Help with mobile phone please

[ohnoherewego]

My DD is going on her first residential trip on Friday. She doesn't have a phone so I thought I would set up an old one of mine for her. I bought a new sim card but when I switched the phone on it says the phone is restricted and to enter the restriction code. Does anyone know why and is there a way round it? TIA

bump

The phone is probably locked to one network (eg Orange) and you've got a SIM for another.

If your phone has a network logo on, that would help identify which SIM to get.

At some point in future, if you happen to buy her a mobile, you could try Asda Living as they have 'unlocked' phones (not tied to one network) as well as phones for O2, Vodafone, T-Mob, and Orange. The unlocked models are a bit more expensive (maybe 5 to 15 quid) but in Carphone Warehouse you might find they're 50 quid more than one locked to a network. (Though Asda / Asda Living get their shelves filled by some other company so don't have as wide a variety of phone makes / models, unfortunately.)

A T-Mobile phone can usually allow a Virgin Mobile SIM to work. A Vodafone phone will accept an Asda mobile SIM (and PAYG is pretty cheap at 8p/min to mobiles or landlines and 4p per text), so if your existing phone is on Voda network, and Asda PAYG SIM would work fine.

Thanks networkguy. It's an orange phone and I bought a vodafone sim. I'll try and get an orange sim.