calmAnyway....I have been a busy little letter writer in the last couple of days. I am struggling to find the "near perfect" cellphone service plan & phone. This is a never ending struggle, I have found. You find a phone that you love, but it doesn't have a couple of things you are looking for. Another has what you are looking for, but is lacking in other areas. You find a great plan, but that company's offered phones are crap. You find a phone you love, but it's REALLY expensive, & the plan required ain't cheap either. I take my electronics/technology VERY seriously. I know nothing in life is perfect, which is why I say I look for the most NEAR perfect plan & phone. Right now, I am flopping back & forth between Sprint, Verizon, & T Mobile. Sprint offers the coolest phones, but they are BY FAR the most expensive. Verizon is right in the middle, money wise. They have one really cool phone (the Z-800), but it's expensive ($400, but I could get it through a friend for around $250-300). But THAT cool phone doesn't have a calculator, which I actually use my phone for quite a bit. I had hoped to find a phone that would work with my Pocketmail Composer, but none that I have found work.
So I mailed off a letter to Sprint, asking WHY I should remain a Sprint customer, since Verizon & T Mobile offer much cheaper prices. Yes, their phones are cool, but Verizon & T Mobile will eventually come out with cooler phones, equivalent to Sprint's. I compared the prices, & questioned why their rates are so much higher than other companies, & if they could offer me any incentive to remain a customer.
Next, I wrote to Kyocera, the makers of my new phone, the Kyocera 2235. I really like this phone...it has a "magic eight ball" thingy on it (ok, that's cool to me); it has a calculator; it has a TIP calculator (you can put in your bill amount & find out how much tip to leave, AND split the bill if there are a group of you); an alarm clock; a stopwatch; & capability to send text messages from OUTSIDE the web browswer (something my Sprint phone can't do). But it doesn't offer as much as the Sprint Kyocera 2255 does (& in my opinion, it should). My friend has the Kyocera 2255 (which you can only get through Sprint), & it is almost identical to mine. Except for two major differences...ones that actually mean something to me. With the 2255, you can download new ringtones & screensavers, directly to & from the phone, using the web browser. In order to download new ringtones to my 2235, I have to purchase a $75 data CD & data cable for my phone....and even then, the downloadable ringtones from the Kyocera website are PATHETIC....like the Star Spangled Banner & La Cucaracha!!! And I can't get screen savers at all. After discovering hundreds of websites that download ringtones to Nokia phones, I *finally* found one that downloads ringtones to my Kyocera 2235...for $2 each. And no luck with screen savers at all. Meanwhile, my friend gets adorable Disney screensavers & cool, hip, current radio hits for ringtones on her almost identical (otherwise) Kyocera phone. Why the difference? That's not cool. I shouldn't have to spend $75 to do what other people can do for free. And I told them how badly they needed better ringtones, & to offer some screen savers. If you are going to make people purchase a cable & data CD for $75, offer them some good shit to download, sheesh!
Then I wrote to Verizon, chewing them out for many of the same issues. I wanted to know why a Sprint customer with a Kyocera phone can download ringtones & screensavers for free, & yet if I get an almost identical Kyocera phone through them, I have to pay for the CAPABILITY to download things, AND get crappy options. I suggested that maybe THEY can offer ringtones & screen savers on THEIR site. Sprint users shouldn't get better options that Verizon users. Just my opinion, of course.
You have to understand something. I am the Queen of Letters. Whenever I think something is unfair, my friends will half-jokingly say, "Why don't you write a letter?" I wrote a letter to United Airlines once, after a crappy flight, & got a voucher for $100 for a future flight. I wrote a letter to the Royal Caribbean CEO after a crappy cruise, & not only did he touch on EVERY single issue I brought up, he sent me $500 in gift certificates for a future cruise, to give them another chance. I wrote to Calvin Klein after unknowingly buying fakes in Turkey, & they offered me two full sized fragrances from their line, for free. I also got 2 people promotions after writing complimentary letters about their customer service to their supervisors. I love getting action through words (git yer mind out of the gutter).
I don't expect any action to come from these letters...but it would be nice if something did come of it. I don't know what, though...I just like to write.
I need to sit & write out the pros & cons of each phone & each service plan....
And yes, I DO realize I don't have any money, so I can't really do anything. But being so broke, that is one reason I am trying to find the cheapest/best plan possible, since I have to have the phone.
