Bad, Bad, Bad Corporate Websites

How many times have you gone to register at a company's website (something they try to force you to do), only to have to fill out the website's forms with all kinds of information, only to be told AFTER THE FACT that your username, password, etc has to be in a certain form. Ridiculous.

Here's an example from an insurance company. They tell you to type in your policy number exactly as it appears on your paperwork. When you do that, you find that you can't enter all the digits! Only after a few more minutes of research and trying do you find out that, in fact, you should not type in the dashes. So why tell the user to "type in your policy number exactly as it appears on your policy" if that policy number includes dashes?

FIRST:


THEN:


Arrgh.

Yo, corporations wanting surveys -- make it easy

Yo, corporations wanting surveys -- make it easy.

What, I have to find a black pen and then spend hours filling in ovals, like I was back in high school? I don't think so.

AARP is not with the times -- is this a surprise?

I just turned 50 years old, and tried to apply to AARP. Twice, using my Mac Firefox and Safari browser. Turns out that the good old AARP is still stuck in the days of accepting only folks using Internet Explorer on a PC. I finally realized this, applied using IE on a PC (using VMWare on my Mac, a really cool solution to the whole Mac/PC thing), and successfully applied. But now I seriously doubt that AARP is going to have much benefit for someone like me, if they can't even get their website together to allow folks with Macs to apply for membership without a huge hassle.

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Corporate Nonsense from United Airlines

Airlines continue to be a source of unintentional humor. Here's an example.

Finally, an affordable and reasonable mobile data plan!

I am truly excited about a product and data plan that Virgin Mobile and Walmart just came out with. The two-year commitments that cell phone carriers require are ripoffs. When I had a Blackberry plan with AT&T, there were months when I was not traveling at all, and I did not use or need my Blackberry at all. AT&T would not let me suspend the service during those periods of non-use. My mother has an iPhone, and she is paying something like $90 per month for it. Even now, AT&T will not let her suspend the service – this time, she is headed out of the country and will not use the iPhone in the slightest because it gets so expensive to use internationally. Paying $180 for something you will not use is pretty unreasonable.

In this economy, more folks agree with me. There are voice services out there that make sense for thrifty folks like me – I have been recommending Net10. With Net10 phones, I’ve bought a refurbished LG300 phone that works perfectly well with voice and receiving texts. I pay $30 for 600 minutes of voice calls that last two months. Since I (and from what I hear, the younger generation) don’t make many voice calls, those minutes last me the full two months, and then they roll over. I pay an equivalent of $15 per month for my cell phone that gives me the voice capability that I need.

And here’s a tip that I unearthed on a cell phone forum. It doesn’t work perfectly, but it works enough to be useful when I am traveling: you can forward emails to your Net10 phone (and likely any other phone that receives text messages) by using your phone’ email address! My Net10 phone uses the T-Mobile network, and its email address is in the form “dddxxxyyyy@tmomail.net” where “dddxxxyyyy” is my cell phone number in the form of area code and local digits. When I leave for a trip, I have Gmail forward my emails to my cell phone, and it works well enough. For my particular cell phone, my emails are truncated, but I am able to glean enough to know if the message is urgent or not. I can then call the person or whip out my laptop to send an email – as long as I am in a wifi zone, which brings me to my new discovery.

Since giving up my Blackberry, I have been waiting for a carrier to come out with a data plan that made sense. What makes sense? I want a data plan that is month-to-month, does not require a longterm commitment that penalizes you if you don’t want the plan, and does not cost a huge amount of money. I want a plan that is priced competitively, gives me enough data usage so I can get my emails and browse my websites when traveling, and works in the places that I travel to, within reason. Most of my business requires emails that are longer than can be reasonably typed on a Blackberry. And I admit that I am wordy.

As far as data plan usage, I can live with a monthly cap of 250Mb. That’s probably the lowest cap per month that would work for me, and would probably get me through a month of traveling and accessing emails and web pages. It’s a bit low, however, and I travel less than the typical businessman (but I consider myself an average guy and not a power user guy in a business suit, who has an unlimited budget anyway).

With the iPad, Steve Jobs seemed to have forced AT&T to offer a reasonable data plan. I have been on the verge of buying an iPad solely for the reasonably priced and month-to-month, no commitment, data plans. Kudos to Apple and Steve Jobs (and perhaps AT&T) for offering such a reasonable data plan for the iphone. However, the cost of the iPad (do I really need yet another device when I already have a netbook, a laptop, and a couple of desktop machines) has made me hold off. And I’ve also been holding off and waiting for E-Trade to send my $500 Apple Gift Card, which is a few weeks overdue! After my recent convention show, however, where I was stranded at the airport and needed web access (shame on SFO for not having free wifi!) to book rental cars and hotels, I was ready to buy an iPad immediately for the 3G access.

T-Mobile used to have a prepaid, 200Mb per month plan with no commitment for $24.99 per month. They have recently revamped their website to solve the problem that I describe below; they offer $30 and $50 monthly prepaid plans now for 300Mb or 1Gb of data respectively. Congrats to T-Mobile for finally getting their act together.

The problem is that if you try to buy this plan, the T-Mobile website forces you to buy a USB data modem also, at $150 to $200. OK, let’s say I buy the modem. Let’s say that I use the plan for two months and then don’t need the data plan for a few months. I cancel the plan. I try to start it up again. Well, if you try to start it up again using T- Mobile’s website, then you will be forced to buy another modem and pay another activation fee! And if you call T-Mobile’s ridiculously awful customer service, they know nothing about this prepaid plan and don’t even have the web resources to look it up! If you go to the store, they will tell you that T-Mobile does not have such a prepaid plan and will try to sell you the data plan that has a two-year commitment! I tried all the above. I even let myself get talked into trying out a data modem on a two-year plan by a store representative who promised me that if I cancelled within 30 days, I would not be charged a dime. It turns out he lied to me, and T-Mobile charged me over $60 for activation fees and usage fees even when I returned the items within 30 days. Yes, I am arguing wth T-Mobile, but of course their awful customer service is suspiciously and sufficiently awful to never credit me the amount promised. I am talking HOURS on the phone.

So forget T-Mobile and its treacherous, two-faced, deceitful offerings. Let’s move on (and by the way, don’t let the cell phone agent at the Costco booth tell you that there will be no charge whatsoever to try out the ridiculously expensive Verizon data plan for less than a month. Verizon will renege, you will discover that the guy in the Costco booth is just some guy that has no training and doesn’t know all the rules of all the plans for all the carriers that he purportedly represents , and you will be billed by Verizon for $100 just for trying out their modem for a few days).

This takes me to my recent trip to Las Vegas for a convention and being stranded at the airport. I have had my eye on a Virgin Mobile data plan, to use it until E-Trade sent me my Apple Gift Card. It cost $40 for month of unlimited service (or $10 for 10 days and something like 100 Mb of data), and it uses the Sprint network. This was still a bit pricey for me, considering the iPad’s $15 per month plan – but I was interested in it. After being stranded at the airport and realizing that I needed internet access while traveling NOW – I rushed over to Walmart after finally getting home and looked for the item: a Virgin Mobile Broadband2Go USB modem. I noticed that Virgin Mobile offered a special $20 per month (for 1Gb), no commmitment plan for those customers who purchased their modems at Walmart. This plan is perfect! Hip hip hooray for Walmart and Virgin Mobile for offering such a reasonable and usable plan. I am happily using this modem now to post this blog to my site.

Setting up the Virgin Mobile USB modem (which is a Novatel U760 modem) is not always simple and easy. I tried installing and uninstalling the Broadband2Go software on my MacBook Pro several times to no avail. I finally fired up VMWare and Windows XP on my laptop and activated the modem using the Windows environment. I was then able to go to the Virgin Mobile website and get my MDM account number, MSID number, and choose my Account PIN. Armed with that information, and still on the Windows environment, I paid for a month’s access on the Virgin Mobile website. Summary: when activating and starting up the Virgin Mobile USB modem, I highly recommend using a Windows XP machine (or emulator) to activate the modem.

Now that my modem was activated, I spent another hour trying to get the Broadband2Go software to work on my Mac using OS X. I finally decided not to use the Broadband2Go software and instead, went into Network Preferences. Here’s a rough description along with two screen grabs:

Go to Network Preferences.
Select the Virgin Mobile modem.
Click the Advanced button.
Under the Advanced page, change the modem from a phone modem to “Novatel Wireless and CDMA.”
You’ll then see green connected and sent/received bars.
When you want to connect to the internet, simply hit the Connect button, and you should be good to go.
Don’t bother using the Broadband2Go software in the Mac environment. It repeatedly asked for my system password but never connected me. Do run the Mac installer, however, to install the modem drivers. Do use the software in a Windows environment as it seems to work just fine.

I am a happy camper! Thanks, Walmart and Virgin. No thanks to you at all, Costco, T-Mobile, and Verizon! I’ll write more about my experience with Costco’s kiosk that markets cell phones. In short, why are we Costco customers, who pay for a good premium shopping experience, having to tolerate Costco’s phone kiosks, who do not offer Costco customers the best deals, do not offer prepaid services, do not offer agents that are knowledgeable, and do not offer the same service and return policies as Costco?

These Companies Suck: T-Mobile and Citibank

Citibank: if you apply for a credit card, expect a call at 7AM in the
morning asking to verify your social security number. Why? And the
last time I applied for another credit card, the amount of phone calls
and credit checks was staggering. Then they started denying our credit
transactions, stating that they were "protecting" us from fraudulent
activity. I told them that we were already covered by federal law from
any fraudulent activity on our credit cards, so we weren't being
protected by this policy -- Citibank was protecting itself. They did
not argue with me.

No other credit card company has hassled me so much or made me call them
so many times.

T-Mobile: all customers in California get a 30-day trial period to test
out if a cell phone company's products work out for you. Return the
phone or SIM card within 30 days, and you should legally not be charged.

Not with T-Mobile! They are obviously trying to hoodwink folks who
don't have the time or the knowledge to combat this evil corporate
entity, which uses standard evil corporate tactics. Here's how they
work: you try out a SIM card for a service. You return that card within
30 days, in which case you should not be charged at all. T-Mobile then
sends you bill after bill each month, each month charging you for
another month's service. You call. You tell them that you cancelled
the service before the first 30 days. You tell them that you returned
the SIM card. They say that they cannot do anything. You yell and
scream, and finally one of their representatives, after putting you on
hold for 15 minutes, tells you that the best they can do is take $10 off
your now $150 bill. You ask to speak to a supervisor. He finally comes
on and understands that you know the law and are not giving up. He
finally does the right thing (we'll have to see) and says that he is
cancelling all charges and all the bills.

I won't even go into how difficult it is to order a SIM card for a
month-by-month plan, which is clearly visible on their website, but
impossible to order without ordering a $200 USB modem as well. It's
always amazing to me when I know more about a company's products (that
are featured prominently on that company's website) than their
representatives. I spent hours on the phone a month ago trying to order
a SIM card for their month-to-month data service. I already had a USB
modem that would accept their SIM card and just wanted the SIM card and
month-to-month service. Guess what? Impossible to order. If you
already have a USB modem from T-Mobile and just need to have data
service for one month, you have to buy another modem from T-Mobile for
that month? Use the data plan for two months, and you have to buy the
modem for sure. Now you have two modems at $200 each. Stop the plan
(it is month-to-month, by the way!) and you have to pay the monthly rate
of $24.99, the activation fee of $35, and buy another modem all over
again!!

After hours of speaking to T-Mobile sales and customer service reps, a
supervisor told me that the only solution around this was to order a
smartphone SIM card, then to call and change the service. Guess what?
The smartphone SIM card didn't work in the T-Mobile modem that I already
had. It was super slow. And then T-Mobile charged me over and over
again even though I returned the SIM card.

I wish a cell phone company would offer a simple data-only,
month-to-month data plan that is actually under $25 per month, lets you
stop and start service when you need without having to pay activation
fees each time, and will let you use the SIM card in a Blackberry, smart
phone, or USB modem for a laptop. T-Mobile is close, but watch out for
the above scenarios. Virgin Mobile's new plan is close, but requires
you to buy a Blackberry for $300 rather than allowing you to use your
old Blackberry. BS!

New Product Recommendations

I'm laid up with a giant bruise that turned into a bacteria-eating flesh wound of some sort. It's been six weeks now and looks like six more weeks before I am able to go diving again.

I'll recommend a few things below.

1. Western Digital Live Media Player: this little unit is fabulous. I held off on buying one since I figured that an existing PC could hook up to my TV and do everything I needed. After getting a $300 electricity bill the last two months, I am on a mission to reduce the power consumption of my devices. Anyway, this little unit does indeed read Mac-formatted disks, and it does indeed play back files recorded by a Media Center PC! It plays back just about every file that my Mac does. Incredible little machine.

2. I finally gave in a bought a hot tub (made by Sunshine or something like that). The thing costs $100 to $150 per month to use! Granted, I am using it on 110V. I will be putting a 220/240V outlet for this and this should reduce the energy consumption, but still -- this is a lot of money to run a hot tub. Regardless, I've experimented with keeping the water crystal clear. Besides using the shock chemicals about every 4-5 days rather than once a week, I HIGHLY recommend a product called Spa Bright and Clear. I had a problem with cloudy water, and despite keeping the water chemically up-to-date and the filter cleaned, I was still getting cloudy water. One treatment of Spa Bright and Clear made the water completely clear for a good three weeks. The product seems like little more than soap, but it is inexpensive and supposedly binds to small particles in the water, so that the particles can be captured by the filter.