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Hi folks
I am just helping my Dad set up his Samsung San Francisco smart phone which is on an Orange Pay As You Go SIM card. If my Dad pays £10 minimum each month, he gets free internet, and something like 600 texts. I can't remember how much call time is included.
I was in the shop when my Dad bought the phone, and I explained that my Dad just needs it for calls, internet and AOL email. He will probably not need to download any apps. The phone was £100 with £20 first top up, and as it has had good reviews, and does what my Dad needs, he decided to buy it. The phone was set up in the shop, but I am doing the setting up of email.
I have just seen the first email sent by Orange, and it says that email is only free for a 14 day trial, and after that you have to then pay extra to use the Mobile Mail.
Some questions.
Are there any other apps on this phone that enable AOL email and do not incur an additional monthly charge?
Is this just on Orange? I always thought email was treated as just bandwidth. Do all networks charge for Mobile Mail.
My Dad will probably take the phone back and get his money back. At no point did the sales assistant mention extra charges for email. Can people recommend any simple smart phones that are good for email and internet, that are similar to the Samsung Android?
Many thanks in advance for any advice offered.
I have never heard of anyone including mobile operators trying to charge for using an email service. Who would pay for it when all other services are free?
If they are trying to charge it would be specifically for the Orange mail service, as email is seen by the network as just data traffic and could not distinguish it from say browser traffic.
You should be able to go into the settings section on the phone to find a mail set up wizard to connect to the AOL account. You may need to get SMTP and POP settings but you can Google those
You don't need to use Mobile Mail, you just need to set your email account so that it POPs.
Log on to Yahoo, or whatever mail provider you use, and set your options to enable your mail to be POPed and save. Then on your phone fire up the Andriod email app, go to settings (button on LHS usually), choose add account and fill in the email account details and that should do the trick.
HTH
Thanks for the info. I can't actually see an email application that is separate from the orange pre-installed one. Am I being dim?
Here is the charging info from the orange site:
pay monthly
* Panther & Dolphin plans - includes unlimited push email and mobile internet (fair usage policy applies), plus minutes and text as part of the monthly access fee.
* Mobile email can be added to any other pay monthly plan - Unlimited push email for an extra £5 a month. Choose the first month free offer with a new talk plan. Call customer services on 150 to have this added to your plan.
View pay monthly plans >>
pay as you go
* 'Add Mobile Mail for £5 a month to get unlimited push email. Text the word email to 247 to receive a link to Orange World to find out more and subscribe (all the pages about this service are free to browse) or call customer services on 450.
Hmm. Maybe Pay as you go phones don't come with a mail app pre-installed and will only allow mobile mail.
If that's the case I'd suggest that you speak to Orange direct. It might be best to avoid the shop route as they are all franchises and usually can't match what Orange direct can offer.
I've got a great £15 month Raccoon plan over 24 months with unlimited internet. OK I'm an existing Orange customer but the same plan with the shop was £25 IIRC.
Don't take it back.
You can unlock a Sanfransico for 5 quid.
Then he can use it on whatever network he likes.
IIRC you can do all sorts of fancy things to the firmware as well.