5/17/2021
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`PERSONAL BUSINESS; Those Black Holes in Your Mobile Phone Service - The New York Times
`
`https://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/24/business/personal-business-those-
`black-holes-in-your-mobile-phone-service.html
`
`PERSONAL BUSINESS
`
`PERSONAL BUSINESS; Those Black Holes in Your Mobile
`Phone Service
`
`By Amy Zuckerman
`
`Dec. 24, 2000
`
`See the article in its original context from
`December 24, 2000, Section 3, Page 8 Buy Reprints
`
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`WHEN Andrea Levy signed up for cellular telephone service, she thought she was getting
`seamless coverage for the entire country. But Ms. Levy, a marketing executive from
`Manhattan, complains about being cut off intermittently everywhere from Westchester
`County to New Mexico, and she sometimes finds unexpected roaming and long-distance
`charges on her monthly bill.
`
`Stewart Cheifet, an independent video producer from Mountain View, Calif., also laments
`about coast-to-coast disruptions. ''I can drive around the San Francisco Bay area and lose
`service,'' he said. In New York, he added, ''I couldn't get a signal from a skyscraper on Wall
`Street.'' He said that he, too, had encountered unexpected charges.
`
`As cell phone use mushrooms -- there are an estimated 107 million users in the United
`States, up from 28 million just five years ago -- so has the number of consumer complaints.
`
`3G Exhibit 2009
`IPR2020-01157
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`PERSONAL BUSINESS; Those Black Holes in Your Mobile Phone Service - The New York Times
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`Roderick Porter, the acting chief of the Federal Communications Commission's consumer
`information bureau, says his department often hears complaints like those of Ms. Levy and
`Mr. Cheifet. And Lou Richman, the finance editor at Consumer Reports magazine, says he is
`swamped with reader letters about poor service or confusing billing. ''There's overloaded,
`congested networks, dropped calls and holes in coverage that are all sources of aggravation
`for consumers,'' Mr. Richman said.
`
`Most of the problems reflect an industry that is still in flux. The networks and infrastructure
`of the wireless service providers, analysts say, cannot fully support the vast and rapidly
`increasing number of customers. A cell phone customer, they say, should understand that he
`cannot simply buy a phone, sign a service contract and expect the phone to offer the same
`service as a traditional phone mounted on the kitchen wall.
`
`But consumers can take steps to find the kind of services that best meet their needs. First,
`experts say, they should understand something about the technology and how it works -- or
`doesn't -- with various carrier service plans.
`
`Many users, for example, may not know the difference between a digital and analog phone.
`(The analog system, which is being phased out, breaks conversation into sound waves that
`are carried over radio signals. The newer digital method, which provides clearer calls with
`greater security, breaks a voice message into a binary computer code and sends it in short
`bursts.) And consumers also may not understand what is meant by ''anytime minutes'' --
`basically, no restrictions for calling times.
`
`Consumers may complain about costly roaming fees, which wireless providers charge when
`customers use their phones outside their service area. They may not realize that their
`phones may be set on ''roam'' even when they are not traveling outside their service area.
`To save money, they can simply shut off the roaming feature, said Scott Relf, a senior vice
`president for marketing and product development for Sprint PCS, based in Kansas City, Mo.
`And because of technological incompatibilities, he added, different carriers' equipment may
`not be interchangeable.
`
`Consumers should also check the fine print of the plans -- and there are many from which to
`choose. For example, CellularOne in Boston -- soon to be absorbed into Cingular Wireless --
`offers 13 plans, ranging from $19.99 a month for a basic analog plan to $174 a month for a
`digital plan that offers 2,500 ''anytime'' minutes.
`
`The costs depend on several factors, including whether the customer has signed up for local
`or national service, or has opted for ''bundling of minutes,'' a combination of the two.
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`PERSONAL BUSINESS; Those Black Holes in Your Mobile Phone Service - The New York Times
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`Another catch phrase is ''buckets of minutes.'' ''Some providers will offer you so many
`minutes per dollar amount, whether that's local or long distance, whether you're at home or
`whether you're traveling,'' said Chris Pearson, executive vice president of the Universal
`Wireless Communications Consortium, an international group based in Bellevue, Wash.,
`that is working on standardizing incompatible cell phone technologies. ''Others will offer
`you 200 minutes, for example, but only for calls at certain times, on certain days or in your
`home area.''
`
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`Mr. Richman of Consumer Reports said users should understand what they're getting into.
`Buckets of minutes ''can be consumed far more quickly than you realize,'' he said, because
`billing policies count partial minutes as full ones, meaning that a 30-minute allotment can be
`used up in as little as 15 minutes.
`
`To decide how much time to buy, consumers may want to keep a log of all calls they make
`over a week or two, he added.
`
`Consumers should also ask about late fees and read the fine print on promotions.
`
`Then there is the issue of coverage. Most companies offer some form of local service with
`national service sometimes bundled in. But the advertisements promising no roaming or
`long-distance charges for the whole country can be confusing -- as both Ms. Levy and Mr.
`Cheifet have found.
`
`Ms. Levy, 37, a vice president for research at Shepardson Stern & Kaminsky, a New York
`advertising agency, chose Sprint last year, primarily because it did not require a long-term
`contract. Although she signed up for the basic $29.99 monthly package for 180 minutes, and
`has supplemented that with an additional $10 a month for 200 nighttime and weekend
`minutes, she has incurred about $50 in unexpected roaming or long-distance charges. Ms.
`Levy says that for as much as she is resigned to the fact that coverage is flawed, she expects
`future improvements.
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`PERSONAL BUSINESS; Those Black Holes in Your Mobile Phone Service - The New York Times
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`Mr. Cheifet, 61, who relies on his cell phone to keep abreast of business while meeting with
`clients around the country, first signed up with AT&T at $89.95 a month for 1,000 minutes.
`''The company was great and the bill was consistent, but the coverage was lousy,'' he said,
`referring to problems with dropped calls or dead zones. He said he switched to Sprint but
`eventually dropped that plan because of billing problems -- instead of the $75 a month he
`had expected, he was repeatedly billed $140 a month ''even though I never went over my
`600-minute maximum.''
`
`Thomas Murphy, a Sprint spokesman, said he could not comment directly on the complaints
`of Ms. Levy and Mr. Cheifet because he was unfamiliar with their service plans. He said
`there could have been errors in their bills, or they may have misunderstood their coverage
`plans. Reception or service problems could reflect a number of factors, including weather or
`clogged networks, Mr. Murphy and representatives of other providers said.
`
`Annabel Dodd, author of ''The Essential Guide to Telecommunications'' (Prentice-Hall) said
`that service ''isn't perfect yet nationwide'' but that she was optimistic that mergers like the
`one recently approved between SBC Wireless and Bell South Cellular to create Cingular
`Wireless would lead to truly seamless service nationwide.
`
`Industry experts say no single provider can yet cover the entire country. Those who
`advertise seamless service are doing so by creating alliances with other providers, Mr.
`Pearson said. When customers move into an alliance partner's network, he said, they may
`sometimes pay roaming charges.
`
`To help avoid them, Mr. Pearson advises consumers to request network maps so they can
`track -- on any given trip -- whether they will be in or out of their provider's network. But
`they should make sure they have the latest maps, he said, because coverage keeps
`changing.
`
`The major companies are rapidly expanding their coverage zones by combining operations
`through mergers, building coverage alliances and establishing additional cell phone
`transmission sites. But Michael Althschul, vice president and general counsel for the
`Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association, a trade group based in Washington, said
`providers as diverse as AT&T and Verizon Wireless were hampered by the lack of available
`spectrum, or frequency bands. To expand, he said, the industry has been negotiating with
`the F.C.C. to obtain additional frequencies.
`
`WILLIAM CLIFT, chief technical officer for Cingular Wireless, said his company has had
`difficulty expanding networks in dense markets like New York City.
`
`''When demand for wireless service outpaces a forecast, it can take six months to a year for
`some networks to catch up.'' he said.
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`https://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/24/business/personal-business-those-black-holes-in-your-mobile-phone-service.html?searchResultPosition=1
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`PERSONAL BUSINESS; Those Black Holes in Your Mobile Phone Service - The New York Times
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`Kenneth Woo, a spokesman for AT&T Wireless in Redmond, Wash., said that ''people want
`service, but you can't imagine the protests we get because neighborhoods don't want cell
`phone transmission sites.'' Moreover, he said, ''cellular is not a perfect technology.''
`
`Equipment, of course, is another variable in reception, service and cost. Expect to spend
`more, for example, for Web-enabled phones. ''Newer is actually better,'' Mr. Pearson said,
`but there are still many users with old-fashioned analog phones trying to complete calls in
`areas where their equipment cannot pick up frequencies. Even dual-band or dual-mode
`phones, which can distinguish between different frequencies and various cell phone
`technologies, will not guarantee coverage from one carrier to another, he said.
`
`A version of this article appears in print on , Section 3, Page 8 of the National edition with the headline: PERSONAL BUSINESS; Those Black Holes
`in Your Mobile Phone Service
`
`https://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/24/business/personal-business-those-black-holes-in-your-mobile-phone-service.html?searchResultPosition=1
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`5/5
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