Almost two million T-Mobile customers experienced service outages on Tuesday evening, but company officials announced yesterday that it had restored services for lost voice, text messaging and data services.
“We are now investigating the root cause of the incident,” said a T-Mobile spokesman.
The outage began at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday and again at 1:30 a.m. Wednesday.
“T-Mobile customers may be experiencing service disruptions impacting voice and data,” the company said in a statement. “Our rapid response teams have been mobilized to restore service as quickly as possible. We will provide updates as more information is available.”
T-Mobile’s new outage, which left about five percent of its users without communication, created many problems for the “phone-less.”
Junior psychology major Terja Gibson had a period where she could not place or receive phone calls and could not text message.
She is considering changing her carrier.
After temporarily losing the personal data of its Sidekick phone carriers, public criticism of the company is high due to the multiple service slip-ups.
Due to a Microsoft Corporation server breakdown in early October, phone numbers, photos and personal data were wiped from Sidekicks nationwide.
Now, disgruntled customers are facing service outages.
Twitter, a popular social networking site, became a forum for angry customers.
“T-mobile offering a $5.00 credit to your account for yesterday’s outage,” said Twitter user Tomtinbender. “WTF, $5.00! SMH.”
Another Twitter user and T-Mobile customer Joselito, said the company’s plan and packages are the only thing keeping her with the carrier.
T-Mobile is the fourth-largest service provider, but has experienced notable subscriber growth as users switch to competitors AT&T and Verizon Wireless.
Some users, such as Nanjah Griffith, senior finance major, experienced a period without service but plans to keep service with T-Mobile anyway.
“My plan is amazing,” said Griffith. “Although the service can be poor occasionally, I get myfavs, mobile-to-mobile, nights and weekends and unlimited texts for a very reasonable price.”
Senior international business major James Morant, is also still satisfied with the carrier.
He is currently overseas and experienced no service in London, but will not change carriers.
“I love T-Mobile,” said Morant. “It was very inconvenient to not have any service and the company is still working out the kinks, but other than now, I haven’t had any problems worth switching over.”
T-Mobile is currently searching for the source of the outage, and many consumers are still dealing with service issues.
“We’re making good progress restoring voice and messaging service to affected customers. At this time [9 p.m. Tuesday], approximately five percent of T-Mobile customers are experiencing service disruptions. Issues began at approximately 5:30 p.m. Eastern Time. Our rapid response team is working continuously to fully resolve this disruption. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience that this has caused our customers,” a T-Mobile spokesperson said in a press release.
According to T-Mobile International, the network provides access to some 36,400 sites using the GSM/GPRS 1900 MHz frequency-band, which is currently the largest 1900 MHz network in United States of America.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the carrier recently unveiled a series of new pricing plans in an effort to increase business and restore confidence in subscribers.
T-Mobile advises those still suffering from outages to contact them. A discussion forum has also been created on the company’s web page.
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