Data services on China Mobile in Shanghai... Android Wifi tethering, VPN service etc.

I'm in Shanghai for the summer.  I've been using China Mobile for my cell.  I switched out my T-Mobile SIM card and put in an China Mobile M-Zone SIM card that I bought a couple years ago in Beijing.  I talked to someone at the 10086 help line and they confirmed that even though I bought my card in Beijing, the data plan worked the same wherever I was in China.  In other words, the 500mb I signed up for was 500mb, wherever I was in China. 

One general observation I have re data services on China Mobile is that they are much, much better in downtown Shanghai than in the suburbs.  When I am downtown, which is probably where most people reading this will spend most of their time, the data speeds are comparable with what I get when I am in LA, even though I think here I am limited to 2G, whereas in LA I have T-Mobile's '4G' service.  When I am out here in the distant suburbs, however, things are much spottier.  My phone signal is strong, as it is everywhere in China, but the data speeds are much, much lower than downtown, and data is much more prone to interruption. 

At least for the time being, my China Mobile data service supports the VPN I have configured my Android phone for. Downtown, the VPN connections tend to be rock solid.  Out here in the suburbs, however, the VPN connection tends to be much less robust.  The connection often drops after only a few minutes.  Sometimes I can't connect at all.  Given that VPN works pretty reliably downtown, I suspect this has more to do with the poor quality of the local data services than anything else.

I am pleased to report that I am able to use WiFi tethering with my Android phone with China Mobile data services, at least for short periods of time.  I wasn't sure how well that would work since I thought not all carriers were too happy about tethering.  Again, this generally seems to work much better when I am downtown than when I am out here in the suburbs.  Out here in the suburbs, the connection via WiFi tethering is pretty slow, and unstable.  Sometimes the connection drops and the phone loses data services completely.  So I really can't really use the WiFi tethering as anything more than an emergency backup when my residential DSL is flaking out.  At one point this morning I actually had a VPN connection running on the machine that was tethered to the phone, but that didn't last very long.

A few notes re data plans on China Mobile, at least with M-Zone.  One is that you manage them via SMS messages to the China Mobile service number, 10086.  I have never found a comprehensive list of the commands that you can issue via SMS, but here are some important ones.  At least if you have service through Beijing China Mobile, you can initiate a data plan by texting a message of the form KTSJLLxx where xx is a number to 10086.  I think KTSJLL stands for 开通数据流两.  To get a 500 Mb/month service costing 50 rmb/month, for example, you would text KTSJLL50.  I think, though I haven't confirmed it, that KTSJLL100 gets you 2gb/month for 100 RMB, and KTSJLL200 gets you 5gb/month for 200RMB.  According to this page, there are different commands if you are signed up through Shanghai China Mobile, or somewhere else.  At least if you have Beijing China Mobile service, to check your data usage for the month, text CXQTC to 10086.  You're only allowed to check your data usage three times a day.  It may be a different command if you have service through Shanghai China Mobile. 

One thing to note is that any data plan you sign up for on China Mobile starts at the beginning of the following month, so if you send the command to initiate in the middle of the month, you will still be paying by the byte until the end of the month, which may drain your account pretty quickly if you have background data turned on.  My Android phone is a data pig if I have background data turned on, so I used up a lot of money on data charges at the end of June before the plan I signed up for kicked in on July 1.  Unfortunately I only signed up for 500Mb/month, and since I realized I was burning through that pretty quickly when I was out and about the town, I have learned to turn off background data when I am out unless I really need it.  I wish I had spent the money and signed up for the 2gb or better yet 5gb plan. 

Another handy SMS for 10086 is YE.  That returns the balance remaining on your prepaid account.

To cancel the plan, text QXSJLLxx to 10086, where xx is the amount of the plan you originally signed up for.  So for me to cancel my barely adequate 500mb/month plan that costs 50rmb/month, I would text QXSJLL50.

One thing I would like to add is that I am pretty impressed with China Mobile customer service via the 10086 number.  Every time something comes up and I need to talk to someone, I get through to a Chinese- or English-speaking representative pretty quickly.  And the people I talk to generally know what they're talking about.  This is a real change from the US, where talking to a human being requires being on hold for half an hour, only to find out that whoever you talk to is working from a script and can't function if there is any departure from the script and you have to wait half an hour while they bump you up to someone who knows what they are talking about.

One other observation I have is that whatever the rules are re showing ID to get a SIM card, they don't seem to be enforced very well.  I bought my M-Zone card a few years ago in Beijing at a shop and never showed any ID of any form to anyone.  I also bought a SIM card here in Shanghai without showing any ID.  However on that SIM card, when I turned on the data services, I did receive a text message saying that I should go to the local Service Center with my ID.  So maybe they only enforce an ID requirement for data services.