phone provider oddities

Phone company interaction has become complex, at least at T-Mobile. However, outside of the idiosyncracies below, 5G reception is better than 4G (eg, inside buildings) and 5G hotspotting carries good speed, eg 6-7Mb/sec during software updates (pacman). There are some idiosyncracies...

1. unlock - hard 40 days

It's necessary to use an unlocked phone if traveling overseas and wanting to purchase a SIM for local service. IME, especially if planning for a trip, buy any new devices 2 months ahead of trip. New devices have a hard 40 day hold (postpaid plans - see below) before T-Mobile will unlock the phone.

Secondly, probably because I purchased my device on EBay, there was no T-Mobile unlock application any longer in the device apps. This means a call was necessary to T-Mobile to accomplish unlocking. Have the IMEI and an email address handy. They will ask "Why? International? Leaving T-Mobile?"; it's almost as bad as KYC in banking. The agent notes unlocking takes 72 hours and that an email will be generated once complete. So 40+3 = 43 days from purchase, best case.

2. misc

• call/chat - chat is preferable. Calls are recorded, but there's nothing in writing and no way to attach screenshots. Talking also means KYC questions "do you plan to travel?"
• prepaid, postpaid plan - postpaid plans require credit checks and report to credit agencies, so this is higher level account. Prepaid plans are lower end and have overage charges. For best service, get all account numbers postpaid, since pre/post can vary by the number on the same account.
• unlock phones - postpaid account: 40 days on the network. Prepaid accounts: 365 days on the network. Website declaring a device is "eligible" for unlock and/or being purchased independently is irrelevant.
• temporary and permanent phone unlock: which is which and why?
• gigabyte accounting: extrememly liberal. I'd wager T-Mobile tallies Gb usage at 1.5:1 or greater. Eg, 1Gb actual usage will be declared as 1.5Gb. Also there's delayed accounting -- account might show 3Gb immediately after use and gradually rise to 4.5 over the next 12 hours of non-use.
• throttling/overage. device dependent. On my dedicated hotspot, I get throttled back to 126 K. On my phone account, I get throttled to 56K. Does the account automatically add gigabytes of data for some charge.
• sim swap - there's typically some network confusion or throttling with a recently swapped SIM or a new SIM. Usually apps will require a new login for an "unrecognized device" when the SIM changes. Google apps can work without the SIM if Wi-Fi is available.

3. usage

Day to day use -- emails and so on, blogging, browsing, is about 1Gb per day, maybe 2 if several videos (typically 360p in phone). Some problems:

• Surfline (app): no way to adjust/lower quality. Immense AJAX and ads. Seems to use 500Mb each time opened, up to 1GB if on there 4 mins.
• NFL GamePass (hotspot): no way to adjust/lower quality . Apparently, server takes over and streams at 1080 or greater. This means a game is is 15Gb, or about 3.5 per quarter of a full replay.
• Criterion Channel (hotspot): about 3-5Gb per film, 520-720p, adjustable.

4. phone app

Say a person has unlimited 5G phone and 40G hotspot. When they look on the T-Mobile app, they see screenshot below. Turns-out 17.6Gb at the top would be the combined number of both phone data and hotspotting usage.