Cingular Helping Consumers

Cingular Wireless realizes the important role wireless communication plays in emergency situations, such as snow and ice storms, and offers the following tips to help consumers prepare:

- Program all emergency contact numbers into your wireless phone. Store
numbers for the police department, fire station, hospital, as well as
your family members so you don't have to think about it during and
after an emergency.

- Have a family communications plan in place. Designate someone out of
the area as a central contact, and make certain all family members know

who to contact if they become separated.

- Keep your wireless phone batteries charged at all times. Use your car
charger to charge your wireless phone when power is out, or pick up a
disposable battery that will give you an hour of talk time without any
charging.

- Keep your wireless phone dry and protected. The biggest threat is water

damage so keep your equipment safe from the elements by storing it in a

plastic sandwich or freezer bag.

- Try text messaging, or SMS (Short Messaging Service). Most wireless
phones today are text messaging capable, and often times during an
emergency situation text messages will go through quicker than voice
calls. More importantly, using text messaging helps free up the voice
lines for emergency officials.

- Keep non-emergency calls to a minimum. Remember to limit your calls to
the most important ones. Chances are that if there is severe weather,
many people will be attempting to place wireless calls to loved ones,
friends and business associates. If the landline phones are not
working, this probability increases.

- Wait 10 seconds before redialing a call. On many wireless phones, to
redial a number, you simply push "send" after you've ended a call to
redial the previous number. If you do this too quickly, the data from
the phone to the cell sites does not have enough time to clear before
you've resent the same data and may contribute to network congestion.

- Use your wireless phone to access weather information. Many homes lose
power during severe weather. If you have a wireless phone that provides

access to the Internet, you can watch the Weather Channel and its new
Severe Weather Mode service through our Mobi-TV service or though My-
Cast Weather.

- If you have a camera phone, take, store and send photos of damaged
property to your insurance company from your device - Cingular.