I want to buy dh an i-phone but don't want 02 does unlocking work?

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I googled i-phone unlocking and sure enough there are people offering this service and also on ebay. DH really wants one and I can just about afford to buy one, but he has 12 months left on his existing contract with Vodaphone. If I bought one and had it unlocked he could use his existing sim card.

However they are expensive and I don't know if the unlocking facility actually works. I also don't know if you can just buy the phone without taking out a contract.

Do any of you lovely folks know?

i-[hone only available with 02 - however the bbs news were showing that it was being unlocked the very evening it was launched so it must be possible - was told that they come unllocked in france

is this true?

dunno

I'm pretty sure you can only buy it with a 2-year O2 contract.

Standard unlocking isn't possible, but a hack did come out for the US iPhone. I think it was a fairly heavy-duty techie hack, though, rather than a "type in a couple of numbers and Bob's your uncle" type. And I don't know whether it works on the UK version.

I know I'm sounding naive here, but the ebay listing does say that it's simple. However it's no use if they won't sell the phone without a contract.

I have one, you can unlock them but bear in mind any software updates could cause a problem with your iPhone in future. And it is a software hack of sorts. To be honest, I would recommend that you wait until your present contract expires - they may even come down in price like they did over here.

And for the record, over here the information for the cellular provided is hard coded into the phone - it's not a SIM card so I don't think this would help your husband at all. May be different in the UK. Phones over here in general don't have sim cards anymore.

Well i should say not SIM cards as you know it, which you lift out and and swap over. Reading online about this unlock, if you really want to get him one, see if you can source it from mainland Europe as they seem to be offering them unlocked and then you'd be sorted. Just be very very careful - better to use a true telecoms provider than EBay to be honest.

France they are unlocked as its illegal to sell a phone locked onto one provider there. BUt the phone itself is more expensive.

Can you not just buy it on the 18 month contract being offered and get his number transferred? then you have ticked all the boxes... keeps same number etc...

I HAD to move from my contract with T-mobile a few years ago, as i was moving to an area at the time with very very poor, if any, reception on t-mobile. they didnt even ask me where i was going, and released me from the contract. i was very apologetic with them and said i didn't want to move etc... you could try the same?

oh, and DH's head office has just had a similar thing when they moved office. absolutely NO vodaphone reception at all, and all the office mobiles were on VP. they also had to release their contracts since they could not provide them with the service.

Thanks you ladies, I did pop into the Apple Store today and sure enough there was a sign by the i-phones about unlocking. Basically it said that it would invalidate the phone and software updates would cause problems. So that frightened me off.

Susiecmp - it's worth a go, I know DH has already spoken to Vodaphone about terminating his contract and it will cost £300. However we genuinely don't get a signal at home, so it may be worth going for that route.