What would make a cell phone suddenly stop sending and recieving text messages?

My phone lost this capability while I was at the Jersey shore. When I got home, the capability came back. I assume it had something to do with coverage issues and my settings on the phone.

I’m in my home area but they send updates from time to time (maybe every 2 months) to keep up with network changes so the phone will stay on. There’s no roaming with ST but since it is on the Verison towers it should work pretty much everywhere…as long as the user dials the prompted updates and they reset the phone from their end. I don’t know how they do this, I don’t want to know. But it works somehow. I get 1000 mins and 1000 texts each month plus data and its alot more than I need. I had a Tracfone that stopped working when I traveled out of state once but that was many years ago. Hard to believe they still work that way now. Tracfone and Straight Talk are basically the same company because when I turn on my phone I get the Tracfone logo on the welcome display. I have read a couple negative reviews from people sending their bad phone in and they lost it somehow and they got frustrated and just re bought another because they got tired of waiting for theirs to come back. This is what concerns me.

It happened to my phone about 6 months ago. I couldn’t text, and then I lost the ability to receive calls as well. That was the tipping point. Had to get a new phone. Who knows why certain technologies fail? Defects? The good thing is with a warranty or servvice plan, I got a new refurbished phone for free.

I wonder about those refurbished phones. The phone I have now was bought new, so I should get a new one to replace it. But that is just my thinking, probably not Samsung’s. I got spoiled with my last phone. It was a Nokia that gave me no problems for almost 7 years. I guess I was just lucky and getting dud phones is just a fact of life now.