FINALLY! Some UMA legacy people answers!!!!!

**SandAngel** · 11-14-2012, 04:42 PM

Been trying to get some answers about UMA and free minutes answered for like a YEAR and finally got some GOOD correct information.

For those who have the UMA legacy plans and UMA PHONES( not WIFI)..........

As UMA wasn't being incorporated into any Tmobile phones anymore so many of were panicking what to do if we wanted to keep our legacy plans without using up our bucket minutes once our UMA phone was dead and gone.

FINALLY after a year of incorrect answers I have the answer.

If you have a legacy plan with bucket minutes ( and the UMA add on), you CAN get a WIFI phone( not UMA) and it WILL work to keep giving you free bucket minutes.
The CATCH is it MUST be WIFI CALLING phone only. If it is just WIFI ENABLED it will draw minutes from your bucket.

So the specs must say WIFI CALLING and not WIFI ENABLED.

Also on the downside is that all the new PHONE FIRST phones available at this time are WIFI ENABLED . That means you will have to salvage an old UMA phone from somewhere or spring for data on that line to get a wifi WIFI CALLING data first phone. This really sucks for those of us who need new phone first phones as I do for my younger kids.

**eds817** · 11-20-2012, 11:43 AM

I don't know what the difference is between WiFi Calling and WiFi Enabled.

The only difference between UMA and WiFi calling is that on a phone with the UMA feature you can be on a call made on WiFi and leave the WiFi area and continue the call on the network and the billing will be UMA/WiFi. On phone without UMA if you leave the WiFi area you will drop the call.

However in order to benefit from either feature you have to have the Talk Forever Mobile feature on your account for $9.99 a month.

I'm not sure why it took you a year for get the information you have since it's be mentioned here on CB many times.

**SandAngel** · 11-20-2012, 01:55 PM

Originally Posted by eds817

I don't know what the difference is between WiFi Calling and WiFi Enabled.

The only difference between UMA and WiFi calling is that on a phone with the UMA feature you can be on a call made on WiFi and leave the WiFi area and continue the call on the network and the billing will be UMA/WiFi. On phone without UMA if you leave the WiFi area you will drop the call.

However in order to benefit from either feature you have to have the Talk Forever Mobile feature on your account for $9.99 a month.

I'm not sure why it took you a year for get the information you have since it's be mentioned here on CB many times.

I'M NOT SURE WHY...... You are rambling on about something I wasn't even talking about!
If you never had a UMA PHONE and an original UMA legacy plan then you won't get it. As stated in my post... Not talking about WIFI plans . NOT talking about plans at all , as a matter of fact so why are you trying to tell me about plans? i was talking about people who had the original UMA PLAN and UMA phones.
By the way you are wrong again about $9.99 . Lots of us got $0 and it was NOT the talk forever mobile!

I guess this why I started the WHOLE POST for UMA LEGACY PEOPLE.

**gariac** · 12-12-2012, 05:47 PM

There are two ways to UMA. There was a $10 a month extra where you could call anywhere in the US if you used your phone via UMA over WIFI.

The other way to UMA is to make a call over wifi without any additional fees. However, the minutes you use over UMA count against your total minutes.

I have used UMA in the second way. Either in office buildings where the T-mob signal didn't reach, or in places where there was no T-mob service.

I believe BB7 didn't have UMA. I'm on a 9780 using BB6. UMA works fine.

**Paintedeyes** · 01-04-2013, 08:50 AM

you can add wifi calling which is UMA for free on the plan. tmo no longer charges for it. It does not use minutes or anything. I've tested this and confirmed it with tmo several times.

**gariac** · 01-08-2013, 03:32 AM

From the T-Mobile website. Note the phrase "uses monthly plan minutes.".
-----------
There is no additional monthly charge to use the Wi-Fi Calling feature on your handset. Wi-Fi Calling uses monthly plan minutes for the following:

Calls made from the US to US numbers
Calls made from the US to international numbers (subject to international rates)
Calls made from outside the US to US numbers (not charged roaming)
Calls made from outside the US to international numbers (subject to international rates, but not charged roaming)
Note: You must disable Data Roaming when traveling internationally to avoid incurring data roaming charges.

**Xader** · 01-14-2013, 03:26 PM

Originally Posted by gariac

There are two ways to UMA. There was a $10 a month extra where you could call anywhere in the US if you used your phone via UMA over WIFI.

The other way to UMA is to make a call over wifi without any additional fees. However, the minutes you use over UMA count against your total minutes.

I have used UMA in the second way. Either in office buildings where the T-mob signal didn't reach, or in places where there was no T-mob service.

I believe BB7 didn't have UMA. I'm on a 9780 using BB6. UMA works fine.

That was how I used UMA on my 8900 as well. It was great for use indoors where signal was spotty or non-existent. I was always on UMA at my in-laws.

**SandAngel** · 01-14-2013, 05:42 PM

Originally Posted by gariac

There are two ways to UMA. There was a $10 a month extra where you could call anywhere in the US if you used your phone via UMA over WIFI.

The other way to UMA is to make a call over wifi without any additional fees. However, the minutes you use over UMA count against your total minutes.

I have used UMA in the second way. Either in office buildings where the T-mob signal didn't reach, or in places where there was no T-mob service.

I believe BB7 didn't have UMA. I'm on a 9780 using BB6. UMA works fine.

Not true>>>> as I stated when I started this thread>>> legacy people were able to add UMA for $0 and it did NOT deduct minutes from your bucket. i have years of bills to prove this!!!!!

**SandAngel** · 01-14-2013, 05:44 PM

Originally Posted by Paintedeyes

you can add wifi calling which is UMA for free on the plan. tmo no longer charges for it. It does not use minutes or anything. I've tested this and confirmed it with tmo several times.

yep>>>>i confirm this answer as long as you are using WIFI calling not just wifi enabled.

**eds817** · 01-16-2013, 06:39 AM

Originally Posted by Paintedeyes

you can add wifi calling which is UMA for free on the plan. tmo no longer charges for it. It does not use minutes or anything. I've tested this and confirmed it with tmo several times.

When I first signed up with TMO years ago they had me add Talk Forever Mobile for $9.99. This feature was supposed to let me make as many phone calls via UMA or WiFi without using any of my minutes.

Are you telling me that I do not need to pay this $9.99?

I logged into my account but don't see where I can add WiFi calling. Do I need to call them to make this change?

**raino** · 01-16-2013, 09:36 PM

Originally Posted by eds817

When I first signed up with TMO years ago they had me add Talk Forever Mobile for $9.99. This feature was supposed to let me make as many phone calls via UMA or WiFi without using any of my minutes.

Are you telling me that I do not need to pay this $9.99?

I logged into my account but don't see where I can add WiFi calling. Do I need to call them to make this change?

You should call retention. If anyone could do it, it would be them. If you don't see it online, I really doubt regular CS would be able to switch you. The way I have it is halfway between what you currently have and what Paintedeyes has described: the feature doesn't cost me anything, but minutes do get deducted. I tried to have it converted to all-free, but they said my plan was too old. I'm guessing your plan is even older than mine.

Not that I would recommend doing so, but have you tried removing this $9.99 feature and making a UMA call?

**TheQuietRioter** · 01-30-2013, 10:10 PM

Call me stupid but I thought UMA was defaulted into BB phones.

**raino** · 02-02-2013, 01:33 AM

Originally Posted by TheQuietRioter

Call me stupid but I thought UMA was defaulted into BB phones.

It was built in, until a few of the OS7 phones lost it (we're strictly talking UMA here, not WiFi calling.) I believe the 9900 doesn't do UMA, nor do some of the OS7 Curves (that TMO may or may not carry.)

**DannyAves** · 02-02-2013, 08:03 PM

Correct, the 9900 has wifi calling only, the old Bold 9700 had true UMA.

**bigboy101** · 02-06-2013, 04:44 AM

Are you sure 9900 doesn't have UMA? It says UMA on my phone when in at home on my WiFi.

**raino** · 02-06-2013, 05:43 PM

Originally Posted by bigboy101

Are you sure 9900 doesn't have UMA? It says UMA on my phone when in at home on my WiFi.

Absolutely sure. Try initiating a call on UMA and walking outside your WiFi's range. The call will drop.

**bigboy101** · 02-14-2013, 12:39 AM

Originally Posted by raino

Absolutely sure. Try initiating a call on UMA and walking outside your WiFi's range. The call will drop.

Yes, you are right. I never knew that UMA can handoff to cellular. I just always assumed that it couldn't. So you're saying that true UMA can handoff? How about the 9700? Does it have true UMA? Because I can swear I was never able to handoff when I left my house with that phone either.

**raino** · 02-14-2013, 10:22 AM

Originally Posted by bigboy101

Yes, you are right. I never knew that UMA can handoff to cellular. I just always assumed that it couldn't. So you're saying that true UMA can handoff? How about the 9700? Does it have true UMA? Because I can swear I was never able to handoff when I left my house with that phone either.

Yep. To paraphrase the Pine-Sol commercial, "that's the power of UMA, baby." UMA (a hardware feature) allows hand-offs while WiFi calling (a software implementation) does not.

The 9700 does have UMA. It may not have worked well for you because of a bad OS build relative to UMA. Even though UMA is a hardware feature, some builds just seem to facilitate the hand-off better than other builds.