Rename "Getting Started"

[MEU_21]

Further to my original suggestion of renaming the "Getting Started" forum topic (link below), I would suggest that under this topic, when clicking on "Start a help ticket", that the user's information be enetered and that the help ticket be protected for viewing by mods only. I know this goes counter to the community help philosophy, but the optics of so many help requests with account activation, plan changes, and payment issues, it may give the optics of a poor back-end system for PM. Personally, with all these issues having been raised, I feel like having an account with PM is as if problems can appear anytime and I should constantly watch my account for extra charges/accidental plan changes, etc. Russian roulette, especially in the public, is really bad optics.

https://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/Public-Lab/Change-quot-Getting-Started-quot-to-quot-A...

[Luddite]

Nah, just pay attention to your phone. If it is working normally, and you can access your account, just ignore everything else. I've had no issues for 3 years and a friend for 4.

[stonechucker]

PM has been great for me.  No problem with initial setup, only an issue changing from 30 day to 90 day plan, and again when a friend couldn't use my number to give me a friend referral.  Other than that, 16 months of bliss!

[pridhams]

I just started yesterday with Public Mobile both myself and my wife.   Already very impressed.  Just a little warning to all you members paying with vouchers.  I tried that however quickly realized the double taxing scenario and decided against that method.  You pay tax on the vouchers and then on the service.   If you can,  always use your credit card or debit visa for payment.

Great Price and FULL BARS LTE!!!!  that never happened with Rogers  

[wetcoaster]

@pridhams"I tried that however quickly realized the double taxing scenario and decided against that method."

Tax is only applied at point of sale and all plan pricing in your account is before tax.

* If you buy vouchers the tax is applied at the check-out. You then add the voucher amount before tax to your account balance.

* If you are paying by credit card, your CC bill will show the plan price plus tax but only the plan price will be added to your account balance.

* At the time of set-up or renewal the plan price is deducted from your account balance.

[pridhams]

nice thanks for your help...Now that I have been with Public almost a month I found a problem I have some concerns with... I often send pictures via text.   I just got a notification this morning that I have used 75% of my 4 gigs for the monthly Data.  I decided to investigate why.   OMG!!!!!!   yesterday I texted a photo 75KB large the data charge was 250MB.   That is a lot for such a small photo.   Why so much public???  Is there a problem.  This has been common for the entire month no wonder 75% used.   I never had that problem with Rogers.  2Gig max for the month..  If someone could please explain.

[stonechucker]

Are you using a standard SMS/MMS app?  My understanding is that MMS messages sent via Public Mobile are excluded from the actual data usage.  In fact, on my Android phone, using the @IWIK created Data Witness data tracking app, I've told it to exclude my SMS/MMS app from the counter, and the numbers are very close between my device and the offical Public Mobile usage.

[wetcoaster]

@pridhams 

This forum is strictly for ideas that we think PM should look at implementing down the line. It's not monitored 24/7 - you will not get an answer / help for your problem as fast as possible (or at all) if you are posting it as acomment on an old idea.

You should post your problem with a new thread in "Plans & Add-ons" so that all the knowledgeable people here can / will chime in.

Having said that, if you are using your texting app (and not a social media app like WhatsApp, Facebook etc) for sharing pictures, MMS are included in the text portion of your plan and are not counting towards your data at Public Mobile. Some other apps must be eating your data. There is some very good information on data management in the Knowledge Base  (PM's equivalent to a FAQ section) and in the forums. 

[srlawren]

@pridhams are you looking at your Usage History and seeing a row similar to this, but says 250MB?

If so, that is an entire day's worth of data usage.  The usage history screen only updates your data once per day, in the early morning (some time after midnight eastern time zone--my example above shows 1:46 AM).  As others have noted, if you sent the image via MMS, it does not affect your data amounts in your plan.  Even if it did, there's no way a 75KB image could consume 250MB.  That's your full day's worth of usage.

If you're not sure where your data is being used up, here's how to check which apps are using up your data:  on an iPhone or on an Android phone.  

[pridhams]

THat is what I am seeing.  I am using Mighty Text on my computer to send the photo through maybe that is the problem.  I will check what program is using it all up

[pridhams]

Thanks for your help it's Spotify thats using up the data. But the time is not the same on the bill