Advice on getting a phone with work email access

Hi, my work have told me that I have to get a new Blackberry or Windows phone as it is mandatory in the company that have acquired us for portfolio directors to have email access 24/7. In London the IT department buys and secures the contracts for everyone but over here they cannot support me.

Thing is, I don't have the first flipping clue what on earth I have to do. The IT department striongly recommended that I get a FLEXT 75 contract with T-mobile and a T-Mobile MDA Vario III

The Flext 75 plan does seem good

• FREE T-Mobile MDA Vario III
• £390 worth of calls and texts each month - that's 1950 mins or 3900 texts or use it up how you want
• All for just £70 per month

Now T-mobile in Germany does have the phone

But their plans just look like gobbledigook to me. They have already missold a Blackberry to me (and refused to refund it because I lost the receipt) and I really do not want to get into a similar wrangle with them.

Does anyone have any advice? Anyone else have to link a blackberry or MDA to a British server?

pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeze help me

bump

kind of need to get this sorted v soon

does nobody on here have any insight that could help?

Don't lose the receipt next time.

I'm not too hot on the techy bits, but I'm using the company blackberry over here and it's a uk model on a uk contract connecting seamlessly to the corporate email server sitting, I think, in some windowless room in London's Docklands. The IT admins set it all up for me and it came ready to use. So, maybe you can try to convince your company that, seeing as they are the ones forcing a corporate pda on you, they should be the ones to sort one out for you too, but that, helpfully, you should be able to use the standard set-up used in London?

yep, I've learned that lesson. I took it back the next day though and spoke to the person who'd sold it to me and a new contract and she remembered me but said that it was my own fault for not being an expert oin Blackberries and that without a receipt I'd have to keep this useless Blackberry as my personal phone for the next two years.

is that not inordinately costly? I mean wouldn't it be better to get a German contract?

There's a thread about somebody getting a rather large bill for roaming charges somewhere. Careful on that one.

The whole of the data over internet charging seems a ripoff. The European Union did a fair job on the cost of calls but the data is still all over the place.

No idea. That question gets filed in the big blue box labelled "Not my problem". The finance department haven't put a contract out on me yet, so I guess it's still within the bounds of reasonableness.

I did a trip to the US and then Scotland and mine was stupidly large. Blackberry on Germany Vodaphone contract but used it as a modem. I won't be doing that again...

The Flext 75 package seems very good value. T-mobile are offering that in the UK but over here all the packages seem to charge you through the nose on a per minute basis.

Just look at the data caps on any plans basically. The fact that the mail server is in the UK is neither here nor there.

Well if the company is mandating it, and paying for it then I'd go with the new blackberry 9000 or 9500 (IPhone Looking)

The new blackberry's are a while off being available in Germany though aren't they?

I'm sooo wanting a bold or thunder. Already started negotiations with my boss...

actually we have just worked that out. Me translating the German and my head of IT interpretting the technical meaning from that. there is a 'Datenoption" called Sidekick Data that you can add for €15 that will give unlimited download volume. Anyone out there using that with web'n'walk?

blast Sidekick can only be used on Sidekick devices

back to the drawing board

Does it have to be T-Mobile? How about Vodafone or O2?

O2 offer one tariff that has 5GB data transfer included: http://shop2.o2online.de/nw/produkte/tarif...wegs/index.html


Vodafone have a data tariff with unlimited data transfer: http://www.vodafone.de/privat/tarife-flatr...ent/105307.html
Tariff Flat or FlatPlus.

just in case anyone is in a similar predicament, this is the option we have gone for:

Device: T-mobile MDA Vario III

Tarrif: Max S (free landline calls in germany, 0.29 pm mobiles in Germany, 0.58 calls within EU)

Add on: web'n'walk 300M - allows 300MB downloads per month which should be enough for my email

monthly tarrif comes to €45 per month and the device will cost about €200