When Cell Service Vanishes

Cell phones have always had their Achilles' heel. Dead zones. Go under a bridge and like AM radio, your reception spits and sputters. "You're breaking up," the caller says. "Can you hear me now?" comes the clichéd rejoinder. This is especially great when you are talking to a boyfriend or girlfriend and a heavy relationship conversation becomes suddenly incomprehensible. Are they saying they want to see other people or they want to go get pizza? You can't be sure. Although, pizza does sound really good.

We've all been there. It's annoying. But it gets worse.

Take the day when everyone's cell service suddenly vanishes. Well, that happened to nearly 14 million T-Mobile customers at 4 p.m. on November 3rd of this year. All at once, people all over the country were having the same problem with their T-Mobile service. Calls were instantly cut off, people received an odd busy signal. Screens lit up saying no service available. People tried ringing up 911 and­­--nothing. It got ugly. Blogs quickly turned into rant rooms. Twitter lit up like a Christmas tree. Customers were outraged and something else-- landlines were suddenly essential again.

The next day, T-Mobile posted the following on their Web site:

ATTENTION:

T-Mobile confirms it has fully restored voice and text/picture messaging services for customers affected by intermittent service disruptions on Tuesday. About five percent of our customers across various geographies were affected for much of Tuesday evening, and by late Tuesday PST their service was restored. Our sole focus has been restoring full services for all customers; we are now investigating the root cause of the incident. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience that this has caused our customers

 

Holding onto your Landlines

Although many young people are foregoing landlines in their first apartment, a chilling experience like the night T-Mobile vanished is convincing many cell customers to hang on to the home phone lines.

Weatherproof

One woman in the Midwest describes a winter storm that wiped out their electricity grid. "The result was two hours of no power," she said. "After the first two hours my son proclaimed the most boring day of his life (no computer, no Nintendo). I've still hung onto my landline. Good thing too. Even my cell phone battery died. I'm keeping my landline, thanks."

The cell phone was originally conceived as the emergency phone. Dads purchased them for their teenage daughters so they didn't get stranded with car trouble. People tossed them in the glove compartment and forgot about them. Soon, however, more and more people started using the emergency cell phone to chew the fat with a friend while driving in rush hour traffic. Then came texting, Blackberries with e-mail and iPhones with endless apps for everything but brain surgery and backrubs. Suddenly, the landline is being viewed as the emergency line. Old faithful. Your port in a storm when cell service fails and ice storms wipe out all other communication.

So whether you use your home phone as a back-up system or as the primary means of staying in touch with friends and family, it looks like the landline is here to stay. Not sure we can say the same for your T-Mobile service.

To learn more about home phones visit dPi Teleconnect