Tutor
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3 Messages
Will I use data when on wifi?
I need help, I am confused. Att says that you use the smartphone at a wifi location you wont be charged data usage, here are my questions
1. can it be any wifi or does it have to be ATT provided wifi, I have charter wifi
2. Are they saying i can use my phone for posting facebook status, watching youtube, surfing the web, and it not use any of my data plan IF connect to wifi?
3. Do smartphones find wifi (let says you are traveling)
One thing i want to use it for is like mapquest, If i am lost i want to be able to look up directions (lets say I am in a wifi area) will this work. ALSO, if I am NOT in a wifi area i can still look up directions but it will us data usage right?
Please break this down for me, you wont offend me if you "spell" it all out for me
ALSO, what is the difference really between other smartphones and iphone... Just wondering, i am looking to purchase one. I am disabled and thought this would be a good thing to have. thanks
mrlerch
Tutor
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9 Messages
7 years ago
Martin
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Jimmy123.
Tutor
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5 Messages
7 years ago
Software upgrades are upgrades too. It never hurts to ask, or maybe realize that I wasn't asking for help and was just making a general statement of agreement that it is a frustrating "feature".
What I provided, for the umpteenth time, is that when I called ATT to ask about why my data has increased so much when I use wifi was that the phone will use whatever data service is faster, even with wifi turned on and the only way to turn it off is by turning off mobile data. Since this has not been addressed and blame keeps getting passed off onto the "user" then I'll assume that you guys are employees trying to spam chat and degrade me so that other customers don't notice or think that it's an issue.
Now to figure out a way to stop receiving updates every time some hero wants to tell me how I don't understand my cell phone.
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Gary L
ACE - Expert
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16.5K Messages
7 years ago
That's not true. The WiFi assist should only use cellular if the WiFi is working EXTREMELY POORLY. Not just if the cellular is faster. The cellular is faster in MANY MANY households, it's not automatically jumping to cellular when I'm getting 60Mbps cellular when my plan only has 50Mbps on the cable (or even when I'm at my mother's who only gets 8Mbps on the cable). I've intentionally pegged my mom's network downloading video from multiple devices and still not gotten my cell phone to start using the WiFi assist.
You will not reach a person on the phone who can explain specifically what your phone is doing to use more data. The only way they could see what the phone is doing is by looking at the settings, as we've been saying. They can say something general, like it's app updates, video, photos and audio; those are the big things, streaming video and audio is likely to be the biggest.
Data use of your phone IS up to THE USER!!
That's why we keep trying to explain how to check it and monitor it...
It's NOT AN ISSUE for the people who pay attention to their phone settings.
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formerlyknownas
ACE - Sage
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117.3K Messages
7 years ago
@mrlerch Software is usually referred to an an update. That's how it's worded on my phone.
@Jimmy123. This is the community, employees are clearly labeled as such with orange letter 'employee' under the screen name and a disclaimer about being an employee on their own time at the bottom. CSRs have the ATT label in the screen name in bold blue letters. Both employees and CSR will sugar coat manure.
I don't have to, they don't pay me or give me a discount.
Calling ATT to ask why data increased is like calling the electric company to ask why electricity bill went up. They can't see that you left a light on, or your refrigerator has dirty coils and is running inefficiently. Only you can. So don't call them. All they can do is spout useless advice, and the same stuff each time. Check settings, turn off this, etc.
I dealt with this when with Verizon. I'm not one to sit on my hands, so I educated myself on how data works, how carriers count and report data. I've written a blog on it and ATT published on their site. In the end, it is all on the user.
Carriers don't control the phones. Your phone is an independant meter of your use. And if the phone says it used 6.6 gigs of data then it did. It doesn't rule out a faulty phone or app. The only answer in on your phone, which is what I'm trying to impress upon you.
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formerlyknownas
ACE - Sage
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117.3K Messages
7 years ago
@Gary L I'm jealous. I don't get more than 9 mbps around here. And recently the signal took a nose dive again. My Dbm at home was -103 give or take a little. It's now at -117. It's so bad I had to put the ATT GS7 back into service for wifi calling. Not cool. The booster may not save me this time.
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mrlerch
Tutor
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9 Messages
7 years ago
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Gary L
ACE - Expert
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16.5K Messages
7 years ago
So you're saying we couldn't have know for sure what you were talking about when you said upgrade?
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formerlyknownas
ACE - Sage
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117.3K Messages
7 years ago
@mrlerch It was not a "smart remark". It was factual. That may be the way Apple does it. I don't use iPhone. New software updates are not released to android phones just because a new phone came out. My iPad recently had a software update. And it was worded that way. Understand why there is confusion rather than look for slights.
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BonbonCojack
Contributor
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1 Message
7 years ago
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Gary L
ACE - Expert
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16.5K Messages
7 years ago
Zero details does not make this helpful (or credible).
My experience is different:
I share 10GB with 3 people and none of us turn our data off. We've used a total of about 2.5GB this month (one day left) on that plan. So no, 50GB won't necessarily be gone in 2 weeks.
I've got 16 months in past bills to back this up.
I'm not saying SOME data doesn't get consumed when on wifi. I'm just saying it's shouldn't consume a good chunk of a 50GB plan unless something is wrong or misconfigured.
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