Verizon wireless - Wrong time zone sent by tower

Author

Wrong time zone sent by tower

Harlan Messinger

2007-06-19, 3:33 pm

I just checked something that was causing a problem a couple of months
ago and it's still there. I'm in Northern Virginia, in the Eastern US
time zone (GMT-5) and we're currently on daylight savings time, so we're
four hours behind GMT. Originally I had my Treo 700W set to use the
network's time zone--and found consistently that my phone thought it was
in the Caracas (GMT-4) time zone, which produced the correct time but
which was still wrong. I finally figured out that I had the option to
have just the time and not the time zone set from the network, so I
switched to that option, and manually set my time zone to Eastern Time.

Today I momentarily turned back on the option to have the network set
the time zone, and it immediately switched back to Caracas. End of
experiment.

Are other people in my area getting the same signal? Is it possible that
Verizon's towers would be announcing the time zone as Caracas Time for
months without anyone fixing it?

Tom J

2007-06-19, 3:33 pm

Harlan Messinger wrote:

> Are other people in my area getting the same signal? Is it possible
> that Verizon's towers would be announcing the time zone as Caracas
> Time for months without anyone fixing it?

It's been going on for months and you didn't report the error??? If I
have an error with my phone, my internet provider etc, the 1st thing I
do is get in touch with them. I don't care whether others have the
same problem at the same time I do, I just want my problem fixed. How
are they going to know they need to fix it if YOU, or some other
customer that is getting the signal from the same tower, doesn't call
them and let them know they have a programming problem????

Tom J

Harlan Messinger

2007-06-19, 3:33 pm

Tom J wrote:
> Harlan Messinger wrote:
>
>
> It's been going on for months and you didn't report the error???

I did, a couple of months ago. And the tech rep said of her own phone,
"Funny, mine says Caracas too", but then her solution was to have me try
setting various things and doing soft resets over and over, and finally,
when she suggested a hard reset, I said, "No."

So typical of technology companies never to believe that the problem
could possibly be on their end, until they've made the customer run
every last possible test, including the destructive ones, on his end.

Tom J

2007-06-19, 3:33 pm

Harlan Messinger wrote:

>
> I did, a couple of months ago. And the tech rep said of her own
> phone,
> "Funny, mine says Caracas too", but then her solution was to have me
> try setting various things and doing soft resets over and over, and
> finally, when she suggested a hard reset, I said, "No."

I call a couple of months ago? Call every day until you get it fixed!!
Get it escalated past the answer desk and get to the technician that
can change the code. Be persistent and tell them that if they don't
get it fixed, you are getting in touch with the person in change of
your area, and tell the person you have on the phone their name:
http://aboutus.vzw.com/leadership/executive/index.html

Tom J
who doesn't have to be hand held to get results

Todd Allcock

2007-06-19, 10:33 pm

At 19 Jun 2007 14:29:30 -0400 Harlan Messinger wrote:
> I just checked something that was causing a problem a couple of months
> ago and it's still there. I'm in Northern Virginia, in the Eastern US
> time zone (GMT-5) and we're currently on daylight savings time, so
> we're four hours behind GMT. Originally I had my Treo 700W set to use
> the network's time zone--and found consistently that my phone thought
> it was in the Caracas (GMT-4) time zone, which produced the correct
time but which was still wrong.

Why does it matter? Caracas doesn't observe DST, so the phone is GMT-4
either way. I just teste
on my PPC phone, and it didn't cause an appointment shift Because there
is no absolute time difference between DC and Caracas right now.

> I finally figured out that I had the option to have just the time and
> not the time zone set from the network, so I switched to that option,
> and manually set my time zone to Eastern Time.

Nice. My phone doesn't have that option- it's time and zone or nothing.

> Today I momentarily turned back on the option to have the network set
> the time zone, and it immediately switched back to Caracas. End of
> experiment.

And again, what's the problem? Essentially it's the difference between
Eastern Time being called "New York" or "Orlando" time- it'sthe same time
either way (at least until DST ends.)

When I'm in Denver, my T-Mobile MDA switched to "Saskatchewan." Both are
the same time, and don't mess up my appointments, so why would I care?

> Are other people in my area getting the same signal? Is it possible
> that Verizon's towers would be announcing the time zone as Caracas Time
> for months without anyone fixing it?

Why not- since it's not a problem for anyone!

I even have a theory why it might be intentional: since so many
smartphones probably weren't properly patched for the DST changes this
year, Verizon probably thought it'd be simpler to switch to a true GMT-4
zone for the east coast when DST kicked in than stay on GMT-5 and hope
every Treo, Blackberry and VX-6700 owner properly applied their
respective patches. That way, even unpatched phones would display the
correct time. I suspect that's why T-Mo chose Saskatchewan for Mountain
time as well- it's a non-DST area that happens to match US MDT.

Just a theory anyway. If they are also using Indiana for Central,
Saskatchewan for Mountain, and Arizona for Pacific Time, I'll wager my
theory is spot-on.

Marc Auslander

2007-06-21, 10:33 pm

Harlan Messinger <hmessinger.removethis@comcast.net> writes:

>
> I did, a couple of months ago. And the tech rep said of her own phone,
> "Funny, mine says Caracas too", but then her solution was to have me try
> setting various things and doing soft resets over and over, and finally,
> when she suggested a hard reset, I said, "No."
>

Seems since the rep had the same problem, you should have told her to
fix her phone and then tell you what she did!

--

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