Combining Tmo "markets" into a family plan???

[dav72]

I have a 2 line family plan here in the Seattle area. A family member, who has a Sprint cellphone (w/ a Hawaiian 808 area code), wants to get onto my plan. I visited the local Tmo-owned store in Bellevue and was initially told the Sprint number was portable. However, half way through the "add-on" process, I was notified that the 808 number could not be added to my family plan. I wasn't given a really clear reason why, just that I couldn't have an 808 phone number because the "Hawaii Market is set up differently." I was told that I had two options: (a) just have a separate Tmo account for that 808 number, or (b) change my 2 Seattle numbers to Hawaii numbers, then I would be able to have the 3 phones associated to (1) family plan.

I'm confused. Does anyone have a good, reason, & understandable explanation? What's so different with the "Hawaiian market"? I have a friend who has an Arizona number on their Washington family plan. Hmmm...

Thanks.
dav72

[Mystictrust]

Originally Posted by dav72

I'm confused. Does anyone have a good, reason, & understandable explanation? What's so different with the "Hawaiian market"? I have a friend who has an Arizona number on their Washington family plan. Hmmm...

There's something wrong with this. I know from personal experience that a family plan must consist of two numbers in the same area code -at least for new sign ups anyway. My mom moved to Arizona from California recently and my sister went along with her. My sister decided she wanted to add a line with the AZ area code, but they told her it was impossible since the main line had a different area code, so she was forced to sign up with that same CA area code. A few weeks later, they both switched to the area code in AZ, but had to do it at the same time. So how your friend has an AZ number on a Washington family plan I'm not sure, did he perhaps start his AZ number not-so-recently?

Either way, I think you can replace "Hawaiian Market" with "Random City's Market" as I'll bet you wouldn't be able to add any other area code to that Seattle plan.

[dav72]

I'll find out the exact details of how they were able to do it. My friend just told me (and I laughed) - "Don't call Customer Service because the rep usually doesn't have a brain. You have to go into the store and speak to someone with a brain."

[Disclaimer - That was her thoughts and feelings, not mine.]

[Mystictrust]

Funny thing about your friend's statement, I usually find it to be the opposite. Usually, the rep's brain is motivated by commission Incidentally, to have anything done to your account, customer service would have to be called from the store anyway

[BbAddict]

I actually think that this has to do specifically with the Hawaii market and also T-Mobile policy. T-Mobile policy does say that if a customer has a family plan that all the numbers on that plan must be in the same market. Although there is really nothing in place to keep a customer from porting a number from a different market onto an existing family plan. Usually you will just have the rep telling you that it can't be done because of policy. The computer system will actually allow it. Be advised that T-Mobile does sometimes run audits for stuff like this and I have heard of people who have had family plans with numbers in different markets being called and being forced to change their numbers to be in the same market (seems to be very rare). On to the issue with Hawaii. I know that Hawaii is special in that it is assigned a special range of SIM card numbers that are different from all of the rest of the United States. In the past this did not allow for customers in Hawaii to be activated other than a location in Hawaii or through customer care being sent the special range sim card. So the problem may also be that all Hawaii numbers must be associated with special sim cards and the primary place of use must be Hawaii. It has been a while since I have looked in this and am not sure anymore if Hawaii still does use a different range of sim cards or if they have been assigned to the ranges of everyone else. There was talk about T-Mobile moving Hawaii to normal SIM but I don't know if they actually followed through or not. I imagine that very few reps have dealt with the Hawaii issues or do not keep up with them so you may be hard pressed to find someone who can give you good answer. So really there are two issues that may keep you from switching that Hawaii number to an existing family plan. One being a rep who is willing to allow the port and two if the special rules for Hawaii still apply. Hope this was helpful. Good luck.

[Janice]

Thank you for the information BBAddict.

[BbAddict]

Wirelessly posted (Opera/8.01 (J2ME/MIDP; Opera Mini/3.1.8295/1724; en; U; ssr))

I actually checked into it a little more and found out that all new customers that activate with Hawaii numbers no longer get unique sim card numbers. They are all the same now. So the only limitation should be T-Mobile policy.

[dav72]

Thanks for all the feedback, and to BBaddict for the info!

I have yet to talk with my friend about her Washington/Arizona account, but I did call Customer Service again to inquire. The service rep told me the reason why they dont allow it is because it will cause problems with Billing. I was like - "Hmm, that's pretty lame". I told him that I'm amazed with all the new technical stuff that Tmo has come out with, especially the @Home service which I have. (BTW, I love it!!!! In Seattle, there's so many open wi-fi networks that you can use. In fact, I was even able to use the wi-fi network at my favorite chinese restaurant in my neighborhood. How cool is that??? Chinese food with a hot-spot! LOLOLOLOL). Anyway, I continued by saying that it's too bad that Tmo can do these wonderful things, but cannot modify the Billing to accomodate this very common request. Lastly, he said that I should be patient because something is coming out soon (and he said he couldn't say more) that should allow it.

[armadill09]

when i set up my service a while back, my wife and i had different area codes too, and i was told that since i was bringing my number in it could be done, but if i got two new numbers, they would have to be the same area market.
talking to a friend about this, they had tmobile and wanted to merge accounts with someone else with tmobile, and they wouldnt allow the different area codes in the same account, but if they took thier number to a boost (or other) prepaid for a month then since its is being brought back into tmobile, tmobile could put it in the same account with different area codes