putting up with my 8700 and the rather rag-tag instantemail solution.

He’s charged the E61 up and he asks for my sim card. Within moments the E61 is booting and he hands it to me.

‘Right, there you go. Now, installation is really easy,’ he says.

I stifle a grunt of knowing laughter. I’ll eat my hat if it’s as simple as the three points he’s got written out for me on a piece of paper:

1. Go to get.good.com in your mobile browser.

2. Type in these details (he had a username and password waiting for me corresponding to a demo email account on Fasthosts).

3. Wait for the application to download then run it.

I’ve been around the block with mobile — I know the realities. I was mentally prepared for an embarrassing half hour trying to get the thing working.

I typed in my username and password and waited briefly while the Good applications downloaded.

All of a sudden the E61’s screen went white and a ‘Good’ logo appeared.

‘Hmm. Nifty,’ I thought, ‘At least the first bit has worked.’

‘OK, that’s it. Try sending me an email?’ he says, taking out his own E61.

Er. Surely that’s not it all ready to rock?

I keep my mind open as I browse the rather familiar interface.

‘Good has kept the interface as recognisable and intuitive as possible,’ he explains, ‘So that it’s just like your desktop Outlook. It also works for Notes users too.’

Within moments I’m creating an email and sending it to him. This is the moment of truth for me. Just how fast is this? Remember I have no tolerance slowness.

‘Remember you’re on a hosted service from Fasthosts,’ the chap reminds me.

I prepare myself.

‘It’s not working, I don’t think?’ I say as I hand him the device.

‘No, it’s ok, that means the mail has gone,’ he explains. Oh. Gosh, well that was quick.

‘Here it is,’ he says, as a little beep emits from his E61. He shows me my email in his inbox.

Ooookay not bad, not bad.

‘Right, you send me one,’ I say. I’m almost opening up my ‘oooh this could be quite smart’ box of tricks in my mind. I’m not quite ready to celebrate until I’ve seen how fast the device receives mail.

‘Ok and it’s….sent!’ he says. I look across at my inbox. For a moment I think, ‘oh noooooooooo,’ and then his message arrives. Couldn’t have been more than what, 3-5 seconds? Fast. Very fast indeed.

At this point I’m sold.

He then begins to show me the calendaring, ‘Remember that’s now synched with your desktop Outlook,’ he explains. Then the contacts.

‘I’m definitely getting one of these,’ I think to myself.

‘Look, try the service out for a few weeks, see what you think?’ he says.

So that’s what I’ve been doing.

I dragged about 600 meg of email over to my Fasthosts account and waited to see what happened. Within seconds, Good had replicated my folder structure and within a minute or so, I could see my whole back archive arriving.

Now, I’m a total mobile email demon. I can query 800 meg of email right from my hand. I absolutely LOVE it. Just yesterday I was sat on the train extremely frustrated about the delays. However, I took out the E61 and began methodically sorting through my older email, replying, filing and deleting. I love how when I get to one of my computers, I see an exact copy of what I’ve just implemented on Good. I’m saving a lot more time now than I used to with the Blackberry.

Of course, now having the power of Microsoft Exchange on the back-end is rather wicked. My colleague Hetty can add appointments and they automatically appear on my device. When I add a new contact on the E61, the details are immediately available when I arrive at my desktop. Pure nirvana.

(I’ve had quite a lot of enquiries from people recently asking how precisely I got Good to work and what services I’m using (e.g. Fasthosts) so I shall be posting more on this shortly.)

Here’s a screenshot of me reading an email:

There are a ton more screenshots to come.

Link: Telegraph | Money | Pay-as-you-go or monthly charges? Finding a package that will fix the problem of your children’s mo

More than 5.8m families shell out for their children’s mobile phone with little or no control of how much is spent each month, according to research from mobile operator T-Mobile.

I reckon if I had children, I’d probably put them on one of the Three UK monthly contracts — that or a £60 T-Mobile Flext deal.

However been a total mobile geek, I wonder if my children will completely rebel against that and adopt tin cans and bits of string to communicate with their friends, just to wind me up.

Have you got children? What mobile strategy did you adopt for them? Monthly contracts? Pay as you go?

Link: World Chatter: Tricks of the Trade: Cell Phones Abroad - DailyCandy

I was sent this by one of New York’s finest hotshot property developers. Not only does she have a First in Law from King’s College, she also ONCE kept a new Blackberry (gift from her brother) under her desk for a year. A YEAR. Before opening it up, using it, and discovering that actually, she did like it.

A mobile expert she isn’t.

However she is a regular subscriber to the DailyCandy newsletters and sent today’s over to me. They track cool, hip, fashionably poncy things going on around New York, London and other less important cities too

She reckoned today’s feature would be of interest. She wasn’t wrong, as it’s all about using your ‘cell’ (i.e. mobile) phone abroad.

I am always interested to see how ‘normal people’ discuss and react to mobile, so if you too would like to see how they treat it, go ahead and click on the link above.

It costs ten times as much as it does at home — when it works. And all you wanted to do was phone home. We found the best options for all travelers and all budgets (billionaire to backpacker).

I had this experience sent in from a reader regarding Phones4U. Had a read and see if their experience sounds familiar.

I went into Phones4u and purchased the new SonyEricsson W850i from them, which was on the Orange Canary 40 Price Plan.

I was initially told that I would get 600 texts, 600 cross net minutes, 1 magic number to any network, and I was also able to change my price plan after 6months.

But after activating the phone and calling Orange customer services, I was told that I only get 400 texts instead of the 600 originally specified to me, also was told that the magic number was to Orange numbers only instead of been any network as told instore, then to top it off I was told by Orange that I had to wait 9mths to change my tariff!

I was quite upset that I had been given incorrect information to take out a contract with them, and decided to return the phone the next day, as I was advised I was able to cancel the contract within 14 days.

To my surprise I was literally hassled in the store - asking for reasons why I wanted to cancel, in which they were almost adamant I was told the correct information. After arguing with them for almost an hour, they agreed to phone it through to cancel it. I received a receipt to say everything was cancelled and I would only be billed for the 2days plus any calls I had made.

Unfortunately, I received a bill from Orange yesterday for £45, which included line rental from 12th - 14th October, and 15th - 14th November. I phoned Orange to advise them that I had already cancelled the contract with Phones4u last week only to find out that it hasn’t been cancelled with Orange.

So I am still stuck in the contract - Orange advised me to go back to Phones4u to get them to cancel it with them… I don’t understand how this has happened as they have given me a receipt to say that the contract has been cancelled, yet Orange have stated that I am still stuck in the contract with them???

Well I’m going to contact the CEO now to see what he can do as those sales people are just ridiculous!

It’s simply not good enough for Orange to wash their hands of the affair. This reader’s account is with *Orange*. Orange should be HUGELY annoyed that Phones4U caused so much trouble by allegedly dispensing inaccurate information.

The right thing to have happened here is for Orange to have solved the reader’s problems. It wouldn’t be difficult for them to knock up the texts by 200, for example, which would potentially have gone a little way to placating their customer. Obviously they can’t be doing this for everyone who phones up saying ‘wait a minute?’

Orange should also have cancelled the contract and deleted the bills. No questions asked. THEN they should have engaged the customer to say ‘ok, right, what can we do for you directly?’

Instead, they’ve referred the customer back to Phones4U… what a total arse.

And OBVIOUSLY Phones4U aren’t interested in you unless you’re wanting to buy a new contract. There’s no incentive whatsoever for a Phones4U sales person to talk to you about anything other than a new contract

At all these swanky conferences I attend, I keep having to sit through fancy presentations from operators and retailers telling me how good their service levels are and how happy their customers are. And how they’ve done X or Y to really lower churn and so on. I really have to stop myself from yelling, RUBBISH, at the top of my voice. This is a super example of where it’s still not working. 20 odd years on, you think the industry could have sorted it out.

Won’t somebody plesae think about the customer?

Justin is CEO of NinetyTen, the people behind location based social network, BuddyPing. He dropped me this note to tell me about the experience his wife Aimee had with Vodafone. Deary me.

So Aimee and I spent the weekend in York with old friends, but alas, her phone was either lost or stolen on the train, and ended up in Edinburgh (I knew this because I did a lookup using buddyPing

Aimee didn’t want to report it lost/stolen because we assumed as it was in Edinburgh, just near the station, it was in Lost property. Lost Property is closed on the weekend, so she rang them this morning. We were told the phone was not there, and had probably been nabbed by the cleaners. After asking to be put through to the cleaners, she was told she couldn’t do that.

Right, assessment so far: Phone Stolen

Step 1:
Rring Vodafone, explain what has happened, block the SIM and phone and get a replacement on insurance. Talked to a nice lady in customer services who blocked the phone and sim.

Step 2:
Transferred to Insurance

Step 3:
A world of pain

It turns out that even though Aimee was a responsible person who did not want to jump the gun and end up with 2 phones, wasting her and Vodafone’s time, they wouldn’t pay out. Why!? Well, you see, she had to report her phone lost or stolen within 24 hours of the incident happening.

After protestations from Aimee, she asked to talk to someone more senior than her.
She was told she was the most senior person.
Aimee asked if she ran the department.
No.
So can she speak to the person who does.
No.
Why?
They are busy.
Well, I want to speak to them now.
Please hold (another 5 minutes on top of the 30 minutes she has been trying to sort it out)
I’m sorry, she is not available

And that was how it was left. Aimee has been told she can appeal, which she will do.

She is now left phone-less, and very pissed off.

Even though she has only had the phone for 2 months (plus a renewed Voda contract), I am seriously considering advising her to leave them, transfer he number and go to someone else.

Aimee, take it to Mr Sarin and get him to fix it. If he can’t resolve it, swap to another network. Don’t reward ‘em.

Link: SMS Text News » dotMobi auctions top ten domains - reaction

It looks like dotMobi continues to elicit strong feelings

Kudos once again to Vance (top PR & Comms chap at dotMobi) for sitting down and engaging with different opinions. Check out the comments — then his response at the link above.

Public Speaker and Networker extraordinaire David is hunting for a new phone. As he describes here, he’s mooching around in neanderthallville with an eons-old Nokia at the moment. Now he needs to get sorted with an up to date handset -

With a couple of new business projects in the pipeline, I need to be in touch with my email, calendar and address book. Plus I am looking to work with some developers on using mobiles and specifically some interactive mobile content for paying through mobile, prompts for events, etc.

So I am on the hunt. Looking at the following. Nokia N80, Blackberry 7130 and HP Ipaq (don’t ask). Any recommendations?

My first instinct is to suggest a Blackberry particularly as he mentioned ‘email’. Although I’d recommend David takes a close look at the keyboard styles of the 7130 and the 8700 to see which he prefers. Most phones do email — but generally rather badly. If he’s actually wanting to do mobile email then I reckon a Blackberry or a Nokia E61 running Good Technology might be the way ahead.

That said, maybe he could accomplish everything he needs with a Sony Ericsson K800?

The next question is regarding contracts.

He’s spending at least £20 a month on his T-Mobile PAYG so it wouldn’t take much to knock him over to a contract. He’d like to stay with T-Mobile but take out at contract.

So what do you suggest…

1. What handset?
2. What service plan?

Link: The Carphone Vodafone Arse | SMS Text News

David Whitewood of Hotxt just posted this defence of Carphone which I reckon deserves highlighting. I’ve quoted it in full, here:

In defense of Carphone Warehouse. (I have no commercial relationship in anyway with CPW).
Carphone Warehouse sets service standards that the whole mobile industry should look up to. They actually invest in training their staff (visit their HQ and see the training for yourself) whom I have found always to be knowledgeable, courteous and efficient.

The CPW monthly catalogue is the most comprehensive guide to pricing and T&C’s available on the high street today.

CPW are a great retailer and like all other great retailers e.g. Tesco, really are passionate about the customer. Did you know that they employ mystery shoppers to visit their stores and test their staff. hear the staff get bonused if the mystery shopper has a positive experience. I have voted with my feet and gone back to retail. Indeed only this week I gave up on O2 direct online channel and purchased an O2 contract from CPW - a free N73 at £25 per month for a 12 month contract with £75 cash back after month 4 - what a steal! Unfortunately the N73 has developed a fault with the camera but I know that I can walk into any CPW store with the receipt and get it swapped out on the spot. Where else can you do that?

In terms of operator stores the UK should look at the Sprint stores in the US. Which other operator sells so much data services and even accessories. How do they do it? They train their staff and instead of trying to sell expensive insurance polices, they take the time to show their customers how to get the best from the Sprint Network and their purchase.
I will bet that Vodafone will be back with CPW by the spring after a dissapointing Xmas new year period.

I’ve written to Mr Dunstone once or twice to congratulate the Carphone team on brilliant service that I’ve received now and again.

I’ve been struggling with my mobile identity. Over the past week I’ve got the Nokia 8850 and the Sony CMD-Z5, both proper ‘phones’. They don’t have any nonsense on them. They ring, you answer, you transact business. You get a text message, you read it, you knock out a reply. Done.

The challenge I’ve been having is then swapping back to my ‘normal’ N90 which I’ve been using as my primary handset for months and months — ever since my kind younger brother disguarded it as old hat and too big to carry around (He was on a Motorola V3x and is now on a K800i which is gorgeous). The problem with the N90 is that it ‘does everything’ and it’s totally huge.

It’s a little slow when it comes to launching text messaging. Not as slow as a Windows Mobile device, but compared to the CMD-Z5 or the Nokia 8850, it takes eons to open the inbox. It’s also slightly overwrought with features that… well… I don’t know, I think it’s possibly interfering with my business communications. For example if I mistakenly twist the screen whilst using it as a phone, that activates the camera/video and we’re away, with menus and options popping up everywhere.

This is hardly a huge issue, but it’s been weighing on me recently and necessitating attention. My primary communications device is the N90 and then my secondary device is the Blackberry. This is a little skewed you see. I think this is what’s been causing the issues. The Blackberry is useful for me to respond to email in real time — a lot of my business operates in this manner. I start confusing people if I knock them off a text message from the Blackberry because it’s got a different number. So I need to put that down, pick up the N90 and send the text with that, then pick up the Blackberry again and read some more email.

Talking with Sutha of Nakama over the Blackberry recently, I’ve been discussing the problem. He explained that he suffered from similar issues and:

I always have my BlackBerry 8700 as my primary phone, but then have a second SIM that ends up being put in whatever cameraphone du jour I get thrown.

That’s the way ahead for me.

I think this makes far more sense. I want an N90 or similar with me because thoroughly enjoy taking pictures and video of stuff when I’m out and about. Further, I want those pictures to be of sufficient quality and the video to be decent enough to send to people. Obviously the Blackberry won’t be anywhere near this level for some years to come ergo I will need to carry a second device — my ‘cameraphone du jour’ — to meet my requirements. So there we have it.

I’m about to activate Blackberry service on my primary T-Mobile SIM, remove the unlimited data add-on and increase the minutes (I was NAILED yet again for 36p a minute for going over my allotted minutes). Then I’m going to add the unlimited data to my secondary T-Mobile sim, remove the Blackberry service and, I think I’ll probably keep that service plan on it’s 1,000 off-peak minutes.

Got this in from reader, Kevin:

Just thought I’d have a bit of a whinge myself. I’ve just received an SMS from Vodafone (apparently) telling me that I need to watch Sky One’s “The Big Idea” (www.thebigidea.tv if you’re interested). And perhaps I could submit a Big Idea myself and be in with the chance to win 10 grand. The end of the SMS was interesting as it read “Opt out - text ’stop SMS’ to 9774″.

Now what I’d like to point out to Vodafone is - how the hell was I opted IN in the FIRST place?! The mobile I’m looking at is a works mobile. It doesn’t really get used very much aside from calls/texts to the family and, other than that, errrr… testing!

So why is it that (premium-rate issues aside) Vodafone and the governing body are the first to issue regulations on subscription services, who can do what, when, how, where and why, but when it comes to Vodafone themselves, they can just suddenly decide to have me opted in to some sodding “Sky One crap info” group?

Unless of course this turns out to be some non-Vodafone spam SMS. But hey - who cares? I hate Vodafone anyway…

I have often wondered about this. I’m sure they’ve got themselves covered somehow — perhaps it’s classed as a ‘network information message’ or something. It’s a little bit wrong though, to send you something without first asking you if you’d like to receive it. This isn’t just a Vodafone thing. I’ve experienced it on all networks.

Steve isn’t having a good month. If you recall, he recently had a whale of a time trying to get his new Blackberry operational via Carphone Warehouse.

Well the phone bug bit him last week and he impulse bought a Vodafone Palm Treo 750. Here’s his experience..

Phones used to just work. Nothing clever, they just worked. You could call you wife and tell her you were working late at the office. You could text your lover and tell her you’d meet at the usual place in 20 minutes. It was all really easy, a few clicks and life was just sweet. Then Microshite came along and got involved. And suddenly we all rush out to buy fancy new Pocket PC’s and Smartphones and stuff (including Treo 750’s) running Windows Mobile Poo 5.0. On day 3 we are all relatively impressed by the sudden increase in things we can do without being tied to a PC. hhmmm we say, this could actually improve my life - give me more time for playin’ around and stuff! But then SUDDENLY…during the adding of a mobile number to an entry in our address book - not a complex task I hear you say…WHAM BANG DEAD!!! “An error has occured in Shell32.exe” and the whole god awful shebang freezes up and the only way to restart this piece of turd is to take the battery out. What the hell have we let ourselves in for by opening the window and letting MicroCrash into our mobile world.

Not good. Now, my Nokia sometimes has a bit of trauma and needs a good battery-out-restart. However I’m willing to bet that Steve’s new Blackberry, which is probably now gathering some degree of dust, has never ever crashed on him.

My Blackberry has never crashed. Not once. In about 3-4 years of usage. As Steve says, ‘Phones used to just work.’

I’m sure the Treo is reasonably good otherwise. Have you got yourself one? How’s it getting on?

Link: 07text0spam.com - Don’t can it, zero spam it!

Next time you get a text spam, simply forward it to 07TEXT 0SPAM (078398 07726). We’ll send regular updates with submitted complaints to the Independent Committee for the Supervision of Standards of Telephone Information Service (ICSTIS), and also to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA).

Prompted in part, I imagine, by the challenges facing Grumbletext, 07text0spam.com is back on patrol. Check it out at the above link!

I’m looking down my recent calls list.

I made a call last night at 1130pm to a colleague for 27 minutes.

I was billed 7 quid by T-Mobile for that call.

EXCLUDING VAT.

That’s 36p a minute, to call someone on another mobile network, after I’m out of my bundled minutes.

What the hell is this industry playing at? Why are we still be nutted for THIRTY SIX PENCE a minute?

You know, 10 years ago, when the miracle of mobile calling was a fresh, delightful experience, we all nodded in agreement. Obviously it cost money to deliver a conversation to a mobile device, so no one had an issue with it actually costing 30-40p a minute to make calls.

I completely despair at two things: -

- One: The operators for charging stupid rates. You’re a sodding commodity. Get real. After I’ve used up my minutes, there’s no excuse to hammer us for almost 40p a minute. Even on Vodafone’s top service plan, I was astonished to find that I’m still paying 35p+ VAT for calls.

- Two: The apathetic British public. I reckon the wool has been pulled over our eyes. We seem to accept that it’s fine to be nailed by these service providers after we go over our standard minute allowance. No one seems to care though. Some of my friends earning £1,200 a month don’t think twice about living with a £120 a month mobile bill. 10% of your income??

Anyway.

I selected the T-Mobile ‘relax 50′ plan. 750 minutes, 42 quid a month, plus some texts, ex VAT.

That works out at 6p a minute, ok?

Good deal.

After I’ve done 750 minutes, they then add on 30p a minute charge if I’m calling another mobile network.

Why?

It’s not as if the networks are being held together with pieces of string and some tape. They’ve been doing interconnects for years. Surely they’ve had time to make it efficient, get some economies of scale and bring the cost down?

Sick. Tired. Pissed off.

I abhore it all.

If anyone ever asks you why the mobile industry goes absolutely nowhere, slowly, this is why. You’ve got fixed line mindset idiots sat in charge who just don’t get it.

Their time is coming to an end soon, especially when some smart cookies enter the industry and make it all 5p/min whoever you call, whenever.

So I’m off to go and buy more sodding allowances from T-Mobile.

I am seriously going to have to start saying ‘er, sorry, have you got a landline I can call please?’ when I have to phone clients. I have a huge problem paying 36p a minute for such a shite bog standard commodity.

The worst possible thing you could do today is to phone up and say ‘Hi, Ewan, I’m calling from Ofcom..’ I will bite your head off.

Has anyone got a solution? Like a wickedly good badly publicised price plan from Three or something that I should be using? Any recommendations apart from the current UK wide consumer strategy of ‘Put Up, Shut Up And Pay’?

I was chatting to Alfie of MoblogUK earlier. I asked him how his Moblogging presentation went at yesterday’s New Directions in Mobile event.

I’d have liked to have gone — so I was delighted when he gave me this outline of his speech and a bit of an overview:

- Who

- What

- When

- How

Rather conveniently, Alfie then said to me, ‘Hey look, for the ‘who’ section there, Mat and I created this monologue from the point of view of a consumer. Want the text?’

Get in! Here it is:

“I don’t want mobile TV at five pounds a day, I don’t want a hundred different seemingly deliberately confusing price plans, I certainly don’t want to be a dolphin, and despite the bags under my eyes, I’m fairly sure I’m not a racoon. I’d love to have a ‘Magic Number’ to call a friend for an hour for 15p, but not when that’s because *you* want me to convince my friend to move over to your network, that’s just mean.

I don’t want to buy a lifestyle, I don’t want built in obsolescence, I don’t want a million free text messages but no MMS, I don’t want to be told that mobile internet/email is a new thing that I need to pay more for when I’ve been doing it for the past five years, I don’t want ridiculous roaming charges where it costs me to receive calls just because I’m in another country (although using the same phone network). It’s a mobile phone, location should be irrelevant.

I don’t want to pay through the nose just because I want to move non-voice data over the network, I don’t want my network provider to put their branding all over my handset’s internals, I don’t want them to add their advertising to MY MMS messages *when I’m paying to send them*. I don’t want ripoff artists selling me useless “content” for my handset at £1.50/tinyphoto or £3/crappy ringtone or £3/lamegame because although I know that I don’t need to buy ‘em (I can upload my own ‘content’ to my phone), other people don’t and then Jamster or whoever make a tonne of money for doing almost nothing at all.

I want a phone with a good camera, a decent battery, an interface designed by someone who knows about HCI, a case that won’t break too easily and the ability to communicate using this device for a reasonable (ie, cheap enough never to worry about using it, like landlines are) price. It would be nice to have customer service that actually warranted the word ’service’, but let’s not go crazy here.

Most networks are not providing what I want from a network. They need to stop hassling me, simplify everything, and drop their prices. Mobile communications must be one of the few areas where we pay more now than we did five years ago..”

That’s pleasure overload. Almost every sentence caused me to break into a ‘HELL YEAH’ in agreement.

Link: Techdirt Corporate Intelligence: Techdirt Wireless - Starbucks Managers Begging To Free Up The WiFi

It doesn’t take an economic genius to figure out that charging for WiFi is a dead end model when the competition is giving it away for free. While many of the restaurants and cafes offering free WiFi are singing its praises as it brings in more customers — especially during the off hours — T-Mobile is stubbornly sticking to their high priced plans. It appears, however, that their major retail partner, Starbucks, may be pushing back.

Carlo saw this and thought of me going nuts in that Starbucks in Paternoster Square in London The above Techdirt article was from almost 2 years ago. No change in the UK. You know what it’s actually no biggie. Starbucks has always monumentally wound me up by never, ever, ever selling any kind of Coca Cola whatsoever. I don’t drink coffee so I end up having to have mineral water or some £5 orange smoothie. Add overpriced Wifi together with the desperate desire to sit there looking cool with my new MacBook (Pro), and no wonder I was blowing a gasket.