Phone help

[JP3]

I have a samsung epic 4g on sprint. approximately 8 days ago I notice I was roaming in areas where I never roamed before so I chalked it up to a one time event . Well ever since then I have been roaming more than not....I work about 30 mines from home at home it is intermittent between normal and roaming. At work it is non stop roaming with periods of no data service at all, no phone at all or both.. My wife called a few days ago 4 time and went right to v/m.
I call sprint and the do the routine..power off remove bat for 2 min. and power back up which sometimes works for a limited time period but then back to the recent norm ..nothing...they tell me a tower is down and s/b up first 7/30 now 8/3.. Is this normal practice Ihave never experienced.. i know the are taking down some towers for conversion from nextel but should this be??? IS there any tests I can do??? or are they just f`ing with me.

thanx