All signed up on first day!... loosing reception every 5-15 seconds :(

[polish_jr]

Hey gang,

So took the plunge and told Rogers to stuff it. On a PM plan with my old phone and number ported over last night. Everything was up and running in no time except I wasn't receiving MMS pictures but figured out how to set my APN settings and now that's all good.

But now the scariest thing is happening: I'm at home, where I get at most 2-3 out of 5 bars, which would be fine except I lose complete signal and network intermittently ! I'd say it connects about once a minute for about 5-10 seconds then has no network for about 40-50 seconds. 

I put the PM sim into another unlocked phone and it didn't seem to have that issue but it wouldn't connect data as I'm sure the settings weren't done changing. I tossed a Wind Mobile card into my phone and it worked fine so it's not the phone's fault.

I checked the location of my nearest towers and there's three within two blocks! I live in the heart of downtown Ottawa so I can't imagine I'd be having these issues!

Oh man this is scary.. I really really want to be a happy PM customer like you all.

[featherland]

Thx for the info

[polish_jr]

Hey, it did eventually get sorted and I've been using this phone on public now for months and everything's fine. Turned out not being the phone that was the problem. I bought a SIM card off eBay to save a few bucks and that was what ended up causing the problem. The one PM sent worked fine. Good luck

[featherland]

Hi, saw your post yesterday and was your windows phone problem resolved eventually ? I have the same phone n I'm experiencing similar reception problem. Thx

[Rockdaddy22]

Unfortunately iPhone 4 doesn't have those menus. That fix seems to work for everyone, so good luck 🙂

[polish_jr]

Thanks for that. I'll give it a try soon. Cuz yeah everywhere said to goto Settings > Cellular > Cellular Data Network ... but I don't have a "Cellular Data Network" option in my menus. 

[Rockdaddy22]

http://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/Phones-Hardware/iPhone-4-3GS-3G/td-p/13467

You need to follow the steps there for your iPhone 4, it'll work 🙂

[polish_jr]

Hey there.

So I received a new SIM very quickly, thanks! But sadly all the problems are still happening. 

I'm looking for a new (used) phone and will test anything before I buy it.

This weekend I'll hopefully have some time to back up my old phone and do a factory reset to see if that solves anything.

I messaged PM through their Contact Us with all the details in hopes they could maybe get a technician to take a look from their end, but I need a phone so the SIM is currently in an old iphone 4. I get phone and texts but not MMS or data oddly enough. And when tried to find the APN settings to resolves the MMS and data issues... the phone doesn't have the menu options I need... so overall this has been a horrible transfer experience but I don't blame PM. I guess it's just luck. I'm sure if I was with one of the big three I'd still be in this boat but I'd had spent hours waiting on the phone to here the news. 

[Luddite]

It's a conundrum and I have no familiarity with Windows phones; I think you are on Windows 8? Not many Windows users I' afraid. Hopefully someone has a better idea than this last one of mine:

do a factory reset after creating a back up so you can recover contacts, photos, etc.

It's pretty clearly an issue with your phone managing your PM sim. Would be good to try your phone with a PM sim that is functioning normally.

Really sorry can't be more help. 

Good luck with the replacement sim.

[Mary_M]

Hey @polish_jr

thank you for the update.

How about we ship you a new SIM card to try ? Would you be able to private message me your complete shipping address?

Mary

[polish_jr]

Hi @Luddite and @Mary_M,

Thanks again for helping out.

I applied tape to the back of the sim; it's really snug in the tray.

I switched out the cards again for a longer time. The PM sim worked in the other phone as it should and so did the Wind Mobile in my phone. The phone I'm using by the way is a Samsung Ativ S t899.

I turned data on and off, wifi on and off, on both phones, and sent texts and made calls. Everything worked. Put the PM sim abck in the Samsung Windows phone and it goes right back to the cycling of NO SERVICE 😞

Just my luck.. and I need this phone for work 😞

[Mary_M]

Hello @polish_jr

Welcome to Public Mobile!

I'm sorry to hear that you're experiencing a few hiccups, but we'll figure it out !

You mentioned that you tried your SIM card in another unlocked device and you did not experience the issue. Can you try your SIM in the other device for a little longer ? 

Also try a different SIM in your device. These 2 steps will help in determining if the issue is coming from your device - or your SIM.

If it is in fact your card, we will gladly send you a new one ! 

Please test it out, and let us know of the results 🙂

Thanks,

Mary

[Luddite]

Best to let us know make/model of your phone. Someone may have specific solution.

Have you tried a factory reset? Have you tried the scotch tape on the back of sim trick to tighten the fit in the sim slot?

Perhaps the moderators @Shazia_K @Mary_M have some thoughts on the issue.

[polish_jr]

Hi Luddite,

I turned off data completely and it's still cycling with the majority of the time being in NO SERVICE.

This is really discouraging. It makes no sense. 

I'm going to try putting the PM sim in another phone for longer to test if it's the phone or the sim but so far all things point to the sim and PM... which is nuts! Can I call Telus to see if a technician could look into it if it is in fact a reception issue?

[Luddite]

Try setting the phone to 3G and not LTE. Helps where I live.

[McLaren]

Reboot the phone?  Also try the sim in the other phone for longer and see if it continues

[polish_jr]

And back to NO SERVICE.

It's cycling the same way again. 45-50 seconds of NO service  then a few seconds of service.

Please help!

[polish_jr]

Wait!

...it stopped. I've been connected now about 10 continuous minutes!

Was that kind of activity normal at the beginning of a contract?

I'll update in a a few hours..

Stay tuned!