Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Philadelphia
Posts: 242

returning from Europe....surfing no longer works!

I have Voicestream, which I used easily to connect to my ISP in Europe, get email, surf, etc.

I return home to the USA. First attempt to get email wirelessly--doesn't connect. Says, "no carrier."

After 3 hours on the phone with Handspring (who says to call Voicestream), my isp (ditto), Voicestream (first thought: call ISP), no answers.

I was using the dialin number from Europe as +1, but took that out just in case. Otherwise, all my settings remain the same, and I was able to connect to my ISP through my desktop i.e., non-wirelessly.

Anyone else experience this?

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Registered: Nov 2000
Location: New Jersey
Posts: 201

Re: returning from Europe....surfing no longer works!

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mark Squires
I have Voicestream, which I used easily to connect to my ISP in Europe, get email, surf, etc.

I return home to the USA. First attempt to get email wirelessly--doesn't connect. Says, "no carrier."

After 3 hours on the phone with Handspring (who says to call Voicestream), my isp (ditto), Voicestream (first thought: call ISP), no answers.

I was using the dialin number from Europe as +1, but took that out just in case. Otherwise, all my settings remain the same, and I was able to connect to my ISP through my desktop i.e., non-wirelessly.

Anyone else experience this?

---

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What do you think, Sirs?

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Philadelphia
Posts: 242

Well, good thought, but of course international roaming was activated before I left, and at that point, I was still able to surf in the US of A...

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Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Philadelphia
Posts: 242

Voicestream is now telling me that I have to have the DATASTREAM activated.

I thought I investigated this before and they told me the reverse!

So this means..

--a change in policy?
--AND they just cut off my service with no warning after it worked fine for a month.

Can I tell you how much I hate Voicestream?

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Registered: Oct 2000
Location: Here
Posts: 213

Ouch is that a big phone bill ?

You have a U.S. voicestream account with roaming activated and while in Europe you were dialing a European ISP number. I think that means an international wireless call. This sounds like a big phone bill, was it?

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Philadelphia
Posts: 242

Actually, I was dialing into my USA isp.
I haven't gotten the bill yet--but four or five calls, 5 to 10 minutes each. I'll live. I hope.

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Registered: Sep 2001
Location: Wellington, New Zealand
Posts: 123

This is the cool thing of a worldwide network... I'm on Vodafone New Zealand. If I roam on Vodafone Australia network, and if I'm calling a New Zealand number, I pay the same as I would pay if using from home!

I believe they have some sort of discount if I roam to Vodafone UK and as well. That's cool!

Registered: Dec 1999
Location: New York, NY, USA
Posts: 60

No Carrier Signal

I haven't bee traveling, but a few weeks ago I started to get No Carrier errors while dialing into AT&T Worldnet from my visorphone to surf, etc. I spoke with AT&T and Voicestream and neither had a clue. I was able to dial into mu hospitals dial-up # and establish a data connection, so I thought it had to be AT&T, but the numbers worked fine from a land line phone. I tried resets, turning off hacks, etc with no luck. Then I suddenly succeeded in connecting once, but subsequent attempts gave the no carrier error. I gave up out of frustration. A week ago I tried again and everything worked fine just like before. I have had no problems since.

I think this is a Voicestream network issue and somehow it got fixed. Alls well that ends well I guess.

Joel

p.s. I am in NYC

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Philadelphia
Posts: 242

Your experience sounds just like mine--mysterious loss of service. Mysterious reappearance of service. No one has a clue.

It's VERY frustrating.

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Registered: Jun 2000
Location: Pembroke,MA
Posts: 307

Mark,

Can't say I can help you with your problem stateside, but I have some info on you being able to surf overseas.

Even though you are dialing in to your ISP back in the States, you are still using the data services of the phone carrier you are going through in Europe. So, it doesn't matter if you have data service here. If your International roaming allowed you to receive data calls, it was due to the European Phone carrier.

I was in Europe last month and have subsequently gotten my bills for the phone calls I made (I too used the VPhone calling my ISP here in the states). You'll have 2 line items from each of the carriers you used in Europe. One for the voice calls and one for the data calls, which are about double the cost of the voice calls. I added about $70 to my monthly charge due to the (goofy) need to AOL IM people back in Boston from Germany/Austria/Italy... I really had to let my buds know about the giant beer I was drinking at that time, while they were slaving away at work!! Definitely worth the expense!

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Philadelphia
Posts: 242

I was perhaps enjoying the novelty of accessing wireless email from France...a bit TOO much!

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Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Philadelphia
Posts: 242

For everyone's information, using mostly France Telecom (the other service available besides the somewhat odd SFR, although it uses a different name than France Telecom, which alternate name I forget), I used a total of 196 minutes and was billed $172, including taxes. Not a happy bill, but about what I expected.

NB: The calls I made in France TO France, also seemed to be billed at about the same rate (0.79 per minute). I don't know if this is because their cell service is expensive or what. But there didn't seem to be much difference.

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