Wonderful Apple Watch!

Yup. But if you do not own an Apple device and you just want to shop and see what they've got, you have to get an Apple ID to make an appointment to go in and browse. You might decide to never buy an Apple product, but if you wanna look you gotta have an ID (to make an appointment) at these stores that are so busy they are refusing access to "I just dropped in" customers.

It's insane. Here are all the Apple stores in Virginia:



Four clustered in Northern Virginia and one for the rest of the state. And on top of those 4 crowded together in NOVA, there are 3 right on top of them in downtown DC. I wonder when Apple might think about changing their model? The Verizon folks are not that conversant in the the details of everything they sell...that would be impossible. I don't know how thorough Best Buy is on this line.

 

This is insane. I resent having to go to extremes to give someone my money, or to get post-sales support.

 

So I was looking at the watch settings and noticed that WiFi was on to get settings from he phone, but the cell communication was turned off. I turn it on, and it says I don't have a cell plan!!! The Verizon guy specifically changed my existing plan so I could have this as a shared device for $5/month instead of $10.

I hate this stuff. Guess I'm be going to the store tomorrow. I hope this watch has LTE in it...

 

I know the plan changed because I keep getting emails as though I'm new to Verizon.

And I know the watch is set up for LTE because the email confirmation cited its phone number (even though it will be a Shared Device on my existing line.)

I hate this crap. Last time I got a new phone they screwed up moving over the contacts. Most of them did not port over, and I happened to notice how short the list was when I got home. I drove rights back and they finished, but the ones that had been left behind got set up to backup to the phone and not to the gmail account...and there's no way to change that setting. You gotta delete the record and recreate it. So when I was in there getting the iPhone I told the guy about it. He said "We'll use a program to move the data over." He hands me the new phone and it only has 20 contacts on it. I tell him there's a lot missing and he runs another program. This time it moved 209 contacts. Good thing I looked...they didn't even after I warned them. *sigh*

So I look at my account online and it shows a pic of my new phone, pics of the internet devices I have, and another device with another phone number but it does not say what the device it. I use the Watch App on the phone and it says the watch is already set up with a stand alone account, and not a shared one...but the watch says that there is no plan at all. The App tells me to keep the stand alone or to set it up as shared...for $10/month. But the guy changed my contract specifically to get it at $5/month!

I hate this crap. Back to the store tomorrow.

 

Try unpairing the watch and pairing it again. I remember when I got my last watch, there was some issue where it didn’t show up properly, but i don’t remember what fixed it.
Restarting everything sometimes helps.
Also, you might just go to that support link for Apple and do the chat with them. It might be something they can tell you that needs to be done, ad then you can avoid the trip back to Verizon.
Robin actually changed all of ours from Verizon to T-Mobile about a year or so ago. They have good coverage, good service, and a special rate for veterans. It also included free Netflix, if you are interested in that.

 

I started off with T-Mobile many years ago and went with Verizon because every time I left my immediate area I would not have service. And until I get fiber internet here, I'm stuck with Verizon wireless internet.

I'm gonna call Verizon tomorrow and pick apart the paperwork line-by-line. The Watch App on the phone gives me the option to keep the stand-alone or change to Shared, but I want to make sure I did not get charged for setting up that new line when I did not want it in the first place. And I want to go through the costs of the devices. The amount of credit I was supposed to get for my old phone kept changing from $200 to $300. Looking at the final price, I wonder if any credit got applied at all...Apple ain't cheap. I just hope I get a domestic rep.

 

@John Brunner, I don't have an Apple Watch but I have owned and do own several Apple devices. The nearest Apple Store is a couple of hundred miles or more from me, and every time I have made the trip, they were most unhelpful. Not only that, but they didn't even seem to be trying to be helpful.

However, their telephone tech support is excellent. Have you tried calling them? You won't have to wait on the phone, as they will call you back when someone is available. Unlike pretty much everything else I have ever bought, Apple's phone tech support is very good. On the one occasion when they were unable to solve a problem over the phone, they gave me an address where I could ship it to be fixed, which doesn't seem to be the case when I have brought anything to the Apple Store. It sounds like yours is a problem that could probably be solved over the phone.

 

That's good to know I'm not missing much for not making a trip to the store. I think that the issue is 99% likely one of the watch not having its cell account activated via the app on the phone. I don't want to "just try it" because there are lots of things that don't make sense to me, mostly the number that got added to my Verizon account that looks like a separately invoiced device (the watch is supposed to Share my phone number) that does not match the documented phone number for the watch. I think I need to have that account deleted, and I need to walk though the costs of this stuff.

I cannot believe a phone still costs $700 after a $300 trade-in allowance. And there's the issue of the Shared Device costs in my account still showing as $10 when the guy switched plans solely so I could get it for $5. Now I want to know why the plan got switched and what the differences really are. Did I gain? Did I lose?

I'm gonna call GoWireless (the Verizon agent) tomorrow. If I need Apple help, I'll follow your advice and go directly to Apple phone support. The folks at this GoWireless store have been very knowledgeable and helpful on my Android devices, but they are not conversant on how to use this watch. I was in edit mode on one watch feature and could not figure out how to change the setting, and the GoWireless woman told me to change it through the phone app. I got home and played with it, and discovered that the setting can only be changed on the phone, and I figured out how to do it. I guess no one can know everything.

As I type this, I'm smiling because I was in the telecommunications industry nearly 40 years ago. And telecom businesses all had these exact issues...the actual plans never matched what the sales guys and marketing said. Never! It damaged a lot of companies when customers refused to pay invoices that no one could reconcile to anything that was sold or consumed. The dust never fully settles...

 

We have had Verizon for a number of years, too, and everyone thought that they had the best coverage; but T-Mobile has improved so much that most of my family has switched over.
Even without the military discount, my son says he is paying about half of what he was paying for Verizon, and has coverage that is at least as good. Both he and my daughter travel for their jobs, so having good coverage is important to both of them.

 

I just took a look at their coverage map. It looks pretty good around me. I wonder how I can find out if they piggy-back off of existing cell towers. Then I would know I'm on the exact same communication infrastructure that gives me a great signal here on my property.

 

I just spent over 3 hours at the local Verizon store. The guy re-paired the watch to the phone and made a change to the plan, so the watch is now working as a stand-alone phone, but we could not get it to send or receive text messages. He called top-tier Verizon tech support and I was with them for most of those 3 hours trying to work through this (the store guy handed my his phone to work with them as he helped other customers.) The watch still does not send or receive text messages...they're gonna replace it.

One interesting-yet-weird thing about this...even though the watch has its own SIMS card to communicate directly to the cell tower (and not through the phone), in order for the watch to send and receive texts, the phone has to be turned on and receiving a cell signal. Now, the phone does not need to be in proximity to the watch (that would defeat the reason for getting the watch tied to a cell account), but it needs to be turned on. So when I leave the house, as long as my phone is sitting on my dresser turned on and seeing a cell signal, I can be anywhere in the country with my watch and send/receive text messages. If the phone is turned off (or does not have a signal) I can still make voice calls with the watch wherever I am, but the texting function will not work. That was one of the "Watch Cannot Send/Receive Texts" troubleshooting steps..."Is the phone turned on regardless of where it happens to be?" Ain't that weird??? But at least it validates that the watch actually has stand-alone texting functionality.

I hope replacing the watch fixes this. I think we got to the "when all else fails..." point. I'll know Friday. At first I was leaning towards blaming the watch but now I'm not so certain.

I did get all the other account stuff cleared up. The $350 "switch to Apple" credit for my old Motorola phone finally got processed. What a deal! I got this mainly to have as my "I've fallen down and can't get back up" device. Compared to the monitoring fees for a "Life Alert" type of system, I'll save enough to pay for the watch in a year, then pay for the phone over the next year, and then forever pocket $25 every month after paying the monthly Verizon fee that makes my watch a stand-alone cell phone...all with this extra functionality.

 

My replacement watch arrived late yesterday afternoon, so I was the store first thing this morning. As goofy as it sounds, the replacement watch fixed the text messaging issue I had! I am still somewhat surprised, unless there was a firmware issue with the original watch.

I still find the whole thing to be baffling. I went on line and confirmed that the paired iPhone must be powered up and on the air anywhere in the world (cell signal or WiFi) in order for SMS Texting to work on the Apple Watch. Now I'm glad I did not opt for buying used with the intent of using the iPhone solely to manage the watch settings (but not have a cell account on it.) If I had gone that route, I would not be able to send/receive standard texts on my watch.

So far I really love this watch. The functionality is insane! And I now have an equivalent Life Alert system on my wrist all day...plus I can go work outside and leave my phone in the house. I should get my screen protection devices tomorrow. I bought the regular film cover, plus these two styles of plastic protectors: