[kerph32]

Just posted this on my blog, so there are some concepts explained in detail that is probably not necessary here, but I didn't want to retype:

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Since May, 2007, I have enjoyed what is referred to as "push" email on my Blackberry. Anything sent to my @gmail.com address was sent instantly to my phone, allowing me to get it right away as long as I was within the reach of a cellular tower. To say that I loved this ability would be an understatement.. no longer would I come back to my computer with 20 emails waiting, and no longer would I miss an important 'Latest Specials' notification from our local Mexican restaurant.

Well, I guess it was all too good to be true, and AT&T has decided to no longer offer this 'push' service for external email accounts. About two weeks ago, I noticed emails arriving in 'clumps', instead of instantly. For example, if I was at work and having an email conversation with my roommates over our house Google Group, 5-6 emails may be exchanged between the five of us over a matter of minutes. In the past, these emails would come instantly as soon as they were sent. Lately, however, my phone sits dormant for up to 15 minutes, followed by a barrage of vibrations (or tones if I have the speaker on) all in a row. So, it would appear that the phone is only checking for emails every 15 minutes.
WHAT? This cannot be... that's exactly the delay that I wanted to get away from (and succeeded in doing so for 10 months) by switching from Treo that I had with Verizon. I'm sure it seems ridiculous to many of you that a 15 minute delay could really matter at all, but it's the difference between being able to have an email conversation over the phone (free using the data plan) or having to use text messages to communicate via the written word (15 cents a pop).

So, tonight, after an hour on the phone I finally got the Blackberry specialist on duty for AT&T to fork over the info: They have indeed changed the way emails are forwarded, and the Blackberry Internet Service only polls email accounts every 15 minutes for new messages. (edit- thanks to Sith Apprentice) If it finds one, it checks back every 3 minutes for the next 15 minute cycle (so 5 times of 3 mintues). Ff it continues to find email it stays at 3 minutes, if in that 15 mintue time period it does not find email, then it goes back to checking every 15 minutes.(end edit) How rude.

This is just another effort to save costs, and I don't exactly blame AT&T for it, but I do hold a high level of contempt for their perceived attempts to cover up this new policy. I even had to go through the trouble of switching out my device last week because the local AT&T store didn't know what was going on. As a member of a few different Blackberry online forums, I have seen more and more posts regarding this issue, with no resolution found. Now that this new 'policy' of AT&Ts has been made clear to me, maybe a public outcry will elicit a reversal back to the glory that was true push email.

A workaround (that works perfectly, in fact) is to just have Gmail/Yahoo forward to your carrier's @blackberry.net address and change the 'reply-to' in BIS. Voila, push email again.

[Erikgreenlee]

One of the biggest strengths of blackberry is their email. If carriers keep taking things away, they're gonna have a lot of upset people

[anon(153966)]

Come on people; own up, is this really true?

[ssadowski]

A workaround (that works perfectly, in fact) is to just have Gmail/Yahoo forward to your carrier's @blackberry.net address and change the 'reply-to' in BIS. Voila, push email again.

As a note, this isn't valid for T-Mobile, which polls BIS emails every 15 minutes or so.

[kerph32]

One of the biggest strengths of blackberry is their email. If carriers keep taking things away, they're gonna have a lot of upset people

Indeed.. that's exactly what I told the lady last night - she was very nice, and hadn't looked into the issue this deep before. She said that she'd been working on BBs for a year and it's always been this way.. I let her in on how it really was (up until a couple weeks ago) and she delved further and found that it might have had something to do with 4.2

Come on people; own up, is this really true?

It happens somewhat randomly - mine didn't 'switch' until I was messing around with my BIS settings one day and changing signatures. It's almost as if it won't 'notice' that you're getting true push until you start messing with things, and by doing so a user 'wakes up' the system to yours situation and it updates itself to the new polling procedure.

As a note, this isn't valid for T-Mobile, which polls BIS emails every 15 minutes or so.

Ah, that's rough, sorry to hear

[Erikgreenlee]

I just did a test on my gmail and yahoo accounts and I received the emails immediately. Maybe it is the messing around with things that breaks it, but so far I haven't had a problem.

[kerph32]

That's good to hear - I guess the moral of the story is, don't mess with your BIS unless you absolutely have to

[pinkdaisy226]

I wanted to say that even though I'm not AT&T, I seem to have problems with Gmail pushing to Sprint. Sometimes it works instantly, sometimes there's a delay... a really long one too.

On that note... I forwarded something to my gmail account 3 hours ago. I just sent something else to my gmail account a minute ago. Both emails just showed up on my Blackberry.

Also, when you set it to forward to your @blackberry.net, what do you have Gmail do with the email - keep Gmail's copy in the inbox, archive or delete? I think either way, it'd be annoying, I'd always have to go in and clear out my inbox instead of deleting it from my berry and my inbox.

[kerph32]

Also, when you set it to forward to your @blackberry.net, what do you have Gmail do with the email - keep Gmail's copy in the inbox, archive or delete? I think either way, it'd be annoying, I'd always have to go in and clear out my inbox instead of deleting it from my berry and my inbox.

I had it keep Gmail's copy in the Inbox, as happened before when I had Gmail through BIS. I like being able to read on my BB and know that it'll stay as Unread in my Inbox for follow-up if needed. If not, I just click All > Mark As Read

[Jackal]

Its funny cuz I've had just the opposite... My gmail wouldn't let me know I had emails (the bb app) but my messages folder would be filled up throughout the day

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[anon(153966)]

With GMail there is really no need to delete. So, just set it to archive...

[kerph32]

Its funny cuz I've had just the opposite... My gmail wouldn't let me know I had emails (the bb app) but my messages folder would be filled up throughout the day

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

That is strange. I've never cared for the Gmail app, lags a bit and doesn't push, but the interface is more attractive/akin to Gmail

[CappinHoff]

Come on people; own up, is this really true?

No. My friend has been pushin gmail and yahoo for years and has messed with the BIS many times and nothing has changed. Same with my gmail/yahoo no issues. Might just be a user issue.

[kerph32]

No. My friend has been pushin gmail and yahoo for years and has messed with the BIS many times and nothing has changed. Same with my gmail/yahoo no issues. Might just be a user issue.

I'm sure you didn't mean this the way it came off.. but I can assure you that it's definitely no user issue. To say that I troubleshooted this issue would be like saying that the Pope prays a little bit

[CappinHoff]

I'm sure you didn't mean this the way it came off.. but I can assure you that it's definitely no user issue. To say that I troubleshooted this issue would be like saying that the Pope prays a little bit

That's the way I meant it. Most issues relating to any electronic device is user related. This is another one. If it's not broken why mess with it. Others don't have this issue.

P.S. not trying to be the bad guy

[kerph32]

That's the way I meant it. Most issues relating to any electronic device is user related. This is another one. If it's not broken why mess with it. Others don't have this issue.

P.S. not trying to be the bad guy

Your tone sounded a bit bad-guyish... but no worries.

This is no user issue, can't be more clear than that. An AT&T rep admitted it to me, and I have read many posts around (I've been a member of BBF for a long time but wanted to share the 'news' here) complaining of the lack of real push for accounts that formerly featured real push.

You must have taken my 'messing around' with BIS to mean that I somehow 'turned off' push - rather, I was just changing my signature and Name fields, but the activity seemed to wake up the beast and initiate the new polling policy.

[Eric_V]

Your tone sounded a bit bad-guyish...

It's the internet and just text...no tones.

My e-mails are getting pushed and no problems here.