Gprs

[mobile69]

I signed up to a gprs package yesterday with Dtac. I managed to download the modenm drivers from Sony Erricson for my mobile phone & install them. Connected to the web, everything hunky dory. Surfed the web for an hour. Checked my post paid account balance for the phone - 60 bt billed to my account. But the dtac account I signed up for was for 12hrs per month for 99bt. Can someone please advise me if this correct. I was of the understanding you didn't pay for the call time in addition to the gprs time. I set my dial up account up as per a posting here with a dial up number *99***2# etc etc. Doesn't seem a good deal if you pay twice.

[Ken]

Not sure if AIS would work the same way as DTAC, but assume it would be similar. AIS had/has a 1 2 Call package at 100 Baht for 25 hours. I signed up in the middle of the month and they pro-rated the 100 Baht to an amount that would take the hours to the end of the current month. Then on the first of the next month the full price of 100 Baht was charged. Sounds like that's what DTAC does also.

[ZZZ]

I'm using prepaid 12Call and the charge is about 5Bath/hour, no other charges.

[Ken]

I'm using prepaid 12Call and the charge is about 5Bath/hour, no other charges.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Are you sure no other charges? I've got a printout from AIS One 2 Call in front of me, albeit a couple of months old that says the base price of 100 Baht for 20 hours (they recently changed it to 25 hours) and any additional minutes over the 25 hours at 0.08 Baht per minute. That would work out to "about 5 Baht" per hour if you go over your base of 25 hours at 100 Baht. But indeed there are no other "per minute" internet usage charges than the ones stated here.

[lampard10]

I paid 10,000 instalation. That is sim card that fits in my computor and 999 a month unlimited. I can use my computor in the car,on a train, in fact anywhere there is DTAC reception. It is maybe a it pricey if you don't use it much, but it is there, which is what I want. Also I use it for back-up when my IP Star is down ( roughly twice a day)

[ProThaiExpat]

I have AIS GPRS with sim car in Sierra Wireless card in my laptop. Unlimited service for 853 Baht a month. Card cost 15k, I am sure there are cheaper ones. Also can receive phone calls while online and use earphone to talk on phone. Have had the contract for years. Am told I can renew at the same price when it expires next year. Many deals out there for 999 unlimited.

[Crushdepth]

It can take a few hours to set up your subscription, so you may have been surfing on the 'casual' rate immediately before your plan kicked in.

It is also possible that they just screwed up, worth giving them a call to check that your plan is active.

[mobile69]

It can take a few hours to set up your subscription, so you may have been surfing on the 'casual' rate immediately before your plan kicked in.

It is also possible that they just screwed up, worth giving them a call to check that your plan is active.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I've used about 2hrs worth now, & when I check my bill, 120bt has been added to my phone account usage, & the estimated next phone bill is 431bt, which looks like the 299bt per month talk bill, plus 99bt gprs bill (+vat). Will keep an eye on my balance. I'm only assessing gprs at the moment. Normally use dialup, but geting sick of all the disconnections at 3bt a pop. Gprs speed seems ok & can log on many times without adding up the 3bt dialup connections.

Tried to set up my emails on the phone, so I can check them when out & about, but it fails to find the server everytime. Maybe the ports are wrong. Those set on the phone (maybe at the dtac office) were 110 for incoming port & 25 for outgoing. Are these correct?

[Khun Bob]

I have dtac post paid for 140hrs and it is good value.

I wouldnt trust the info dtac automatically gives - personally i find it confusing - if you have any issues with dtac visit there cust serv cehtre on the 6 floor of world trade and they will help you - you even get a special foreigner ticket there and the staff speak reasonable english - i got a print out of all my calls and there was hundreds of gprs calls which i dont understand but they did explain all the other issues i had.

If you have the zad offer for voice then the minutes/money do roll over up to an accumulation of 1500 baht, however there is no roll over for gprs.

Would recommend registering on their website for billing info and to get 50 free sms's per month to other dtac phones. Also you can enter *121# to the phone to get current billing - i dont fully understand this, but by looking at the bills on line you can work out the voice and gprs usage.

I have a SE phone as well - where did you get your drivers from as i'd like to use a direct cable connection, but have so far failed and have to use IR - it is a SE T610 - cheers

PS the DNS servers recommended by DTAC occaisionally require some help - so if you try to get your email and it fails - if it says somethine like host site could not be found - find out what they are and type this into your browser - this will get the host name of your mail server into the DNS cache and you should be able to get your email provided all other settings are ok

Edited October 13, 2005 by Khun Bob

[mobile69]

Thanks Bob,

I'm usin Zad, & I'm beginning to wonder if I'm just using up all my voice roll over. I've tried registering on line, but keep getting stuck on a thai script page - will have to get the wifey to look at this. Probably have to take a trip back to dtac.

Driveretc from sonyerricson

I got my usb cable from Chi chang at airport plaza, Chiang Mai. These cables not easy to find here in CM. Cost 1290bt. On the box it says its good for t610.

[Khun Bob]

Cheers mobile69

To be honest i dont understand at the mo fully how the dtac billing works - but the bills on the website certainly help - first time i registered on line everything was fine - then you have to call a no - think it is *1817 - or something like that - just got thai - anyway trip to the cust serv centre in world trade sorted it out - now have two on line accounts - one that is registered and one that isnt - TIT

Still need to find out how much GPRS time i have left - i guess a call to cust serv can help but they sting you for a voice call - anyway have found that my local dtac shop in ngamwongwan has a free cust service phone which i can use when doing a bit of shopping down there...

The two things i would really like to know at the mo is :

How to find out gprs time left in a month

How to find out my balance is for rollover voice time on zad

I know i can call cust serv - but this usually end up in an expensive 20min plus call first to get someone that understands and then to get the right info...

[Khun Bob]

I'm using prepaid 12Call and the charge is about 5Bath/hour, no other charges.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Think this has allready been mentioned but is this just for gprs - if so this is very reasonable..

Where do you get the sim card and how much do you pay ?

Is the price just for gprs or are there additional costs?...

[sas_cars]

Just get a usb bluetooth dongle about 800-900 Baht, a bluetooth enabled mobile phone and u can wirelessly surf the internet virtually everywhere in thailand wherever the mobile network is present.No need to buy that expensive GPRS Cards.All that bulky Sierra and other GPRS cards sux big time,both money and by sizes

[sas_cars]

Or If your notebook or desktop as built in Infrared,and you have a mobile phone which has infrared too,no need to buy that USB bluetooth dongle either.Just go surfing without wasting even a single penny.

[Khun Bob]

DTAC in their wisdom have put something flashy on their home page - www.dtac.co.th - which is a pain when i try to use their gprs to access it ! and i will not compromise my security to run flash or whatever - anyway here is a direct link to the dtac online services

http://www.dtac.co.th/en/customer/OnlineSe...neservices.aspx

The online billing info is the best info i have got - but this is still confusing, below is an excerpt from my info page :

Pre-discount (Baht) 1,834.12

Post-discount 698.00

Remark:

- For ZAD customers, post-discount amount includes discounts from rollover

and other charges not included in promotion such as AudioText 1678 and

international calls.

- For Dpackage customers, post-discount includes fixed payment

not really sure why i get a pre and post discount and the numbers dont add up either - will keep looking at this...

from talking to customer service they tell me that zad rollover is specified in the last bill - its all in thai and there is no english option on the website to see the bill in english

[mobile69]

Registered with dtac online. You're right , you can get very detailed info about previous bills, but not your current bill. This is what we need to see. Agree with you Bob, not possible to see how much of your gprs hours you have left. If you call *121# & see your amount to pay rising by 0.5 bt per minite online you know you've used your quota.

Problem is there's quite a delay sometimes before this is updated.

[Khun Bob]

Hi mobile69

I'm going to keep working on this one as theyre may be something in the current charges you get from *121# - as said before dont fully understand this one but it seems to be current for some thing...

Apart from this a long call to customer service - would be nice if they could answer via email or have messaging via website where they can answer this and other questions - will explore this to as i need to know my rate of usage - i know i have approx 4.5 hours per day and occaisaionnaly exceed this but need to keep an eye as i dont want to pay .5 bt per min.

as a side - whe you did the sony erricoson download did you get the modem setup scripts which is a mver small download or did you download the mobile synch manager which also seems to have modem drivers for ir, cable and bluethooth - this is a bit more heavy weight at 29 MB ?

Cheers

[mobile69]

as a side - whe you did the sony erricoson download did you get the modem setup scripts which is a mver small download or did you download the mobile synch manager which also seems to have modem drivers for ir, cable and bluethooth - this is a bit more heavy weight at 29 MB ?

Cheers

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Got the modem scripts - a very small file. The download page said they were good for windows ME & XP. I use windows 98SE but they appear to be working fine.