Starting sometime early this morning I began having problems accessing the T-Mobile internet. I have T-Mo's full internet package and access the internet via internet2.voicestream.com (with no proxies). I have been intermittently able to connect to the internet to ActiveSync with my Exchange server, and intermittently open pages via Pocket Internet Explorer.

While at lunch today, two of my co-workers, also using T-Mobile data plans (T-Zones through wap.voicestream.com) began having problems. Returning back from work our CIO (on internet2.voicestream.com) reported the same problems with his phone.

This is 2 different data plans, and 3 different phones (by different manufacturers).

1. Sean rep. #8288428, was checking on the status of the network and were disconnected. I called back.
2. Jeff rep. #??8573??; computer is (security) locked up, and a manager will have to unlock it. He can't check on the status of the network, nor can he transfer me back into queue; was able to transfer me to the "Dash" department.
3. (female) rep. #?705221? (computer is being very slow), had to transfer me to WDS (what's WDS?); it took 9 minutes to get through to them.
4. Yosh (didn't provide his rep. #). Had to re-verify my account (which took another few minutes because his system -- billing -- is having problems, too). No reported issues in the 84016 area. Freeport Center, Clearfield, Utah is a 3-bar area. T-Zones is having a "global" issue presently which effects Utah and Idaho using HotSpot at home, but that's not related to this issue. I've now been on the phone for 35 minutes and am back on hold again. Another 10 minutes on hold and all they want is for me to pull the battery out and un-bind me from the tower; an interesting item of note is that the tower that we're going through is "Outside of T-Mobile Properties". Three other phones have been "fixed" (meaning they can connect but data is very slow) and all also show the "Outside of T-Mobile Properties" as the tower being connected through. I've now been on the phone for 50 minutes. I asked Yosh to open a ticket and add this to my account, he put me back on hold while they discussed it. There may be a new (unreported) service issue in the area, but it looks like it's "coming back online". He asked me to call back in a couple hours if the problem hasn't been resolved. I said I'd do that but I would like a credit to my account for yesterday when the service wasn't available, and for today as well; should the problems persist tomorrow I'll call back and require another day credit, and will repeat calling in every day for a credit until the service is restored to the level at which it was before. He put me on hold again (I've now been on the phone for 65 minutes). He came back on, apologized for putting me on hold for so long, then put me back on hold. At 67 minutes he told me he'd have to have me call back in to tier 3 support if the service issue isn't cleared up. In the meantime he's transferring me to customer care for a credit to the account. Transfer started after 73 minutes on the phone.
5. Cindy in Customer Care tells me she can offer me some free minutes, or free text messages or up to $5 (for the life of the plan) to compensate me. I asked for a credit for the time that part of the service was down ($20/month for data divided by 30 days/month = $0.67). She said that would be part of the up to $5 "inconvenience credit" per account or 7.5 days of service.
6. Hillary (a manager) says that it's up to $5 per occurrence, not per account. We agreed to credit the account for $5 and I'll call back for another credit after the sum network interruptions are grater than 7.5 days (right now we're at two calendar days of interrupted service). She was clear to note than T-Mobile does not guarantee uptime, which I am not requesting. My counter-claim was that even though service is not guaranteed, if service is interrupted I should not be required to pay for those days that I did not have service. She agreed and stated that is exactly why they have the $5 per occurrence inconvenience credit.

So, after an hour and 40 minutes (100 minutes), I finally got off the phone. Although the problem has existed for over 12 contiguous hours (spanning two days) no network ticket was ever opened (they still want me to call back about that in a few hours), but I did get credited for the time I haven't been able to access the data.

Unfortunately, AT&T's unlimited data plan is $40/month; twice that of T-Mobile's.