Long-time Lockergnomie Rob Vanderhaar read our article RE: free ‘unlimited’ SMS on VZW data plans and wanted to submit his experience for your review. First, he quotes our original post on free SMS. This is especially important to current and future Verizon service subscribers:

“I learned an interesting and somewhat humorous lesson this month. As you know, the MS/VZW/Palm consortium quietly omitted real-time “push” email from the Treo 700 (as well as the XV6700) - ironic, since that was one of the most-hyped features that would make this a “BlackBerry Killer”. Anyway, the alternative when using MS Exchange is what MS calls “AUTD” (Always Up To Date). When you receive a new email, your Exchange server sends an SMS message to your phone that’s intercepted by ActiveSync to trigger a “pull” of your new message(s). Pretty kludgey solution, but at least it works (most of the time). Only downside is that it chews up your battery like it’s going out of style if you get a lot of incoming emails!”

VZW has obviously been beaten bloody by people like me that bought the phone in part for “push” email - only to find the feature missing until Palm/VZW get their collective act together to release the MSFP (MS Security and Feature Pack) that adds push email. So VZW has quietly added a special option for unlimited data plans - 2000 free SMS messages. In other words, if you call and complain about the lack of push email, they’ll (maybe) tell you about AUTD and offer to add the 2000 free SMS messages needed to support it. I say “maybe” because a lot of reps don’t know about it, so you have to play “CSR roulette” until you find one that does.

Many VZW CSR’s can’t even find this option in their list of offerings (kinda like “double secret probation” in Animal House?), but I was lucky on the first try, and got the 2000 free SMS added to my account. I set up the AUTD option in ActiveSync on my phone, and life was wonderful - up until I got my February bill! I almost fell out of the chair when I saw a $346 charge for extra text messages! Turns out that 2000 SMS/month isn’t even close to enough if you get a lot of email - I used 4500; minus the prorated ‘free’ allowance left 3460 that were charged at $0.10 each! Took me a full hour on the phone with VZW and several escalations before I got someone that understood why this was an error, and agreed to credit the $346. (Note - as of 3/1, I still have not received the credit… what else is new?).

Needless to say, I turned off AUTD on the spot and no longer use it - but a word to the wise: if you go over the allowance and are not charged, consider yourself lucky! Personally, I think AUTD was more trouble than it was worth - especially since my battery life fell from about 10 hours to probably 6, meaning I couldn’t even make it through the day without recharging along the way.

I don’t use SMS at all - email something to me if you want me to see it. SMS is almost as antiquated as FAX. It’s yesterday’s technology - much like the phone. And speaking of “phone,” I have to tell my dad (publicly) that I’m sorry I flaked on this week’s phone call. I was thinking of you, but was traveling to LA for E3 and have let the communication slip since being busy on the conference floor. I will make a concerted effort to call you tomorrow, and I hope your wrist is better.

[tags]wireless,cellular,sms,verizon,cell phone,text messaging,phone call,vzw,phone plan,data plan,data subscriptions,autd,free sms,unlimited sms[/tags]