Unable to use T-Mobile Home Internet with work VPN, any suggestions?

Let me first say that I’ve been a T-Mobile fan boy ever since I signed up.  

When I first got TMHI, it worked like a champ.  My wife logs into PaloAlto GlobalProtect everyday. Worked.  Worked better than my previous fiber connection which seemed to need too many reboots to work, which is why I moved to unwired internet.

Then out of the blue, VPN stopped working, but EVERYTHING else still worked.  Naturally, I thought it was the VPN issue. Called into TM support, and was told it was an issue between GlobalProtect and TMobile and that they were working on it with no ETA.

I started Googling the issue and found that there were numerous complaints about the same problem in this community. I tried everything that has been suggested with little success.  The most success I had was yesterday.  I decided to factory reset my Sagemcom. When it got to the part when the app asked me to update, I closed the app.  I checked the connection to the VPN and to my surprise, everything worked.  Outlook, TEAMS, the internet, and everything else my wife logs into. It worked for about 4 hours.  Unfortunately for me, I had posted on another thread about what I did to get it to work and what I thought about TMobile's culpability about it.

After about 3 hours after I posted about it on the other thread, the troubles started again. Not only with the gateway, but my Linksys mesh network connected to it, which was a first. It's possible that my Linksys issue is a coincidence.

So, I've got opinions. LOL. First, I think it's pretty repugnant that TMobile would let us sway in the wind like this.  They have known that the update they pushed to our gateways caused the VPN connection issue. I suspect it's gotta be a business decision.  They probably didn't foresee how many users were going to use their service to connect to their work VPN servers.  There must be a great amount of data that is being used. If it was the VPN companies issue, why was I able to login to their network and use it flawlessly for so long? When I did start having trouble, there was a message on the gateway stating that there was a problem and to reboot? Also, I imagine that a T-Mobile moderator cruises these threads and I may have opened myself up to a targeted whatever you wanna call it. Again, I could be reaching.

Anyway, I'm very disappointed in how TMobile has dealt with this. I don't like being lied to. If they had any intention to fixing the issue, they would have pushed a firmware patch weeks ago. I do not buy the "we didn't know" or "we just found out and we're trying to fix it" pitch. 

Good luck to the rest of you.  I moving on to a different provider. 

sterlinglp wrote:

I'm glad I found this thread. As of the same date everyone here is having issues, I am as well.

I use these under a business account for multiple locations and I currently have 3 deployed.

As of the same date of you issues, end of January 2024, two of the lines started having problems. VPN does not work to connect to critical cable systems I need to maintain, and one line is throttled to 0.01mbps with low usage, and I've tried the SIM in enterprise cell modems and other tmo boxes, same throttling.

So since late Jan 2024, lines are being throttled with low usage for no reason and OVPN, Wireguard, and oither VPNs no longer work.

Also issues with streaming services for no reason.

I guess I'm switching away. I wondered if $55/month unlimited on a cell network was too good to be true. I liked how it was impervious to utility and power failures with a battery backup but I'll have to use other carriers with an enterprise modem instead.

Go ahead and call in to repair and have them do a reset on your account.  So far, so good, but it's only been an hour. Hah. I hope others see this thread also.  It's been a tough month.

Rogueplayer wrote:

sterlinglp wrote:

I'm glad I found this thread. As of the same date everyone here is having issues, I am as well.

I use these under a business account for multiple locations and I currently have 3 deployed.

As of the same date of you issues, end of January 2024, two of the lines started having problems. VPN does not work to connect to critical cable systems I need to maintain, and one line is throttled to 0.01mbps with low usage, and I've tried the SIM in enterprise cell modems and other tmo boxes, same throttling.

So since late Jan 2024, lines are being throttled with low usage for no reason and OVPN, Wireguard, and oither VPNs no longer work.

Also issues with streaming services for no reason.

I guess I'm switching away. I wondered if $55/month unlimited on a cell network was too good to be true. I liked how it was impervious to utility and power failures with a battery backup but I'll have to use other carriers with an enterprise modem instead.

Go ahead and call in to repair and have them do a reset on your account.  So far, so good, but it's only been an hour. Hah. I hope others see this thread also.  It's been a tough month.

What exactly does an “account reset” do? LOL

Sorry. I knew that was going to sound funky. Basically a refresh on your line, port, whatever it is that makes your line "your" line. I'm not hip on the IT lingo. I'm old school POTS guy. LOL.

Rogueplayer wrote:

Sorry. I knew that was going to sound funky. Basically a refresh on your line, port, whatever it is that makes your line "your" line. I'm not hip on the IT lingo. I'm old school POTS guy. LOL.

I'm an old school POTS guy turned digital. I do it all.

I need to call them anyway to waive activation fees of their modems that don’t even work and lines I cancelled but got charged for anyway.

I figured a few calls would probably get things working again. But I have to ask myself, at what cost of my time?

I'm happy to report that all is good now.  I only wish T had sent a blanket email out the very minute they fixed it instead of letting us have to figure it all out for ourselves. It would have saved a lot of aggravation.

Carry on. LOL.

Rogueplayer wrote:

I'm happy to report that all is good now.  I only wish T had sent a blanket email out the very minute they fixed it instead of letting us have to figure it all out for ourselves. It would have saved a lot of aggravation.

Carry on. LOL.

I still haven't had time to call them. Hopeing for good things

 

RemoteAwesomeness wrote:

I just spoke with Louis at support - there seems to have been an update pushed out on 2/27/2024 (he couldn't confirm), and all I had to do is reset my modem/router and I am able to use my VPN again. I have AT&T Global Network Client VPN and the Sagemcom model modem/router.

Hopefully this saves others some agravation.

One of my problems isn't device specific. With the SIM in other modems and phones one of the lines is still throttled to 0.01mbps both up and down.

I’ll report back when I finally do have time to call.

sterlinglp wrote:

Rogueplayer wrote:

I'm happy to report that all is good now.  I only wish T had sent a blanket email out the very minute they fixed it instead of letting us have to figure it all out for ourselves. It would have saved a lot of aggravation.

Carry on. LOL.

I still haven't had time to call them. Hopeing for good things

 

RemoteAwesomeness wrote:

I just spoke with Louis at support - there seems to have been an update pushed out on 2/27/2024 (he couldn't confirm), and all I had to do is reset my modem/router and I am able to use my VPN again. I have AT&T Global Network Client VPN and the Sagemcom model modem/router.

Hopefully this saves others some agravation.

One of my problems isn't device specific. With the SIM in other modems and phones one of the lines is still throttled to 0.01mbps both up and down.

I’ll report back when I finally do have time to call.

TLDR; The guy that actually knew his stuff said there are know issues with specifically the Sagemcom unit and VPN usage. I still have yet to test his theory, but how others here have mentioned adding a double NAT router or changing your devices MTU make sense. So this seems to be isolated to the Sagemcom unit. You should be able to go to any store and request a newer (Nokia) or older unit, both other which do not have issues with VPN. You will be charged an activation when switching units, but should have luck calling into support for a credit. Note billing issues cannot be handled in the store and only over the phone or internet with overseas support.

15 minutes in, I’m on my 6th transfer to the same department that can’t handle business accounts.

So that’s 10 minutes listening to pop music on full blast.

7th transfer, got an English speaking rep in NC. But he can't help with business either. Told me the online account side of things for business had been royally messed up and they don't even have the resources to know how to contact the business center. I could tell he was really trying and did give me some useful information as to the numbers of the different lines, and what actually happened here.

So here’s what happened:

I have had a business account with T-Mobile for a long time. I had many lines on this account, all with the same exact service.

When I get the home internet units on this fully unlimited plan, I remove the SIM cards and use them in enterprise cellular modems (the ones used in military and law enforcement applications). They are used as a redundancy to VPN tunnels for voice and point of sale applications.

Whoever added the last line selected a different 100GB capped service - so that’s one issue solved.

Then he indicated there are issues with VPN and specifically the Sagemcom unit.

He warm transferred me to business billing. They then proceeded to give me access to an online business account as a master admin that wasn't even my company. LOL

TLDR because I’m tired of typing, what a joke, but after a hilarious and painful 90+ minute phone call, I myself was able to get things sorted out for T-Mobile.

sterlinglp wrote:

sterlinglp wrote:

Rogueplayer wrote:

I'm happy to report that all is good now.  I only wish T had sent a blanket email out the very minute they fixed it instead of letting us have to figure it all out for ourselves. It would have saved a lot of aggravation.

Carry on. LOL.

I still haven't had time to call them. Hopeing for good things

 

RemoteAwesomeness wrote:

I just spoke with Louis at support - there seems to have been an update pushed out on 2/27/2024 (he couldn't confirm), and all I had to do is reset my modem/router and I am able to use my VPN again. I have AT&T Global Network Client VPN and the Sagemcom model modem/router.

Hopefully this saves others some agravation.

One of my problems isn't device specific. With the SIM in other modems and phones one of the lines is still throttled to 0.01mbps both up and down.

I’ll report back when I finally do have time to call.

 

TLDR; The guy that actually knew his stuff said there are know issues with specifically the Sagemcom unit and VPN usage. I still have yet to test his theory, but how others here have mentioned adding a double NAT router or changing your devices MTU make sense. So this seems to be isolated to the Sagemcom unit. You should be able to go to any store and request a newer (Nokia) or older unit, both other which do not have issues with VPN. You will be charged an activation when switching units, but should have luck calling into support for a credit. Note billing issues cannot be handled in the store and only over the phone or internet with overseas support.

 

 

15 minutes in, I’m on my 6th transfer to the same department that can’t handle business accounts.

 

So that’s 10 minutes listening to pop music on full blast.

 

7th transfer, got an English speaking rep in NC. But he can't help with business either. Told me the online account side of things for business had been royally messed up and they don't even have the resources to know how to contact the business center. I could tell he was really trying and did give me some useful information as to the numbers of the different lines, and what actually happened here.

 

So here’s what happened:

I have had a business account with T-Mobile for a long time. I had many lines on this account, all with the same exact service.

When I get the home internet units on this fully unlimited plan, I remove the SIM cards and use them in enterprise cellular modems (the ones used in military and law enforcement applications). They are used as a redundancy to VPN tunnels for voice and point of sale applications.

 

Whoever added the last line selected a different 100GB capped service - so that’s one issue solved.

 

Then he indicated there are issues with VPN and specifically the Sagemcom unit.

 

He warm transferred me to business billing. They then proceeded to give me access to an online business account as a master admin that wasn't even my company. LOL

 

TLDR because I’m tired of typing, what a joke, but after a hilarious and painful 90+ minute phone call, I myself was able to get things sorted out for T-Mobile.

Also, I was able to finesse a nice $130 credit. I figured that was fair for the time I have wasted with them on the phone.

Hello - First, thank you to all who have posted and tried to resolve this.  I am happy to say that changing to the TMO-G4SE 5G Gateway Wht Kit resolved my issues entirely.