XM and the 396

You can call XM and have it re-activated over the phone.

What if you're not near a phone when you discover that you need it and
it's not there? Or if "due to unusual call volume, there will be a
slight delay before our highly trained service representatives can get
to your call."?
--
Nothing takes longer than a shortcut.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

In article ,
Jose wrote:
What if you're not near a phone when you discover that you need it and
it's not there? Or if "due to unusual call volume, there will be a
slight delay before our highly trained service representatives can get
to your call."?

Honestly, when is this ever going to be the case? The reasonable
assumption is that if you're going to go flying, you call and activate
it. If you know you aren't going to be flying for an extended period of
time (months), you deactivate it.

I believe that XM charges a $75 activation fee if you deactivate and
then re-activate, so you would have to determine your break-even point
based on the plan to which you subscribe.


JKG

"Jonathan Goodish" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Jose wrote:
What if you're not near a phone when you discover that you need it and
it's not there? Or if "due to unusual call volume, there will be a
slight delay before our highly trained service representatives can get
to your call."?

Honestly, when is this ever going to be the case? The reasonable
assumption is that if you're going to go flying, you call and activate
it. If you know you aren't going to be flying for an extended period of
time (months), you deactivate it.

I believe that XM charges a $75 activation fee if you deactivate and
then re-activate, so you would have to determine your break-even point
based on the plan to which you subscribe.



The issue isn't that they are turning it off to save you money. Your system
gets an "Account Active" packet from time to time from the satelite. XM has
no way of knowing if you received the packet so they can't stop charging
you.

There is really no way to know when your packet is going to come down the
stream. You might turn it on for a few minutes on Sunday night and then go
to the airport Monday morning and it not be working.

In article L_SCe.40379$DC2.8922@okepread01,
"Gig 601XL Builder" wr.giacona@coxDOTnet wrote:
Honestly, when is this ever going to be the case? The reasonable
assumption is that if you're going to go flying, you call and activate
it. If you know you aren't going to be flying for an extended period of
time (months), you deactivate it.

I believe that XM charges a $75 activation fee if you deactivate and
then re-activate, so you would have to determine your break-even point
based on the plan to which you subscribe.



The issue isn't that they are turning it off to save you money. Your system
gets an "Account Active" packet from time to time from the satelite. XM has
no way of knowing if you received the packet so they can't stop charging
you.

There is really no way to know when your packet is going to come down the
stream. You might turn it on for a few minutes on Sunday night and then go
to the airport Monday morning and it not be working.


My point is that if you know that you won't use the service for months,
why wouldn't you call to cancel it, and thus stop the monthly charges?
I never said anything about XM "turning off" anything.

I believe the receiver activation issues that some folks were having
were caused by the receiver losing the activation code. My
understanding is that the activation code is only sent when requested
from XM;it is not an automatic transmission as you suggest. If your
receiver loses the code, it becomes "deactivated" and you must call or
use the web site to tell XM to re-send the activation code.


JKG

"Jonathan Goodish" wrote in message
...
In article L_SCe.40379$DC2.8922@okepread01,
"Gig 601XL Builder" wr.giacona@coxDOTnet wrote:
Honestly, when is this ever going to be the case? The reasonable
assumption is that if you're going to go flying, you call and activate
it. If you know you aren't going to be flying for an extended period
of
time (months), you deactivate it.

I believe that XM charges a $75 activation fee if you deactivate and
then re-activate, so you would have to determine your break-even point
based on the plan to which you subscribe.



The issue isn't that they are turning it off to save you money. Your
system
gets an "Account Active" packet from time to time from the satelite. XM
has
no way of knowing if you received the packet so they can't stop charging
you.

There is really no way to know when your packet is going to come down the
stream. You might turn it on for a few minutes on Sunday night and then
go
to the airport Monday morning and it not be working.


My point is that if you know that you won't use the service for months,
why wouldn't you call to cancel it, and thus stop the monthly charges?
I never said anything about XM "turning off" anything.

I believe the receiver activation issues that some folks were having
were caused by the receiver losing the activation code. My
understanding is that the activation code is only sent when requested
from XM;it is not an automatic transmission as you suggest. If your
receiver loses the code, it becomes "deactivated" and you must call or
use the web site to tell XM to re-send the activation code.



I agree with you that if you aren't going to use the system for an extended
period of time the thing to do is turn off the service.

But if you use the XM regularly it will get the packet and keep on ticking.
I'd be willing to bet that if those that do get shut off pulled the plane
out of the hanger and turned the XM on and then left for a week when they
came back the XM would be working. (If the battery hasn't died.) But pilots
aren't known for paitence and in this case we're right to expect it to be
working when we turn it on if we paid for it.

Thier system and that of the sat/tv industry is based on the system being in
standby (thus being able to get the packet) even when you aren't using it.
Right now the system is is biased towards them getting paid. It doesn't work
unless it got the last packet. They need to change that around for the
aviation product so it works for X days weeks or years unless it gets a
cancel packet.

What if you're not near a phone when you discover that you need it and
it's not there? Or if "due to unusual call volume, there will be a
slight delay before our highly trained service representatives can get
to your call."?


Honestly, when is this ever going to be the case? The reasonable
assumption is that if you're going to go flying, you call and activate
it.

No, the reasonable assumption is that if you're paying for the service,
the service will be available. So you want to go flying today, you turn
on the XM weather. No dice. So you call to activate (assuming there's
a phone nearby, which isn't always the case). "Due to unusual call
volume we won't be able to help you until next March".

Imagine if the phone system were like that? "Your records indicate that
you haven't made any calls to Toledo this month, so your phone service
has been deactivated. Please call to reactivate."

Jose
--
Nothing takes longer than a shortcut.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

A nickel is not a lot of money, but 20 million nickels is...

Think bandwidth. Think expensive satellite bandwidth.

I XM is interrogating the receivers on a periodic basis, it makes sense to
determine which receivers are not being used, and stop interrogating them.

This cuts bandwidth usage, and cuts costs.

(motion of hand shifting gears in an automobile)

When cable television first became available to me, I signed up for it,
along with HBO, the only movie package available at the time.

Then for several month, I would stay up until 3:00 or 4:00 every morning
watching HBO. I figured that since I was paying for it, I was going to get
as much use out of it as possible.

(motion of hand shifting gears in an automobile)

It would seem to me that if you are paying $29.95 or $49.95 per month for
satellite weather, you would want to turn it on at least once or twice a
month just to look at what you're paying for.

And then again, if you aren't using your satellite weather more than once
every couple of months, should you really be flying in conditions where you
would need satellite weather?





"Jose" wrote in message
...
What if you're not near a phone when you discover that you need it and
it's not there? Or if "due to unusual call volume, there will be a
slight delay before our highly trained service representatives can get
to your call."?


Honestly, when is this ever going to be the case? The reasonable
assumption is that if you're going to go flying, you call and activate
it.

No, the reasonable assumption is that if you're paying for the service,
the service will be available. So you want to go flying today, you turn
on the XM weather. No dice. So you call to activate (assuming there's
a phone nearby, which isn't always the case). "Due to unusual call
volume we won't be able to help you until next March".

Imagine if the phone system were like that? "Your records indicate that
you haven't made any calls to Toledo this month, so your phone service
has been deactivated. Please call to reactivate."

Jose
--
Nothing takes longer than a shortcut.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

This cuts bandwidth usage, and cuts costs.

It's my money they are "saving", and they are putting it into their
pocket. There's a word for that, it begins with a beverage and ends
with the sense of mass.

Jose
--
Nothing takes longer than a shortcut.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

In article ,
Jose wrote:
Honestly, when is this ever going to be the case? The reasonable
assumption is that if you're going to go flying, you call and activate
it.

No, the reasonable assumption is that if you're paying for the service,
the service will be available. So you want to go flying today, you turn
on the XM weather. No dice. So you call to activate (assuming there's
a phone nearby, which isn't always the case). "Due to unusual call
volume we won't be able to help you until next March".

XM WX is a subscription service, it isn't a pay-per-use service. Once
you have an active subscription, you are being billed for it on a
monthly basis whether you use it or not. That is the subject of my
statements.

The XM receiver activation issue is another one entirely. You can
reactivate the receiver over the phone or via the web if your receiver
loses activation, but that doesn't seem to be a big problem with newer
receivers.




JKG

"Jonathan Goodish" wrote

The XM receiver activation issue is another one entirely. You can
reactivate the receiver over the phone or via the web if your receiver
loses activation, but that doesn't seem to be a big problem with newer
receivers.

I think someone has gotten it right, now.

This is a discussion without any current data points; just conjecture.

The unit keeps its activation, if it -stays on-, or at least -powered-. It
doesn't need a new activation code, if it didn't lose it in the first place.

Everyone, do this. *Wait* to continue this discussion, when someone first
has a problem losing activation, that has power on it, continuously. Until
then, the argument is moot.
--
Jim in NC