former attws subscribers: sms number changes

Jeremy Wrote:
>
>
> I believe that the switch from "mobile.att.net" to "mmode.com" was to
> comply
> with the terms of the merger that required Cingular to discontinue use
> of
> the AT&T name.
Actually the SMS issue has nothing to do with the Cingular merger. The
old message center number was in an Alaska number series. A while ago
AT&T swapped service areas with Dobson Cellular giving Dobson Alaska. I
can't remember what AT&T got. Since the message center # was an Alaskan
number and had to be given back to Dobson, Cingular had to change that
number. Most of the transition was smooth. It was done by Over the Air
Activations. This was tried repeatedly over a 2 or 3 week period. There
were a small percentage of phones that could not be reaced or were not
programmable over the air. These phones all had issues with message
center number and had to call it in to get it fixed. There was no way
for Cingular to figure out which phones programmed correctly and which
did not. Cingular had a choice to either send out a mailing to all
former AT&T custmers or wait for the few affected ones to call in to
get the issue resolved. Sending out millions of letters when only a few
thousand phns were effected probably didnt seem justifiable so they
chose option 2.


--
movak