iPhone Activation Issues

[Hmac]

Don't you think a rational person would have realized this and made the proper precautions?

-markYes, I do... the proper precautions being waiting to try to activate the thing for a couple of days (or weeks). All this weeping and wailing and rending of garments could have been avoided.

[SPUY767]

Came back from jogging, checked mail, got my third "Thank you for your recent purchase" email:confused:

We are currently processing your order. Your order number is XXXXX
You will receive an additional e-mail when your order is complete that will provide further instructions to activate your iPhone.

I've gotten Four emails saying that exact thing. Three with the same activation number, one with a different number.

[swindmill]

I should clarify that I am an existing ATT customer so I am not sure of the process of getting porting from a different carrier.

the ICCID and IMEI number thing WAS done over the phone with me and I didnt hang up til I got the activation email. I had called like 20 times before so no way I trusted some outsourced customer service rep.

Hang in there guys, phone is great, worth it for me.

What number did you call? I'm a new customer, not porting a number, and I have received the "your activation takes additional time to complete" message. I called an ATT number listed above and they gave me my new #, but said it would be 12-24 hours before it would be activated.

[plumbingandtech]

Important Update!!!!!

As you may know my phone was "actvated" at 10am PST after waiting 15 hrs.

Well the iphone could do everything, sync play videos etc.. but i still got the no service message and could not make callls.


I am transfering from tmobile so after 6 hours of not "getting service"

I called 1-877-419-4500 and spoke to a nice lady.

I think my itunes step by step activation got stuck somewhere because I had to pick a plan again.

Then she asked for the IMEI # which is on the bottom of the iphone box.

THEN i had to pop out the sim and read her a 20 digit number.

after about 10 minutes I was able to get ATT service. (take that tmobile. i hvae more bars now then I did with you!)

so i can call out now.

She then called porting and they told me it would be about 6 more hours for my tmobile # to come over. Not a prob. for me.

I would say to those waiting for 20+ hours to do as I did. Also get a paper clip handy and your box handing since you will be need both.

hope this helps.

[Cadence]

I received this email:
Your current AT&T rate plan is not compatible with the iPhone.

They forced me to take on one of their current plans: 450 minutes etc. instead of being able to use my old AT&T plan (850 minutes for $39, weekends starting at 7pm, etc.)

It was a complete sham that current customers would be able to carry over their plan. I was apart of the old AT&T (before Cingular merge)...either way I've been a loyal customer for 4 yeras and I was still forced...

It's been a really really long process with this iphone, one I'm not sure has been worth it.

[paja]

My friend and I, who are both Windows user's thinking of switching, stood in line from 1:30PM to about 8:30PM on Friday. Very excited about Apple, Bootcamp, Leopard etc.

Have waited for activation for about 22 hours. Received one email. I am already a Cingular/AT&T customer simply adding the data plan for the iPhone. My old phone is now deactivated. I have no phone, period. I have no land line. Just had cell.

I am just a bit pissed off.

:mad:

[petsounds]

I've been on the phone with various departments of AT&T (and Apple) all day. Literally...about 6 hours today.

First of all, do not believe any support rep who tells you this is Apple's fault. It is not. The fault lies squarely at the feet of AT&T.

I got up high enough in AT&T's iPhone Activation Center hierarchy to be told, "We weren't prepared. The system is automated, but it is overloaded. We have had staff (at the aforementioned Indian call center) helping out with manual processing of activations."

At about 18 hours now, I've been told to expect activation within 7 more hours. They put an extra flag on my account to expediate processing, but I don't believe it will do any good. And only at the point of activation can the porting process from Verizon even begin. So don't believe any support rep who tells you there is a delay because you're porting your number. They don't know what they're talking about. Activation is completely separate process, and entirely internal to AT&T.

Anecdotally, when I called the Verizon port center today, a very peppery woman told me that AT&T has been experiencing outages in their port transfer system for a couple weeks now. Her tone did not appear scripted, but instead the result of many dealings with them.

I've been buying/using Apple products since 1986. This has been the worst "Apple Experience" I've ever had. I suggest that everyone involved in this fiasco let Apple know what you think of your experience. And that you ask for your pound of flesh in return for the inconvenience. Apple knows that AT&T not only dropped the ball, but kicked it into the sewer, and so they will more than likely go to bat for you.

[NeuronBasher]

So, I've gotten all the emails, including the one telling me I should now be able to make outgoing calls, but my wife's phone is saying "No Service" in the upper left corner where the signal strength should be. Has anyone else seen this?

AT&T swears that my phone should be activated and that my number porting from Verizon is completed, but the phone doesn't want to see the network. Apple tells me I need to keep waiting, but I'm about half convinced that they're only telling me that to keep me from returning it to the store for a replacement.

My other iPhone worked essentially instantly after I got the email telling me that I should be able to make outgoing calls, and the port of it's number from Verizon finished up this afternoon, so I'm at a loss.

Anyone else seeing the "No Service" in the corner?

[ahmedrah]

Has anyone had issues from having to switch from att blue to orange...then successfully activating this??

[aimfire]

Ok, long story short, I'm an existing ATT customer from the old "blue" days.

After 9 hours I finally received an email from ATT saying there was a problem and to call 877-800-3701. I did that and was told my old plan was incompatible, I needed to switch to the new plan. Told them fine, just do it.

Ok, so now my old phone/sim has been deactivated and I have no cell phones. Called back ATT... they checked my sim, told me my iPhone has been activated - but it's NOT! So they told me to call Apple, it's a "tech issue". I'm not buying that...

It's been 18 hours total for me.... no iphone activation yet.
I'm back on the line with ATT AGAIN and they are looking into it... on hold and she keeps coming on every few minutes, telling me she's STILL looking into it.... Ok, finally she is the first person with the sense to ask me for the IMEI number on the back of iphone.... now on hold again....

Ok, she's telling me the system shows my phone is activated, and that the phone should update with a few minutes up to 2 hours. She's trying to make a "test call" to my iphone now... Says everything is fine, but found *should* be activated in 2 hours max..... So time to cross my fingers and WAIT... again...

I cannot believe how F'ed up this situation is...

[avkills]

Jesus this process is ****ed. Since Apple in there infinite wisdom asked for an Apple ID when I went through the process, it decided to use that as the email for all this **** to send to. I don't have .Mac, so all those emails are going nowhere basically.

-mark

[eddiewouldcode]

I've been on the phone with various departments of AT&T (and Apple) all day. Literally...about 6 hours today.

First of all, do not believe any support rep who tells you this is Apple's fault. It is not. The fault lies squarely at the feet of AT&T.

I got up high enough in AT&T's iPhone Activation Center hierarchy to be told, "We weren't prepared. The system is automated, but it is overloaded. We have had staff (at the aforementioned Indian call center) helping out with manual processing of activations."

At about 18 hours now, I've been told to expect activation within 7 more hours. They put an extra flag on my account to expediate processing, but I don't believe it will do any good. And only at the point of activation can the porting process from Verizon even begin. So don't believe any support rep who tells you there is a delay because you're porting your number. They don't know what they're talking about. Activation is completely separate process, and entirely internal to AT&T.

Anecdotally, when I called the Verizon port center today, a very peppery woman told me that AT&T has been experiencing outages in their port transfer system for a couple weeks now. Her tone did not appear scripted, but instead the result of many dealings with them.

I've been buying/using Apple products since 1986. This has been the worst "Apple Experience" I've ever had. I suggest that everyone involved in this fiasco let Apple know what you think of your experience. And that you ask for your pound of flesh in return for the inconvenience. Apple knows that AT&T not only dropped the ball, but kicked it into the sewer, and so they will more than likely go to bat for you.


I think ATT should waive the $36 activation fee, seriously!!

[SPUY767]

I received this email:
Your current AT&T rate plan is not compatible with the iPhone.

They forced me to take on one of their current plans: 450 minutes etc. instead of being able to use my old AT&T plan (850 minutes for $39, weekends starting at 7pm, etc.)

It was a complete sham that current customers would be able to carry over their plan. I was apart of the old AT&T (before Cingular merge)...either way I've been a loyal customer for 4 yeras and I was still forced...

It's been a really really long process with this iphone, one I'm not sure has been worth it.

I've been a customer continually singe '91. at&t doesn't give a ****. I used to be able to push the guys at cingular around cause they respect custmer loyalty, but these at&t goons suck.

[SPUY767]

Jesus this process is ****ed. Since Apple in there infinite wisdom asked for an Apple ID when I went through the process, it decided to use that as the email for all this **** to send to. I don't have .Mac, so all those emails are going nowhere basically.

-mark

You whined about that yesterday. Maybe you should have signed up with a real e-mail address, or changed your apple account like I did before the iPhone was released.

[Zolk]

Just got off the phone with 877-777-4192. I was told to leave the iPhone connected and that I should receive a confirmation email within 30 minutes to 24 hours. Since my IMEI and ICCID are already in my account, it should happen "soon" supposedly.

[NIHMacAddict]

I'm just too tired... I've had my sake, am reasonably numbed to this extraordinarily painful process, and will now turn in and pray that I get the magic emails while I'm asleep (hours 25-33).

Good luck everyone.

[AtariAge]

Has anyone had issues from having to switch from att blue to orange...then successfully activating this??
You are not alone, I also had a blue account and when I called them earlier today they told me, "Oh, yeah, that account won't work, it's a good thing you called or this would have been delayed even further". Of course, that was at 11am and it's now 8:30pm and STILL NO activation. I just called the 877-800-3701 number again and spoke with someone who said that my account had been flagged because there was some issue with the data portion of my calling plan and that it was in the queue in the "Processing Department", whatever that is. And that it would take up to 8 hours for them to get to it (who knows if that is from now or from earlier today).

Absolutely freakin' ridiculous. I had been somewhat patient up to this point and now I'm getting livid. I get different answers every time I call up AT&T. It's ludicrous that they cannot activate these phones faster and I'm sick of the ********* that their systems are backed up. This is incompetence I have not witnessed on such a grand scale before. I'm about to the point where I'm going to create a website detailing how botched up this whole activation process is and make sure it gets heavily indexed in Google.

..Al

[toneloco2881]

Members over at everythingiPhone.com, alerted me to having great success in activating another sim card. Try and go to your local AT&T store and tell them you need another sim. Go through the same process in iTunes, and hopefully this time it will work. I'm just passing along the information, as this happened to me last night and I was ABSOLUTELY livid! Thankfully, my activation email came in a few hours but my friend wasn't as lucky. My friend went and picked up a new sim and he was activated in 5 minutes. Good luck!

[avkills]

You whined about that yesterday. Maybe you should have signed up with a real e-mail address, or changed your apple account like I did before the iPhone was released.

Well it was kind of tough to know there was a problem considering all of Apple's "new music Tuesdays" spams were coming to my proper email account just fine. Hindsight is 20-20 though, and yes I probably should have checked that.

AT&T has assured me that the email is just a confirmation and not critical, but I don't know if I believe them or anyone at this point.

-mark

[Jsimon9633]

What number did you call? I'm a new customer, not porting a number, and I have received the "your activation takes additional time to complete" message. I called an ATT number listed above and they gave me my new #, but said it would be 12-24 hours before it would be activated.

877 800 3701

THATS THE NUMBER I CALLED

THEY CAN MANUALLY DO IT, IF THEY DONT ITS CAUSE THEY ARE OUTSOURCED EMPLOYEES WHO ARE LAZY :)

[sdotbailey]

Members over at everythingiPhone.com, alerted me to having great success in activating another sim card. Try and go to your local AT&T store and tell them you need another sim. Go through the same process in iTunes, and hopefully this time it will work. I'm just passing along the information, as this happened to me last night and I was ABSOLUTELY livid! Thankfully, my activation email came in a few hours but my friend wasn't as lucky. My friend went and picked up a new sim and he was activated in 5 minutes. Good luck!

PLEASE!!! Was he porting or just activating as a new customer???? This would be so freaking helpful to me!!!

[SpyderFCS]

I have a lady on the phone that said she has activated my phone but now she is trying to figure out why when I connect it to my computer iTunes isn't seeing that it's activated. I think I need an e-mail with iTunes link but I'm not sure if she can send that or if Apple sends that....

[ichris2]

I've been on hold waiting to speak to someone for over 1 hour on the 877-800-3701 number...is that normal?

[avkills]

877 800 3701

THATS THE NUMBER I CALLED

THEY CAN MANUALLY DO IT, IF THEY DONT ITS CAUSE THEY ARE OUTSOURCED EMPLOYEES WHO ARE LAZY :)

Yes they are lazy and I had a woman laughing at one point. Apple needs to have an all afternoon ass whooping with the AT&T **** heads about the art of customer service.

-mark

[toneloco2881]

PLEASE!!! Was he porting or just activating as a new customer???? This would be so freaking helpful to me!!!
He was an existing customer, adding the iPhone to his line.

[sdotbailey]

He was an existing customer, adding the iPhone to his line.

Dammit. I have a new SIM card right here because I was told I needed a new this morning from the girl at customer service. I'm strongly considering just activating it as a brand new customer to get this thing working. I don't even care about porting my old number now.

[aimfire]

He was an existing customer, adding the iPhone to his line.

Thanks for that info... I'm gonna give it 1 more hour (for a total of 19 hours now) and if nothing... go to an ATT store and have them give me a new SIM so I can restart the whole process... this is BS

[sdotbailey]

I've been on hold waiting to speak to someone for over 1 hour on the 877-800-3701 number...is that normal?

I've coming up just over a half hour now. I think they're still getting killed out there.

[ichris2]

Anybody know how to restart the activation process?

[bios]

I'm porting, but just passed 24 hours since I activated. This is crazy!! Every time I call I get. "We think that yours should be activated soon."

This is madness :/

[fbx]

I went to the AT&T store where they didn't know anything. Guy made a call was taold activation might take 48 hours from now. I think they were just pick a number out of their a55.

I took teh SIM out of the iPhone and put it in my old phone (a SLVR L2) and it worked fined. Make and receive calls fine.

Does that mean that AT&T has done its part and Apple is the holdup? Since thenew iPhone AT&T SIM card worked fine in another phone, that's what I was thinking.

Meanwhile I've still go the "your activation requires additional time" message and no emails.

Can we sue yet?

[macridah]

I am porting my number and haven't received an email that my activiation is complete, but my sprint phone doesn't work at all. I also can't login to my sprint online account, but in my cingular web account and I could see the ported number as a new family talk line.

So I'm SOL until I receive that email. wtf. for the past 4-5 hours, no one can call my cell or I can't make any out going calls.

I thought that I could make calls from my iPhone and receive calls from my original phone for a few hours until the transaction is complete :confused:

[sdotbailey]

Anybody know how to restart the activation process?

If I ever get to a rep here I'm going to ask them to delete/cancel the process I have running now. It's ******** that we're still sitting here doing this. I was really patient up until about an hour ago. Now, I'm getting pissed.

[aimfire]

Here's my theory...

During the frenzy of activations last night, something went very wrong on ATT's end... they were just not at all prepared for this. Some activation attempts made during that time seem to have been lost in a black hole somewhere.... It's like a "luck of the draw" thing, which is why some people have had minimal problems while others - like me - have been waiting for over 18 hours with still nothing.

I don't know what the solution is... most of the phone reps have been completely incompetent and don't even seem to realize there is an issue with iphone activations. Like I said, I'll give it 1 more hour, then I'm headed to the ATT store and force them to do something... either a manual activation or a new SIM card.... whatever it takes.

And btw - my iphone sim works on my old RAZR phone ok.... which jsut adds even more confusion

[tranced25]

If I ever get to a rep here I'm going to ask them to delete/cancel the process I have running now. It's ******** that we're still sitting here doing this. I was really patient up until about an hour ago. Now, I'm getting pissed.

I've been pissed since I got home with a $600 machine that's as good as D.O.A.

I think it's completely busted that Steve won't let us at least play with the darn thing. Nice going, you smarty-pants. I hope you drop yours in the toilet, Steve.

[bios]

I'm porting, but just passed 24 hours since I activated. This is crazy!! Every time I call I get. "We think that yours should be activated soon."

This is madness :/



Oh.. I would also like to mention that I've been a Voicestream, T-Mobile customer with absolutely no issues for the last 10 years. This is the worst cell phone issue I've ever dealt with. I hope ATT isn't always like this. It might not be worth the iPhone.

[xckid87]

So if you bought the iphone from att, you get the check code and can input it on itunes when it asks. i bought from apple there is no code on the receipt how do i get it??

[SpyderFCS]

Ok...the lady I talked to for over an hour (45 minutes of that time I was on hold while she was doing stuff) was able to give me my Web Order #, my new phone number, and she said she fully activated the phone. She said I would be able to call the phone and it should ring but right now it just says, 'the mailbox you have called has not setup voicemail yet, goodbye.'

I'm hoping that she did everything on her end and now I just have to wait for the e-mail with the iTunes link to 'unlock' the phone via iTunes. I just hope it doesn't take forever to get the e-mail.

I think they are confused with this phone because of the whole 'unlocking it via iTunes' piece of the equation.

[swindmill]

So if you bought the iphone from att, you get the check code and can input it on itunes when it asks. i bought from apple there is no code on the receipt how do i get it??

The credit check is done during the activation in iTunes.

[brackle]

Ok...the lady I talked to for over an hour (45 minutes of that time I was on hold while she was doing stuff) was able to give me my Web Order #, my new phone number, and she said she fully activated the phone. She said I would be able to call the phone and it should ring but right now it just says, 'the mailbox you have called has not setup voicemail yet, goodbye.'

I'm hoping that she did everything on her end and now I just have to wait for the e-mail with the iTunes link to 'unlock' the phone via iTunes. I just hope it doesn't take forever to get the e-mail.

I think they are confused with this phone because of the whole 'unlocking it via iTunes' piece of the equation.

The unlocking issue is the entire problem here. It's not about porting numbers.

[xckid87]

The credit check is done during the activation in iTunes.

what do you mean? the activation will not let me finish until i enter a credit check code

[sdotbailey]

Like another user I also fell asleep for a couple hours to get my mind off of this. My roommates both got their phones up in minutes - one was an existing customer, the other activated it as a new customer. Combined time took about 10 minutes I think. I'm on hour 21

I'm on the phone with the 877.3701 (ohhh, I'm talking to Geoffrey in India)

Will update this post as the conversation as it proceeds...

Telling me the same thing as earlier - account is on hold because of the Visual Voicemail error that occurred last night.

Oh hold.

And now I got hung up on. Cool. (5:19 PM)

Calling back. Chose Option 3, entered Activation Code - "Need more information, will transfer" Waiting. "Your call for the next agent will be processed as soon as possible. Please continue to hold and your call be answered in the order it was received." Every 12 seconds.

(guy that disconnected me called back. Gave me a new number to call 800-331-0500)

Seriously considering cancelling the account that is in progress right now and signing up as a brand new customer. Roommate's great experience is making me consider.

5:49 now.

"Everything was so secret. We didn't get any information until you received your phone yesterday. We're learning as we go just like you."

Wow.

Another hour of my life wasted. Calling 800-694-7466

[phigment]

You guys I had the same issue for the last 20 Hours. I called and called and called, both AT&T's main number and the local att shop. Nobody could help me, everyone told me something different. Some of the excuses were:

Wait 2 hours
wait 4 hours,
wait 48 hours,
It'll be activated today at 9:30pm
we don't know what's wrong...
Be patient...

I was going insane playing with that emergency call slider... My friend that got his number ported from verizon and bought his AFTER me got his activated way sooner and I am a legacy AT&T customer. What Gives!!!!

Finally I called 877-800-3701 and got someone that kinda knew what she was talking about. She said mine was stuck because it orignally had an issue with the rate plan, it should have been fixed since I changed it...but it was still stuck. She told me she would cancel the entire thing, I'd have to reactivate through itunes. Well I did it, and within 30 seconds I was activated, kept my old number too. Don't let the idiots over there tell you they don't know, or you should wait...get someone on the phone to cancel you activation if it's stuck and redo it...everything should go smoothley.

[Bradley W]

_

[Spar]

okay.... here is my issue.. long story but do read if u've been waiting for 15+ hours like I have.

So I got the email that said:

We are currently processing your order. Your order number is XXXXXX
You will receive an additional e-mail when your order is complete that will provide further instructions to activate your iPhone.

So I waited for few more hours, went to a movie (Die-Hard), etc. Came home, nothing. So browsing through these posts, i find the #: 877-800-3710 and option 3 to check status. So I called to check my status and it told me that AT&T needed additional info to complete my activation.

Now i'm fuming :mad: cause if they needed more info, they should of sent communication earlier rather than me stumbling on some # through a random internet post and happen to take the initiative to call them. I talked to the guy, he said whoever handled my account yesterday completed butchered it and his going to need about 30 minutes to fix it. Turns out the rep that messed with my account yesterday put it on "hold".

[SPUY767]

Dammit. I have a new SIM card right here because I was told I needed a new this morning from the girl at customer service. I'm strongly considering just activating it as a brand new customer to get this thing working. I don't even care about porting my old number now.

On that note, Could you, say, activate the phone, then put another sim in it after the phone has unlocked itself because it sees itself as activated as long as the sim is compatible?

[davidrousseau]

I called the 5401 # and was told to wait 24 hours, but kind of hung on the line to see if the rep would check anything... 1) she verified i had an account 2) there was no plan chosen: showstopper, so I chose the original plan 3) I was shown as no accepting the terms, so I accepted 4) I gave her my Sim # (use paper clip, and read the 8910 number on the bottom of the card) and IMEI from the box and she had a little trouble, but said the account is all set up on ATT's end.

Tried to get fee waived, but she said iTunes was not transmitting info correctly, and to try calling them. Apple in Emeryville denied activation issues before I bought the phone. The phone is now active (the moment I plugged it back in) and there is a reason it wasn't. Incomplete account info. Could be ATTs fault also, but this is a technical issue that can be solved if you treat them OK.

Try emailing oldmadbrother at yahoo dot com if you need more info, but that is the one account i left off the phone. This should at least help those where a "real" issue is holding things up. There are backlogs, but it was instant after my account was cleared up. New #, no porting required. Gonna play with my phone now that it works. Somebody (ATT / Apple) should take these huge profits and throw a little my way for my time to get this resolved. Classic finger pointing !

[macaddiict]

Started activation at 9:15pm
Got "Processing your activation" email at 12:19am
Got "Activation Complete" at 1:03am
Got "Service Activation Complete" at 4:03am
Now the phone says it is "Waiting for AT&T Activation" .... geez!

Just an update to all I got mine working!... I sat with my phone "Waiting for AT&T Activation - This may take some time." for about 4 hours. Rebooting the phone did not help. Removed the SIM & re-inserted without any luck. Called AT&T twice, Apple twice, no help...

Finally, I called AT&T and said that I'd done the iTunes activation, the phone was unlocked but "waiting for activation." I explained that Apple had said the hold up was on AT&T's end. I lied and said Apple told me to have the IMEI # checked... she looked over my account, made a "hmm" noise, and said, AH - your phone should be active now. BAM - It went from No Bars/No Service to Full service and AT&T. I asked what was wrong, and she said there wasn't an issue she just was going to re-send the activation signal.

The number I called was 1-877-419-4500

Give them you iPhone telephone number

This will probably only help those of you who are getting the message "Waiting for AT&T Activation - This may take a while"

Good luck!

[n8design]

I called the 1-877-800# to get "phone is now activated, and should be working" message but nothing is happening. What gives?

Realize this may have been written before in this thread, but I'm wondering why all the conflicting messages?

[SPUY767]

I've been pissed since I got home with a $600 machine that's as good as D.O.A.

I think it's completely busted that Steve won't let us at least play with the darn thing. Nice going, you smarty-pants. I hope you drop yours in the toilet, Steve.

Well, I've come to the conclusion that the problem is somewhere in the communication of at&t with Apple's servers. If the phones received activation directly from at&t like regular phones, I think they'd be getting done, because the sim is getting activated pretty fast. I was able to take my iPhone SIM and put it in my regular phone in a matter of minutes and it was working. I really don't ****ing know any more.

[paja]

for wasting 24 hours of my life on your brilliant phone or should I say useless iBrick.

It would have helped if I could have at least set it up as a iPod while wating 24 hours for your insufferable iTunes activation.

Packing it in until Monday when I will stop at the AT&T store on my way to work to bitch.

Pathetic experience really.

[swindmill]

what do you mean? the activation will not let me finish until i enter a credit check code

I don't remember exactly what that part of the activation process looked like, but I do know there is an option other than entering the code. The only way you could have that code is if you had a credit check done at an ATT store. Otherwise, it does it as part of the activation in iTunes.

[Tazzy531]

Latest Update: Called TMobile and they connected me to the number porting specialist. Lady (sounded very nice and has been dealing with this all day long) said that according to their records, my number was released to AT&T at 8:05PM last night. It is now in AT&T's hands.

She mentioned that there were quite a number of people calling about the same problem and it seems like AT&T lost a number of number porting requests from last night.

She gave me the number to the number porting specialists at AT&T (1888 898 7685).

Again, AT&T is dropping the ball and giving me the run around...

[Sigh]

[sdotbailey]

Called 877-419 to ask if I could cancel the process right now (porting, new customer) and just start from the beginning as a brand new customer with an AT&T number. He said that the Porting department (888-898-7685) needed to be called - he has me on hold right now while he calls them. The purpose is to cancel the port request.

If the entire process is killed, my plan is to use this extra SIM I received this morning in the phone and begin at the beginning with iTunes.

[KHaynes725]

Been waiting 24 hours now...I have been on the phone with AT&T numerous times, and I finally got to speak with a supervisor. She told me that she shows my phone to be completely activated and that it has to be a hardware issue. I asked her why I had not recived an email telling me it was active, something to sort of prove that AT&T did in fact activate my phone. She said the email is automated and she doesn't know why I haven't gotten it. Anyway, she assured me that they manually activated my phone, but if it is still not working I need a new SIM or possibly a new phone (WTF?!). Anyone heard anything similar to this ? Anyone have any suggestions/solutions?

Thanks!
Karen

[kemer]

Have an ATT high level activation rep on the phone now. VERY helpful. He said something that wasn't made public beforehand was that, to activate the phone it has to go through a mandatory "24 hour period" (which he also said is sometimes less. Apparently the reason for this is because ATT is uploading a significant amount of information directly to the phone....

... he seems to know what he's talking about.

[Undecided]

Update: this afternoon I got two emails about my phone being ready to activate (which could be done by either plugging it in again or if it's already plugged in, which it was, clicking on a link). It works great now and I'm syncing stuff.

My phone number has not yet moved to the new phone, which probably won't happen until tonight. In the meantime, I can make but not receive calls.

[AtariAge]

Have an ATT high level activation rep on the phone now. VERY helpful. He said something that wasn't made public beforehand was that, to activate the phone it has to go through a mandatory "24 hour period" (which he also said is sometimes less. Apparently the reason for this is because ATT is uploading a significant amount of information directly to the phone....

... he seems to know what he's talking about.
Sorry, that is one of the most ridiculous things I have heard today from an AT&T rep.

..Al

[shelydmb]

Since all I have is a cell phone and no land lines I got a $15 GO Phone plan for my old phone till my iPhone activates. I can't be without a phone for 24 hours!! Anyway the numbers I had stored in my phone were all there when I put in the new SIM card. Well slowly they are disappearing and in no particular order. I find it strange and I wonder if its just the slow pace that my iPhone is activating at. I'll be counting down for a while yet...I only started activating mine late this afternoon. Can't wait though!!

[avkills]

Have an ATT high level activation rep on the phone now. VERY helpful. He said something that wasn't made public beforehand was that, to activate the phone it has to go through a mandatory "24 hour period" (which he also said is sometimes less. Apparently the reason for this is because ATT is uploading a significant amount of information directly to the phone....

... he seems to know what he's talking about.

I think I am going to have to call ******** on this one. What could they possibly be uploading? The SIM card is what is supposed to contain the info that AT&T needs for cell usage. ??

-mark

[Cybergypsy]

Just got off the phone with 877-777-4192. I was told to leave the iPhone connected and that I should receive a confirmation email within 30 minutes to 24 hours. Since my IMEI and ICCID are already in my account, it should happen "soon" supposedly.
Mine 2 iphone took 10 minutes no more

[Cadence]

I'm another former "blue" plan member that is stuck with the activated phone, but it says not activated and stuck in itunes. I may try to call and cancel and restart? But what about my plan that I negotiated?

[k8glenn@mac.com]

First of all, the particulars:
I've been a Cingular/AT&T customer for about 6 years now.
I do have a family plan & was adding on the 1500 sms plan.
I received my "Will require additional time to activate" email at 7:18pm Eastern Friday night.
I am now waiting on hour 26.

I actually got through to someone at AT&T that was extremely pleasant & helpful. She couldn't solve the issue, but suggested that I could put the iPhone sim in my other phone if I needed to make calls in the meantime. She suggested that if I do that, to put the sim back in the iPhone every few hours just to check on the activation.

I also spoke with someone at Apple. He said that a lot of the sales from Friday night were placed on this one particular AT&T server that couldn't handle the information & crashed. So, he said that a lot of people that have been waiting as long as I have are not stuck in the queue somewhere. He said that the orders are in limbo because of this server that crashed. He said this is definitely AT&T's bad, and suggested taking the iPhone back & exchanging it for a new one. He said I should activate the new iPhone & then call AT&T and cancel the activation on the other phone. I just wanted to post in case this helps others. I'll post again once I've tried this out.

[thejoshu]

When dialing my number from another phone, I get the 'voice mailbox not set up' message rather than the call being routed to my Sprint phone. This is hour 25. Similarly, outgoing calls no longer work from my Sprint phone.

Edit - 5 minutes later, I have received both the e-mail and the text message, and my iPhone has been activated. Good luck, everybody.

[avkills]

First of all, the particulars:
I've been a Cingular/AT&T customer for about 6 years now.
I do have a family plan & was adding on the 1500 sms plan.
I received my "Will require additional time to activate" email at 7:18pm Eastern Friday night.
I am now waiting on hour 26.

I actually got through to someone at AT&T that was extremely pleasant & helpful. She couldn't solve the issue, but suggested that I could put the iPhone sim in my other phone if I needed to make calls in the meantime. She suggested that if I do that, to put the sim back in the iPhone every few hours just to check on the activation.

I also spoke with someone at Apple. He said that a lot of the sales from Friday night were placed on this one particular AT&T server that couldn't handle the information & crashed. So, he said that a lot of people that have been waiting as long as I have are not stuck in the queue somewhere. He said that the orders are in limbo because of this server that crashed. He said this is definitely AT&T's bad, and suggested taking the iPhone back & exchanging it for a new one. He said I should activate the new iPhone & then call AT&T and cancel the activation on the other phone. I just wanted to post in case this helps others. I'll post again once I've tried this out.

Umm, couldn't they just get the info off the current iPhone and make a new order and cancel the other one? I swear to God these AT&T service reps are lazy, stupid and did I mention lazy.

-mark

[macenforcer]

Here is what happened.


The sim card waits for a response from the ATT servers for activation. Thousands of people tried to activate all at the same time and the ATT activation servers crashed. Upon reboot the system lost all the pending activation codes. ATT servers are up and running fine now but your sim is waiting for the code. There is no way to clear the sim by yourself.

The only way to fix it is to go to ATT and have them give you a new sim. Activation will be immediate after you have a new sim installed.

STOP WAITING FOR THE EMAIL. It will not come.

[basicfiend]

Opening new account. Not transferring number. I got the message that activation needed more time to complete. Took two hours for email to come. Activating now!

[AtariAge]

I think I am going to have to call ******** on this one. What could they possibly be uploading? The SIM card is what is supposed to contain the info that AT&T needs for cell usage. ??

-mark
It is bull, simple as that. So much for a "high level" AT&T rep. being knowledgeable. The amount of bandwidth used by a typical voice cell phone call is obscenely more than anything they might "upload" to the phone in order to activate it.

..Al

[Jsimon9633]

Here is what happened.


The sim card waits for a response from the ATT servers for activation. Thousands of people tried to activate all at the same time and the ATT activation servers crashed. Upon reboot the system lost all the pending activation codes. ATT servers are up and running fine now but your sim is waiting for the code. There is no way to clear the sim by yourself.

The only way to fix it is to go to ATT and have them give you a new sim. Activation will be immediate after you have a new sim installed.

STOP WAITING FOR THE EMAIL. It will not come.

I dont buy that

I was one of those who tried to activate last night at 7pm and mine was MANUALLY ACTIVATED by them.

It can be done, they are lazy and hope they dont hav eto. thats all

[aimfire]

I also spoke with someone at Apple. He said that a lot of the sales from Friday night were placed on this one particular AT&T server that couldn't handle the information & crashed. So, he said that a lot of people that have been waiting as long as I have are not stuck in the queue somewhere. He said that the orders are in limbo because of this server that crashed
This makes the most sense...
Seems that you need the activation process to be restarted... either on ATT's end or by getting a new sim. I've been on hold for 30 minutes, going to request they cancel the activation and let me start from scratch.

Been over 19 hours for me... ATT keeps insisting the phone is activated, but not so

[avkills]

Here is what happened.


The sim card waits for a response from the ATT servers for activation. Thousands of people tried to activate all at the same time and the ATT activation servers crashed. Upon reboot the system lost all the pending activation codes. ATT servers are up and running fine now but your sim is waiting for the code. There is no way to clear the sim by yourself.

The only way to fix it is to go to ATT and have them give you a new sim. Activation will be immediate after you have a new sim installed.

STOP WAITING FOR THE EMAIL. It will not come.

Ummm, ok, that sounds feasible. But AT&T says my phone is activated, but I still have not received the email nor has iTunes unlocked my phone.

But I may do just what you suggest tomorrow.

-mark

[wstohner]

This makes the most sense...
Seems that you need the activation process to be restarted... either on ATT's end or by getting a new sim. I've been on hold for 30 minutes, going to request they cancel the activation and let me start from scratch.

Been over 19 hours for me... ATT keeps insisting the phone is activated, but not so

I'm in the same boat, although it's been over 26 hours for me. They said my phone was activated (they allegedly did it manually), and that I should expect any time now. I am going to forget about porting my number next time. Does anyone know, can I got into an AT&T store in a week or so and have them port my number then?

[AtariAge]

I also spoke with someone at Apple. He said that a lot of the sales from Friday night were placed on this one particular AT&T server that couldn't handle the information & crashed. So, he said that a lot of people that have been waiting as long as I have are not stuck in the queue somewhere. He said that the orders are in limbo because of this server that crashed. He said this is definitely AT&T's bad, and suggested taking the iPhone back & exchanging it for a new one. He said I should activate the new iPhone & then call AT&T and cancel the activation on the other phone. I just wanted to post in case this helps others. I'll post again once I've tried this out.
This is interesting. If by tomorrow morning I still do not have an activated iPhone (and I'm pretty pessimistic at this point), I will drive to the AT&T store where I bought my iPhone and get another SIM card.

..Al

[jbomber]

877 800 3701

THATS THE NUMBER I CALLED

THEY CAN MANUALLY DO IT, IF THEY DONT ITS CAUSE THEY ARE OUTSOURCED EMPLOYEES WHO ARE LAZY :)


I just waited on hold for 30+ minutes before getting thru to them and INSISTING they manually force it thru, but they said they were absolutely unable to do it. I even escalated it to managers and supervisors. They said it wasn't possible.

Right now i'm on a 2-hour wait, because according to them, it's all set up. If it doesn't happen for me, iIll have crossed the 24 hour mark, and I swear on all that is good and holy- ATT will not only pay for the 2 days I've gone without a phone, but somebody high on the foodchain is going to send me a hand-written apology and pay for half my service.

I am livid in ways that I can't even begin to get into....

[AtariAge]

I dont buy that

I was one of those who tried to activate last night at 7pm and mine was MANUALLY ACTIVATED by them.

It can be done, they are lazy and hope they dont hav eto. thats all
I've called AT&T several times today and every time I've asked about manual activation the reps have said that it's not possible. :mad:

..Al

[sdotbailey]

OK, so, I called the 419-4500 number and was able to get the guy to contact porting and cancel the request. He said that I can insert the new SIM card from this morning start over as a brand new customer to AT&T without porting a number. I did it and the process took all of 4 minutes. I'm up and running right now, syncing the phone with calendar/contacts.

So, if this is an option for you call 877-419-4500 and then ask for the porting request to be cancelled (their number for future reference 888-898-7685). Insert new SIM, go for it.

Now, the only thing I'm worried about at the moment is that they still push through an account under the number I was trying to port and I have two accounts at the end of all this ****. It would not be cool. But, the guy made it seem like I'd be ok. I will call on Monday and discuss this with them as well - I'm going to let the weekend rush die.

Hope this can help someone out, I truly appreciate the help others gave me too. THere really needs to be a petition or something as well to get the activation fee waived from this debacle.

[Jsimon9633]

I just waited on hold for 30+ minutes before getting thru to them and INSISTING they manually force it thru, but they said they were absolutely unable to do it. I even escalated it to managers and supervisors. They said it wasn't possible.

Right now i'm on a 2-hour wait, because according to them, it's all set up. If it doesn't happen for me, iIll have crossed the 24 hour mark, and I swear on all that is good and holy- ATT will not only pay for the 2 days I've gone without a phone, but somebody high on the foodchain is going to send me a hand-written apology and pay for half my service.

I am livid in ways that I can't even begin to get into....

you see the trick is that some places are not employees of apple or ATT

its outsourced random people so its possible those guys including managers/supes have no damn clue what they are doing

honestly if going to aTT store and getting new sim to start over works for most thats what I was going to do if it didnt happen tonight

now i can finally move on to using it and enjoying my 796 dollar total purchase

good luck guys

[delsurf]

OK, This is my first post. I had to create and account and post since I've been reading and bearing this burden with you all.

I just got off the phone and got my iPhone activated. The Rep was about to give me the 24-72 hours song and dance, then I got an email saying registration was complete. I told her and she was like "hmm.. I didn't think that would work" so I told her it worked and I already synced my iPhone and asked her what she did. She said that she "Deactivated, then Reactivated the Sim Card". She was trying it just for the heck of it, but as soon as she did, I got my email. She has dispatched an email to all of her coworkers regarding this. Her name is Marti and I reached her by calling the 877-419-4500 number. So if you call that number, you may get it activated due to the fact that she mass-emailed her coworkers about it.

Good luck... I'll be checking back to see if this actually does work for you guys, or if it was just a coincidence.

Now, time to go play with my iPhone!

[aimfire]

Right now i'm on a 2-hour wait, because according to them, it's all set up
I was also told this too... 2-hours (or a few minutes)... they insist the phone has been activated. I've rebooted it several times, nothing.

So that was 2 hours ago, still nothing.
When they told me this on the phone, I told the rep I was skeptical about the 2 hour thing and asked if she was *sure about this*. Yes she was... So I what to do if, in 2 hours it is still not activated, should I call back again?? She told me that wouldn't happen.... that the phone just needed time to "refresh".

Yup... 2 hours later and nothing.... getting ready to go to the ATT store soon, these phone reps are useless.

[lilvenom]

25.5 hours later, my verizon service has shutdown and my iphone is still unlocked. now i'm really s.o.l.

on the phone now to the activation dept. but who knows how long ill be on hold for. this is beyond ridiculous. it was ok before because at least my old phone worked, but now i am without a cell phone period.

[Zolk]

I've been speaking with a very helpful AT&T rep this afternoon.

He's called me back twice to see how things are going. During his last call, he sent emails and made phone calls to a bunch of other departments to try to get information. From what he's heard from the higher-ups it's just a mater of waiting for the backlog of activations to process.

He's not in tomorrow, but said he'll call me Monday to make sure everything is working by then. Hopefully it will be!

[avkills]

OK, so, I called the 419-4500 number and was able to get the guy to contact porting and cancel the request. He said that I can insert the new SIM card from this morning start over as a brand new customer to AT&T without porting a number. I did it and the process took all of 4 minutes. I'm up and running right now, syncing the phone with calendar/contacts.

So, if this is an option for you call 877-419-4500 and then ask for the porting request to be cancelled (their number for future reference 888-898-7685). Insert new SIM, go for it.

Now, the only thing I'm worried about at the moment is that they still push through an account under the number I was trying to port and I have two accounts at the end of all this ****. It would not be cool. But, the guy made it seem like I'd be ok. I will call on Monday and discuss this with them as well - I'm going to let the weekend rush die.

Hope this can help someone out, I truly appreciate the help others gave me too. THere really needs to be a petition or something as well to get the activation fee waived from this debacle.

I'm not paying for any activation fee. In fact, I am not going to pay them **** until it gets activated. I am probably going to call my bank on Monday and put a hold on the purchase as well.

-mark

[swindmill]

I waited about 2 hours for my activation from Apple, and the activation from ATT took about 3 minutes after that. It started syncing and is now frozen. I can't stop the sync or eject it. I guess I'll just pull it off the dock and put it back on and hope for the best.

[sdotbailey]

I'm not paying for any activation fee. In fact, I am not going to pay them **** until it gets activated. I am probably going to call my bank on Monday and put a hold on the purchase as well.

-mark

I'm with ya there man, power in numbers though I think.

[nicoleva]

Almost 27 hours later.

Syncing now.

[brackle]

Ok i have something else for you guys to try. I got through to the 877-800-3701 number again after a 30 minute wait and told the guy that I'd heard there were some codes that were causing problems with the 1500 text message plan. He said he couldn't see the features but there was a code on there they were having problems with. When you call ask if you have billing code MMV2 (I think it's for the 1500 text messages) on your account. If so you need them to change that. I think what it's changed to depends on where you live. May not work for everyone but hopefully someone. By the way, I spoke to Edward and he was EXTREMELY helpful compared to everyone else I spoke to today. I'll let you know if this works but this sounds like where other people were right before they got "the holy activation email." I'm still holding for him to finish with it..

Well he finished making the change an still no activation yet...

[tranced25]

I just waited on hold for 30+ minutes before getting thru to them and INSISTING they manually force it thru, but they said they were absolutely unable to do it. I even escalated it to managers and supervisors. They said it wasn't possible.

Right now i'm on a 2-hour wait, because according to them, it's all set up. If it doesn't happen for me, iIll have crossed the 24 hour mark, and I swear on all that is good and holy- ATT will not only pay for the 2 days I've gone without a phone, but somebody high on the foodchain is going to send me a hand-written apology and pay for half my service.

I am livid in ways that I can't even begin to get into....

Just went through the same thing, and I have long past the 24 hour mark... They said the same things to me as well. Not to jinx you, but I doubt you'll see your email anytime tonight.

I'm going to bed, and I will be @AT&T tomorrow to see about the sim card thing, but I just can't let this iCircus rent anymore space in my head for another minute tonight. I just have to sign off, and put the iBrick down. I'm done playing with the emergency slide, and I can't seem to make any killer music with the dial tones, except for Mary Had A Little Lamb.

Until tomorrow, as the iWait continues......

PS. Hope Steve already peed in the toilet before he drops his iPhone in. Damn him for locking these things like this. :D

[fbx]

So if you bought the iphone from att, you get the check code and can input it on itunes when it asks. i bought from apple there is no code on the receipt how do i get it??


THis worries me. I got the credit check at the AT&T store and have the number, but I don't think it was asked for anywhere in my "activation" process (26 hrs ago).

Am a Cingular/AT&T customer, just changing one phone out three on a family plan.

Just called and a nice woman said my new data plan wasn't listed on my account. She also removed the Blackberry data plan I'd had previously. She was so nice I decided not to press for a supervisor, but to give it another hour or two.

Since my iPhone SIM card works in my old phone (SLVR), I'm figuring some large part of the problem is Apple. It's the device itself, not the service, that is not being activated. The service is operational (demonstrated by the SIM card working fine in another phone).

People want to blame AT&T, but it looks as if the blame is all Apple's.

[Aniej]

24hrs... umm I am on 28 hours.

Please confirm if anyone else has had this told to them:

Your activation is in progress, but there is a problem.We must activate a feature, according to AT&T it is called 1apl or 1appl, that enables the web capabilities and until then the activation will not go through. They have placed the activation on hold until the feature is able to be enabled by AT&T technical team. So following the 24 hour wait, they have asked me to wait an additional 6 hours. I am at a level of anger and frustration I have never experienced before. It is like dealing with a cable company, airline, and IRS all wrapped into one big kick in the...

[ShockerMan4x4]

At around 6pm today I was told that there was some error in my account that was possibly holding the progress of the phone and that it was re-queued and should be active shortly.

It is now 9:55 and still no dice.


Now I'm officially pissed.

[jaderaven]

I got two phones. One for me and one for my wife. We are transferring from Verizon and I plugged mine in to my macbook pro and fired up Itunes. Went thorugh the screens, chose the family plan and that I wanted to activate more than one phone. After 10 minutes it gave a message that they needed more time. No other options to plug in phone#2 so I plugged it in anyway and went through the same process.

Same thing. 2 hours later the phones are not activated and they are useless. I called AT&T and they said they are getting a ton of complaints but have no idea why this is happening! She also told me I created TWO family plan accts at $100 each!

I told her I wanted one and both phones to be on it. After 90 minutes on the phone (I am still on the phone with her, on hold) she said they can merge it to one acct, but as far as the activation goes, she has no idea. She called Apple and they had no idea. I guess we just have to wait 24 hours!

WHAT A JOKE

Pretty much the same happened to me. I ended up creating 2 family talk accounts.

The only differences are that one of my phones activated within 5 minutes and the other is going on 26 hours now.

Also I called att several times. The first time I was told by a very nice girl that two accounts had been created and that they could be merged but not until the second account was activated. After about 6 hours I called again and was told that I would have to cancel the 2nd (unactivated) account asked how to do this and was told that I would have to wait 60 (SIXTY) days before I could cancel the account. I said that was unacceptable. I was told that I should not have activated both phones until the first phone had been fully activated. I told her that there was nothing in the directions to tat effect at all and I should not be penalized. She said that the only way to cancell it faster would be to return both phones to Apple and stay with Verizon. I asked to speak with her supervisor. The supervisor spouted out the same crap. I then asked her for my complete understanding "Let me get this straight, ATT does not want me as a customer because I activated two phones with them incorrectly?" she said YES. We hung up and called Apple. Apple said that we should go to an ATT store in the morning and see if someone could help us there face to face. And if that did not work to come back to the store and they would help us fix the situation.

At about the 13 hour when were just about to go to the ATT store I received a call from ATT on the old phone for the number still pending activation with att. The lady there told me that verizon claimed the account number I entered was incorrect. This is the same account number that worked for the first phone, mind you. We verified everything and she put me on hold and came back and said that everything went through ok with Verizon and my phone should be activated within 3 hours. I then told her of my experience with the att call I had in the the middle of the night and she was shocked to hear the story. She said she never should of told us that.

At any rate it has been way longer than 3 hours and the 2nd phone is still not activated.

This whole experience sucks. The directions for setting up two iPhones on a family share plan are completely lacking and that is Apple's fault. ATT however is a horrible company to do business with. And I blame ATT for being completely unprepared for this.

Let this be a warning to anyone setting up a Family Talk plan. Set up the first phone first completely before trying to activate the second phone. :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

[PuterSaurus]

24hrs... umm I am on 28 hours.

Please confirm if anyone else has had this told to them:

Your activation is in progress, but there is a problem.We must activate a feature, according to AT&T it is called 1apl or 1appl, that enables the web capabilities and until then the activation will not go through. They have placed the activation on hold until the feature is able to be enabled by AT&T technical team. So following the 24 hour wait, they have asked me to wait an additional 6 hours. I am at a level of anger and frustration I have never experienced before. It is like dealing with a cable company, airline, and IRS all wrapped into one big kick in the...

Yes I was told this about 1130am today. They referred to it as mnv3 and then I was given a different number to call to have it enabled. I called and the person who answered immediately (ATT) had no clue.

I was activated at 1130 and still have no service both inbound or out.

[roblogic]

First of all, thanks to all here for the info and moral support, it's made my 22 hour iPhone activation adventure bearable.

Folks, it you've received your "order number" email and are still waiting on your activation email, call the 877 800 3701 number, and choose option 3 for a status check. You'll enter your order number and get an automated response. If there's something holding up your activation, you'll be transferred to a live rep who can manually activate your phone.

My wife & I are long-time Cingular/AT&T customers with a family plan. We picked up a pair of iPhones at the Raleigh Apple store last night (in and out in 5 minutes) and have been trying to get them activated since around midnight EST. We had some problems with our account (a corporate account flag, no idea where that came from) that an AT&T rep helped us iron out, at which point we got the "processing activation" email from the iTunes store. Then nothing until about 3:00 this afternoon, when we both received the "order number" emails within minutes of eachother. A couple of hours later, my wife got the final activation email, unlocked her phone, and there was much rejoicing. While I waited. And waited. After about 4 hours, I stumbled across ther 800 3701 number here and gave it a call. Come to find out, AT&T needs additional account information to activate my line. Would've been nice of them to you know, send me an email to that effect, rather then having to call and find out. But whatever. After a few minutes on the phone with the rep, she manually activate my phone and all is well.

So the moral of the story is, if you've gotten your order number, and you've been waiting for hours to get your activation, give 'em a call. They CAN straighten it out.

[robhedin]

Just got off the phone with (877) 419-4500, after going by the AT&T store. The person I spoke to checked (again) our account and said that there was a conflicting feature on it, she (supposedly) removed the feature and added the iPhone data plans to the account... still not active, but she mentioned to give it a little bit of time.

At this point, I think something is just woefully wrong with this activation process... dropping by the local Apple store and seeing many people happily playing with their new iPhones makes me think that we've just fallen through the cracks somehow.

rob.

[SeattleMike]

I'm at the 25 hour mark as the owner of two iBricks.

Five calls to the Activation Hotline, three times hung up on by AT&T reps or because they left me on hold so long their monitoring system dumped me back to the root menu.

Actually went into the local AT&T store to see if they were willing to help -- they're useless and handed me their phone to call the toll-free number for a 6th time.

Finally called and got an offshore fellow at AT&T who acted liked he was real-time translating what I was saying in a Berlitz English dictionary -- I asked him to kindly kill my activation in queue so I could start over. Didn't understand a word of what I said then tried dumping me back in the Activation Hotline queue but told me it was so backed up I should just call later.

Is this the type of service $1384 buys someone nowadays? Shoot, AT&T should take a page from the JetBlue playbook about how to save face after a service disaster. Here's s a start:

#1 -- No rep transfers a customer or puts a customer on hold EVER, PERIOD. If they need to talk about something they can do it with the customer on the line. There are no secrets here, other than AT&T's terribly dysfunctional service.

[Egomaniac]

We tried to activate my wife's phone under a Family Talk plan last night, under the assumption that as soon as her phone was active we would add mine to the account. 24 hours and numerous support calls later, we were stuck with two iBricks.

I decided to just try activating my phone separately, reasoning that we could cancel the pending activation on hers if mine went through. It took thirty seconds to activate. So anyone telling you that you just need to "wait until the backlog of orders is processed" is feeding you a line of ******** -- you could probably get through it almost instantly just by canceling your pending request and starting over.

Of course, now we're on hold about canceling the earlier request, so who knows if this will turn out to be worth it...

[shelydmb]

He said that I can insert the new SIM card from this morning start over as a brand new customer to AT&T without porting a number. I did it and the process took all of 4 minutes. I'm up and running right now, syncing the phone with calendar/contacts.

4 minutes??? I was not one that tried to activate my phone last night. I started the activation process 3 hours ago. Still nothing! Has anyone else been waiting that did not start activating their phone last night?

[maveness]

...and no joy.

I will be calling at midnight and demanding some kind of action.

[avkills]

I'm starting to believe nobody has a clue at AT&T. The reps have been pretty forth coming to the fact that Apple left them in the dark until about 2 days before the launch; and given Apple's level of secrecy.

-mark

[SpyderFCS]

Does the activation e-mail come from AT&T or Apple?

I got my WebOrder # and talked to a CSR and both say my phone is activated but iTunes doesn't recognize that it is. So I'm guessing I just need that e-mail right?

28 hours here...

[aimfire]

She said that she "Deactivated, then Reactivated the Sim Card". She was trying it just for the heck of it, but as soon as she did, I got my email. She has dispatched an email to all of her coworkers regarding this. Her name is Marti and I reached her by calling the 877-419-4500 number. So if you call that number, you may get it activated due to the fact that she mass-emailed her coworkers about it.
Ok, THAT is the ATT number to call - the other one (877-800-3701) is completely useless! The people at the 4500 number actually know what's going on... here's what I learned:

- Rep said she cannot deactivate the sim card, that would only make things worse.

- Do NOT to remove the iphone from cradle or in iTunes. Leave everything on and keep it connected. Otherwise, any reconnections will only delay the process further by 3-4 hours :eek:

- Ignore any ATT rep who tells you to call Apple - this is NOT an Apple problem! It's all ATT (heh, no kidding) ;)

She then admitted that ATT was completely unprepared to handle all the new activations. She said that they were "hoping" things would go smooth, but they all had doubts about it.

She also told me that if your old sim is deactivated and if you have NO service for over 24 hours on both phones, then you are eligible for a service credit

FINALLY, I got someone who actually knew WTF was going on!

The sad part is, she said everything is good to go with my account info, it's just a matter of waiting now... again.

btw, I heard the other reps on the phone in the background... everyone is calling in about iphone activation issues... unreal how bad they F'ed this up

[Cadence]

any former BLUE members get theirs working? We all got the "your plan isn't compatible with iphone" message and then were sent to the migration dept. upon a phone call where they manually activated the phone and made us change our plans.

But now we're stuck when we try to activate through itunes it just sits there with the old message of waiting for an email, however I already have my order # email and all that. We're activated, just stuck cause I think itunes wasn't prepared to handle a manual activation as such?

I'm on hold waiting to speak to the "synch dept" from AT&T.
?

Anyone with the old blue plan have any luck?

[ciscokidd]

this is the worst experience i've ever had with any company... i just got off the phone with 2 different people from 2 different numbers... the first on put me on hold to connect to another department.. came back and said that they were not answering their phones and i could call them at my convenience

the 2 numbers he gave me were
1800myiphon (called this and it told me to call back during normal business hours)
18778003701 (called this and said they were experiencing high volume of calls and to call back later)

i can't f'in believe how much of a nightmare this has become - how hard is it to f'in activate a NEW phone???

i then called the 1-877-419-4500 - the guy said everything on my account looked fine and it is just a waiting game... he told me to hang on for another 24-48 hrs!!!! WTF????

[aimfire]

the 2 numbers he gave me were
1800myiphon (called this and it told me to call back during normal business hours)
I was told this is the wrong info by a good ATT rep... she said this is not an Apple problem and any rep telling you this is wrong, Apple can do nothing about it. This is an ATT problem, be persistent and do NOT undock your iPhone or restart iTunes... let everything sit and keep it on

[n8design]

This may be a really dumb question but...

I bought the phone at the Apple store and didn't open until I got home. Is there a chance that they needed to have placed a SIM card in the phone but didn't?

Or did these phones come with pre-installed SIM cards?

[SPUY767]

Phone is activated. I replaced the SIM card and restarted the activation process, but I re-registered an iTunes account that matched all the data with the cellular account perfectly. Got to the "This could take three minutes" screen, and within 30 seconds, the phone was active. Hope this helps.

[rer220]

any former BLUE members get theirs working? We all got the "your plan isn't compatible with iphone" message and then were sent to the migration dept. upon a phone call where they manually activated the phone and made us change our plans.

But now we're stuck when we try to activate through itunes it just sits there with the old message of waiting for an email, however I already have my order # email and all that. We're activated, just stuck cause I think itunes wasn't prepared to handle a manual activation as such?

I'm on hold waiting to speak to the "synch dept" from AT&T.
?

Anyone with the old blue plan have any luck?


i started the process last night and i checked again this morning. nothing. i called them and the changed my plan into a regular cingular plan then to a iplan. the slvr did not shut off untill they made that change. hopefully that is a good sign that things are moving foward. let me know if any blue members get activated

[PuterSaurus]

Just hung up the phone (landline!) with a friend who bought two iPhones this afternoon (Saturday). He activated a family plan and the first phone took about 1.5 hours to activate but was dead beyond that. Gets a yield symbol. He activated the second phone on the new family account within minutes.

He was a new ATT customer and no porting.

I'm up to 26 hours waiting for the phone to work....porting from sprint.

[ciscokidd]

any former BLUE members get theirs working? We all got the "your plan isn't compatible with iphone" message and then were sent to the migration dept. upon a phone call where they manually activated the phone and made us change our plans.

But now we're stuck when we try to activate through itunes it just sits there with the old message of waiting for an email, however I already have my order # email and all that. We're activated, just stuck cause I think itunes wasn't prepared to handle a manual activation as such?

I'm on hold waiting to speak to the "synch dept" from AT&T.
?

Anyone with the old blue plan have any luck?

i guess i'm on the old 'blue plan' since i retained my old att account before the cingular merger.... but ive had a miserable experience as many of you trying to play with my new toy!!! i received an email saying my rate plan was not compatible with the iphone last night - after another hour or so on hold and talking to many reps they straightened out my account and said i should receive the final confirmation w/in 24hrs - its obviously elapsed that period and they are only telling people to wait another 24-48 hrs... great customer service

[AtariAge]

any former BLUE members get theirs working? We all got the "your plan isn't compatible with iphone" message and then were sent to the migration dept. upon a phone call where they manually activated the phone and made us change our plans.

But now we're stuck when we try to activate through itunes it just sits there with the old message of waiting for an email, however I already have my order # email and all that. We're activated, just stuck cause I think itunes wasn't prepared to handle a manual activation as such?

I'm on hold waiting to speak to the "synch dept" from AT&T.
?

Anyone with the old blue plan have any luck?
I'm in the same boat as you--no luck so far. I still haven't even received an order # email! No emails at all since the initial "We are processing your activation" email I got yesterday at 8pm when I first tried to activate my phone.

Just how many "departments" does AT&T have? It's ridiculous, talk about an overbloated bureaucracy--it's no wonder there is so much confusion and so many different answers from customer service reps.

..Al

[eddiewouldcode]

More strange **** is happening!

I called 877-800-3701 and chose option 3 to hear the status of my activation. It reports my phone is activated and should be able to use all it's features. The funny thing is I called that number with my old carrier phone, my old phone still sends/receives calls, and I never gotten the magic activation email. I work in IT, don't they know better never launch anything on a Friday, I don't ****ing believe it.

[jbomber]

Oh

Sweet

Jesusphone....

:eek:

So it turns out there IS a difference when you call 877.800.3701

Some call centers are actual ATT employees and others are outsourced people with no power.

Right on the 24th hour, I called and got in touch with some ACTUAL ATT call center people. I spoke to a super helpful woman who was a little hoarse, named Deborah. She totally checked over the entire account, and then got things up and running. She was totally helpful, and knew exactly what she was doing. My own personal iPhone savior. I'm FINALLY up and running.

The thing to do is to call the number and ask if you're speaking with actual AT&T employees. If not, you might as well hang up and try again.

THANKS DEBORAH!

[themacdetective]

It is over 24 hours now with my iphone. It looks nice but still waiting for that activation. Talked to AT&T twice. Basically they say it is Apple's fault. I am an existing AT&T customer and just was switching over to the iPhone data plan. If this is not solved by Monday morning I am encouraging ALL OF US to return the iPhone to AT&T and demand them not to charge the restock fee. You can't charge somebody $600 for a non-functioning device. OUTRAGEOUS! It is time we unite and have our voices heard. Monday morning there will be lines at the AT&T stores. I bought an iPhone not an iBrick.

[dshadownyc]

I was just informed that my sim although reflecting in AT&T's account system as being activated, it is not. They tried to send data directly to my sim card and their system response came back that the sim is not active. On the account screen it says everything is Ok yet when they test it with an update the sim is obviously not..

Going to the AT&T store tomorrow to have them replace the sim...

For many former blue who had their iphones manually activated (because we had no other choice) it seems best to go to an AT&T store to demand a new sim.. if that doesn't work, grab the demo and run.....

As a test any former blue customers who's account is supposedly activated can call the 877 419 4500 number ask them to send an update to the sim to see the response..If its really active then AT&T will be able to tell. At least we can slowly begin to trouble shoot if anything..

[aimfire]

I read this trick over on the Apple forums - it worked for me!!
My iphone is finally activated after 20 hours!! :)

Ok, you need an extra SIM card - one from your old deactivated cell phone, or someone elses. In my case, I used my old ATT sim card which had been deactivated.

- Take your iphone out of the cradle, turn it off, remove sim card

- Put the other "spare" SIM card in iPhone

- Put iphone back into cradle, turn it on and launch iTunes

- In iTunes and on the iPhone, you'll get an error message saying that the sim is not valid with the iphone - this is what you want!

- Take out the iPhone, shut it off, and then put back the original SIM that came with iphone

- Put it back in the cradle, it will show up in iTunes

- In my case, I got a "Your iPhone has been activated!" message and my iphone is actually working - wooohooo... about damn time!!


Not sure why this works exactly... almost like iphone and itunes need to be forced to start from scratch or something...

Let me know if it works for you... I waited for 20 hours for activation and this finally worked. Good luck!


UPDATE: I also just received an "Activation Complete" email from ITunes after doing this.
"Congratulations, AT&T has successfully activated your iPhone service."

[Cadence]

To all my OLD BLUE plan buddies,

The latest I got from them is well...to wait. Again. According to the latest rep she said my plan is still migrating (even though it was done on the phone hours ago) and the status is pending. So I'm not sure if us migrators are just waiting for something to go through the system or we're sitting like ducks cause they havn't set up a proper system to migrate our old accounts for iphone.

BTW, did any of you retain your old blue plan? They forced me to sign up for a new iphone plan but gave me 200 additional mins and 1000 rollover minutes. This is a decrease as I previously had 850 minutes, unlimited n/w starting at 7pm. I now have 650 (450+200) mins, 5,000 nw starting at 9.

[SpyderFCS]

Oh

Sweet

Jesusphone....

:eek:

So it turns out there IS a difference when you call 877.800.3701

Some call centers are actual ATT employees and others are outsourced people with no power.

Right on the 24th hour, I called and got in touch with some ACTUAL ATT call center people. I spoke to a super helpful woman who was a little hoarse, named Deborah. She totally checked over the entire account, and then got things up and running. She was totally helpful, and knew exactly what she was doing. My own personal iPhone savior. I'm FINALLY up and running.

The thing to do is to call the number and ask if you're speaking with actual AT&T employees. If not, you might as well hang up and try again.

THANKS DEBORAH!

Did you have to receive an e-mail with a iTunes link to get it unlocked?

[killmoms]

My other iPhone worked essentially instantly after I got the email telling me that I should be able to make outgoing calls, and the port of it's number from Verizon finished up this afternoon, so I'm at a loss.

Anyone else seeing the "No Service" in the corner?

This is the exact situation that I'm in, except that I don't have another iPhone to verify that it's even possible that it will work. I'm just stuck at No Service. If you find a resolution to this problem, drop me a PM and let me know what you did.

[basicfiend]

To all my OLD BLUE plan buddies,

The latest I got from them is well...to wait. Again. According to the latest rep she said my plan is still migrating (even though it was done on the phone hours ago) and the status is pending. So I'm not sure if us migrators are just waiting for something to go through the system or we're sitting like ducks cause they havn't set up a proper system to migrate our old accounts for iphone.

BTW, did any of you retain your old blue plan? They forced me to sign up for a new iphone plan but gave me 200 additional mins and 1000 rollover minutes. This is a decrease as I previously had 850 minutes, unlimited n/w starting at 7pm. I now have 650 (450+200) mins, 5,000 nw starting at 9.

What did it cost you?

[Samuel Beckett]

First of all, thanks to all here for the info and moral support, it's made my 22 hour iPhone activation adventure bearable.

Folks, it you've received your "order number" email and are still waiting on your activation email, call the 877 800 3701 number, and choose option 3 for a status check. You'll enter your order number and get an automated response. If there's something holding up your activation, you'll be transferred to a live rep who can manually activate your phone.

My wife & I are long-time Cingular/AT&T customers with a family plan. We picked up a pair of iPhones at the Raleigh Apple store last night (in and out in 5 minutes) and have been trying to get them activated since around midnight EST. We had some problems with our account (a corporate account flag, no idea where that came from) that an AT&T rep helped us iron out, at which point we got the "processing activation" email from the iTunes store. Then nothing until about 3:00 this afternoon, when we both received the "order number" emails within minutes of eachother. A couple of hours later, my wife got the final activation email, unlocked her phone, and there was much rejoicing. While I waited. And waited. After about 4 hours, I stumbled across ther 800 3701 number here and gave it a call. Come to find out, AT&T needs additional account information to activate my line. Would've been nice of them to you know, send me an email to that effect, rather then having to call and find out. But whatever. After a few minutes on the phone with the rep, she manually activate my phone and all is well.

So the moral of the story is, if you've gotten your order number, and you've been waiting for hours to get your activation, give 'em a call. They CAN straighten it out.

We tried that three or four times over the course of today, told the first two times it would be activated in X hours, never was. The last couple of times only got an option of leaving voicemail. Going on 29 hours with nada.

[avkills]

I am at my Apple store right now, they are going to try and ring AT&T's bell.

I'll post back on what the results are.

-mark

[OziMac]

I read this trick over on the Apple forums - it worked for me!!
My iphone is finally activated after 20 hours!! :)

Ok, you need an extra SIM card - one from your old deactivated cell phone, or someone elses. In my case, I used my old ATT sim card which had been deactivated.

- Take your iphone out of the cradle, turn it off, remove sim card

- Put the other "spare" SIM card in iPhone

- Put iphone back into cradle, turn it on and launch iTunes

- In iTunes and on the iPhone, you'll get an error message saying that the sim is not valid with the iphone - this is what you want!

- Take out the iPhone, shut it off, and then put back the original SIM that came with iphone

- Put it back in the cradle, it will show up in iTunes

- In my case, I got a "Your iPhone has been activated!" message and my iphone is actually working - wooohooo... about damn time!!


Not sure why this works exactly... almost like iphone and itunes need to be forced to start from scratch or something...

Let me know if it works for you... I waited for 20 hours for activation and this finally worked. Good luck!


UPDATE: I also just received an "Activation Complete" email from ITunes after doing this.
"Congratulations, AT&T has successfully activated your iPhone service."

Think it was just your time - I followed your process, and iTunes still says that my activation requires additional time. :(

[kemer]

WORK!!! ... 22 hours. I was on the phone with ATT trying to solve the problem when I decided to eject the iPhone, pull it out of the cradle, and then put it back in... and it worked! I got a message saying "Activating with ATT Now"

Try it. I never got an email from ATT.

Seems all is well now...

[Zolk]

Think it was just your time - I followed your process, and iTunes still says that my activation requires additional time. :(

Yeah, I'm in the same boat (old Blue plan) and the SIM card switch didn't work. :(

[rxden]

here is a good one for you guys - i am on the phone since yesterday at 730 - getting the ole wait for the jesus email which would bring prosperity - so 24 hours later (tonight) i finally get a rep who tells me that the original activation had errors or something because i am porting from verizon - so we confirm everything and everything is correct - so she says - oh it was in an on hold bucket since last night - i said oh really and why did it take 8 reps and 24 hours to finally tell me this - she couldnt obviously explain - so she say ok let me put this through again with a red ticket - everything should be ok now - i hang up - 10 minutes later an email stating my number is non portable and to sign into itunes and establish a new number- WTF - i get back on the phone with them and they say must be on verizons end - so i call verizon ready to raise holy hell - and get the porting center - they tell me they approved the port last night at the exact moment i signed up for att - the vz rep offers to call att with me on the line because he tells me there have been a number of these instances - so we call and boom they are closed - i am now back on hold by myself waiting to talk to the activation center at att - WHAT A JOKE - is this really worth it - i am thinking of just getting an Att number and then porting at a later date once this **** calms down - total bust though - they had 6 months to train these people and they are all clueless - i hope this **** surfaces and someone at apple sees this - i dont see much on the websites about people getting hosed -

[jbomber]

Did you have to receive an e-mail with a iTunes link to get it unlocked?

i received an email, but i didn't need to click anything in it to make it work.

essentitally the key was she told me to turn off the phone for a bit and she was going to hit "UPDATE"

that seemed to do the trick.

[brackle]

This is for everyone porting from another carrier. Cancel your activation and start over by getting a new number from AT&T. Tomorrow you can call their porting department to get your old number transfered over. My phone is activated now.

[scoobierules]

This is for everyone porting from another carrier. Cancel your activation and start over by getting a new number from AT&T. Tomorrow you can call their porting department to get your old number transfered over. My phone is activated now.


I did that today and they told me that I would have my number ported by 8 and as of 10. NO LUCK! I hate att

[ntblood]

Clearly AT&T is not only unprepared and overwhelmed but has made nothing but a snafu of the activation process. I've been on the phone with them repeatedly (hours -up to 4 so far) and many times I've been told it's all good and should go through but then to get an email right afterwards saying they need more information or my address isn't right and that I need to call them back. Why can't they get this straight the first couple of times is all I ask? I'm pretty darned frustrated now and disappointed. I waited 3 hours in line at and AT&T store, sold out, then went to an Apple store and had one in 5 minutes.
Honestly I have spent the whole day on the phone trying to sort out one issue after the other or on hold. F.AT&T
They had better get this straightened out. I will feel burned for a long time which I'll remember and share with others who are sure to ask how I like my iPhone. :mad:

[twinturboZ]

Finally got activated after just over 26 hours. Numerous calls to the activation support number indicated everything was in order on my account, and recommended i just be patient and wait it out. Finally got through to one knowledgeable rep who pulled up my account and realized I had my old Cingular/AT&T MediaWorks package attached to my existing account, which is incompatible with the MMV1/2/3 features needed for the iPhone. Anyhow, if you ever activated MediaWorks for internet access on your previous AT&T phone, it has to be removed to get things working.
Hope that helps at least one person.

[jdoctoroff]

Not that I have anything substantial to add to this thread, but I too have been waiting 27+ hours now for the phone to be activated, so I figured I'd at least add my whiny voice to the group. I bought two phones last night, one of which I started activation on last night - I got the "activation requires additional time to complete" message. This line was a former ATT/Cingular line, just replacing a Blackberry with an iPhone. It still shows no progress. Tonight, I tried activating the second one, and got the same message - this line is a Verizon port. Since trying to get the second phone working, I've gotten one e-mail saying that they are currently processing the order and giving me an order number. And only one of those. I spoke to a whole host of people at the various numbers floating around, the latest of whom confirmed that the first phone's plan has all been changed over (which I knew... it was done manually at about 1 this afternoon), and that the second is pending a port, and gave me an exact date and time that that should be done by. I'm now thinking that the second is under way (and just delayed, as usual), and the first somehow got lost or hung up on something last night. I guess, the question is, what (if anything) is there to try doing at this point? I think I'm just going to have them cancel the activation on the first one and try it over again, does that make sense to anyone else? I suppose I could also take it/them to the apple store now and see if they'd help me (obviously, it's an ATT problem, but maybe I'll find someone helpful...) .
Sorry for the rambling post... It's been quite a while. =)

[jtkiley]

Just over 24 hours here, and I think the call I just finished may have helped and provided some info I haven't seen here.

Here's my basic info, so you can compare:

Existing Cingular/ATT Customer
Started 10:45p EDT yesterday
BB Pearl went to invalid SIM instantly
iPhone SIM works in BB Pearl
Called to have my account changed in case that was an issue.

Here's the good part:

I got a really helpful tech who said that I still had a couple features on my account that conflicted with the iPhone plan (and he confirmed that this problem was preventing activation for me). One was an old phone insurance feature (apparently not the current one, though it doesn't cover an iPhone in any event).

The other was NOIN, TYPE 1. It's listed under added features on my ATT account page. He could not remove it himself, and he had to refer it to another department to fix it. He said that once it is gone the IPhone data plan can be added, and my phone will activate.

Hope this helps some others who have been waiting a long time. I'm still waiting too, but this seems like progress (finally!).

I just received another "currently processing" email, but I've learned not to pay any attention to those.

[Lazernet]

We were told there was no way to do the activation manually. I wonder how you got them to do it. Did you say anything specific?

I specifically said, I'm stuck in your system and I've called several times already. My old number has been ported and is no longer working on my old phone. My new phone is not yet activated, can you manually activate my phone because I am dead in the water here.

That seemed to ring their bell and she said sure... and I was through within a matter of minutes.

- Eric

PS - Its worth the wait folks.

[SpyderFCS]

After getting off the phone at about 8:45 where the CSR said I was absolutely activated....I docked my iPhone and then got my activation complete e-mail at about 10:40

Finally!!!

[ashleym]

I've now been waiting for 28 hrs & 20 mins for the infamous activation process to complete.

Using 877-419-4500 I've spoke to multiple reps and the closest I've gotten is that they received an error message when trying to manually add the iPhone $20 data plan "mmv1". The error was that billing code "wixc" needed to be removed first. Rep did that and successfully added the iPhone data plan to my existing Cingular account. I confirmed this addition from looking at my account on the Cingular site. He then asked me to reboot the iPhone hoping that would solve the prob - well no luck.. I'm still stuck..

Suggested I continue to wait until Sunday morning and if it's still not working then to call back.

Something else I found out that hasn't been mentioned yet. Depending on where your account is located there's a different billing system used. The first few reps I spoke to weren't trained on my billing system and were limited in what they could do. I'm located in NC and my billing system is called "Care". Finally got a rep in Ontario, Canada who had the proper access to add the iPhone data plan.

[mrat93]

So, the email said to wait 24 hours and I have. My old phone is working as it shouldn't (meaning it's working like it used to) and my iPhone is NOT receiving calls. What should I do?

[mactarkus]

So I waited in line for 12 hours in the Florida heat and purchased two iPhones at my local AT&T store. I was even on the front page of our local story with an interview:

http://www.nwfdailynews.com/article/6934

Now everyone I know is calling or e-mailing to let me know they saw me in the paper and "How's the iPhone?". I wish I knew!! I'm in activation hell like most of you going on 28 hours now. It all began because the checkout person at the store spelled my name "Janes" instead of "James". This played havoc with my account and go me off to a bad start. After about 3 hours on the phone talking to five different people, I'm assured that is corrected and I'm just to wait 2 or 3 days to get activated. How do I show my face at work on Monday with no operating iPhone to show??

James
iPhone-less

[mikalakai]

How do you cancel your activation?

[Bradley W]

_

[paja]

Steve Jobs can shove my iBrick up his a55!

[synth3tik]

It sucks that you all have had a hard time. From plugging my phone into the computer to total activation including porting from T-Mobile took about 10-15 minutes for me. It seems like a lot of you have corporate accounts and smart phones, does this seem to be the issue or did I just luck out. I only had a PEBL so I didn't have any data plan or anything.

[JSmoove05]

OK i just recently signed up for at&t last week and they gave me a phone number to use. How do i change that number to my current TMobile number which I use. Im not sure how to do this I just got the IPhone and dont wanna screw things up any help would be great thanks.

[applehappy]

Just an update to all I got mine working!... I sat with my phone "Waiting for AT&T Activation - This may take some time." for about 4 hours. Rebooting the phone did not help. Removed the SIM & re-inserted without any luck. Called AT&T twice, Apple twice, no help...

Finally, I called AT&T and said that I'd done the iTunes activation, the phone was unlocked but "waiting for activation." I explained that Apple had said the hold up was on AT&T's end. I lied and said Apple told me to have the IMEI # checked... she looked over my account, made a "hmm" noise, and said, AH - your phone should be active now. BAM - It went from No Bars/No Service to Full service and AT&T. I asked what was wrong, and she said there wasn't an issue she just was going to re-send the activation signal.

The number I called was 1-877-419-4500

Give them you iPhone telephone number

This will probably only help those of you who are getting the message "Waiting for AT&T Activation - This may take a while"

Good luck!

I HAD THE SAME ISSUE. THIS POST SAVED MY DAY. They fixed an ERROR in my IMEI# and BAM 5 mins later I'm syncing!!!!

[n8design]

Dear AT&T,

"Your monthly statement requires additional time to complete.
You will receive an email confirmation once the rubber check is complete."


FAQ:

1) Is it really necessary to make our customers wait 1-2 days for activation?
2) On a scale of 1-10, how annoyed do you suppose our customers were that they were denied an iPhone at an ATT store, when the Apple store had PLENTY of phones?
3) ...add your own...


AT&T. Your World. Delivered... (revised)...
AT&T. Your Day. Wasted.

[akonikui]

Lined up at 5:30 am at the Apple store - was second in life
Waited twelve hours for the store to open
Was the first one out of the store with an iPhone
Drive home, plug it in, and wait
Email: my account requires additional info (turn out they don't accept P.O. boxes - wish i had been told that sooner)
Update billing address, and wait
Fall asleep, wake up, check laptop - no new email from Apple
Browse these forums while at work - find out i need to update my plan from being ATT Blue (wish i had known that sooner)
Update plan and IMEI numbers
Decide to call 877-800-3701 - wait on hold for an hour
Have some sweet lady check absolutely everything on my account - she assures me everything is fine now and my iPhone will activate tonight

Not to sound picky, but i really wish i had know a lot of things beforehand so i could have updated my account info BEFORE purchasing the iPhone - or maybe while i waited in line for 12 hours

Oh well, i don't want to curse myself. I guess i'll wait patiently... i just wish i could play with it already - will post the second i get the email (been waiting on wait cycle number 3 since 8:30 pm pacific time

[AtariAge]

Just called AT&T again (877-419-4500--they answer almost immediately), figuring I'd make at least one more attempt before I go to sleep to get some type of information. Turned out to be another useless call, the CSR said everything appeared to be correct in my account, that there were no conflicting features that would prevent activation and that I simply had to wait. She apologized several times for the delay while I (politely) ranted about how stupidly ridiculous this whole process was. I also stated that if my phone is not activated tomorrow morning I will be returning it and certainly will never choose AT&T again (and have been a customer for at least 10 years).

Did I mention how grossly incompetent AT&T is? This whole experience is leaving a really bad taste in my mouth.

28 hours and counting! YAY!

..Al

[Cadence]

Just called AT&T again (877-419-4500--they answer almost immediately), figuring I'd make at least one more attempt before I go to sleep to get some type of information. Turned out to be another useless call, the CSR said everything appeared to be correct in my account, that there were no conflicting features that would prevent activation and that I simply had to wait. She apologized several times for the delay while I (politely) ranted about how stupidly ridiculous this whole process was. I also stated that if my phone is not activated tomorrow morning I will be returning it and certainly will never choose AT&T again (and have been a customer for at least 10 years).

Did I mention how grossly incompetent AT&T is? This whole experience is leaving a really bad taste in my mouth.

28 hours and counting! YAY!

..Al

I'm with you. I'm giving up for the night. Time to go drink.

[jdoctoroff]

I know it's totally an ATT problem, but, since I've been waiting well above a day now - should I just go to an Apple store and see if any kind person will help out?

[ichris2]

I final got a hold of a lady who seemed to know what she was talking about. She said my IME # was wrong on my account so she transfered me to some other lady who was able to change the IME#...that was about an hour ago...still waiting for something to happen....

[n8design]

I know it's totally an ATT problem, but, since I've been waiting well above a day now - should I just go to an Apple store and see if any kind person will help out?

That's what I was told when I called tonight.
The guy at the Apple store said to make an appt. through the Apple web site to speak to a Mac genius and that they'd make sure I was happy when I left.

If you have the time to do that, and don't want to wait any longer, book the appointment.

[AtariAge]

I'm with you. I'm giving up for the night. Time to go drink.
I like that plan, I've had enough of this for one day!

..Al

[Freakk123]

Update:
Long story short, I called, waited, after an hour got a rep who I talked to for a bit then basically said that my phone would be activated within like fifteen minutes. Five minutes later, no exaggeration, I get an email: "We're sorry, AT&T has identified a problem with the information you provided. For more information call 877-800-3701."

I was so excited for it to finally start working and then this. This is absurd. Talk about a disappointment.

[ashleym]

Here's a summary of my activation adventure so far:

Friday
6:30pm - Purchased iPhone at Apple store
7:10pm - Connected iPhone to iTunes to start activation process
7:14pm - email from Apple saying "AT&T is now processing your activation. You will receive an email confirmation once your activation is complete."

Saturday
10:24am - received email from AT&T saying "Thank you for choosing AT&T. Here is some information about your AT&T plan". Pointless email..
Noon-10pm - spoke to multiple csc reps who said to continue waiting
11:15pm - got csc rep to remove old data plan and add iPhone $20 plan
11:32pm - email from AT&T saying "We are currently processing your order. Your order number is 69XXXX"

We'll see what happens while I'm sleeping..

[JSmoove05]

Is there a way to port your number to a current a at&t number by using the Itunes Activation or do you have to actually talk to the porting department?

[macridah]

Finally got the email I've been waiting for

Congratulations, AT&T has successfully transferred your existing mobile number.


Your iPhone mobile number is:


But I had to call about 5 times. They said it was stuck on some process and the CSR pushed something to a technician. I received one phone call but then it's offline again. AT&T said it would a few hours before it can place and receive calls. But the good news was that I was able to close my sprint account before July 1 so I wouldn't be charged a month in advance.

[boeingair]

Sigh.. Still stuck here.

[ciscokidd]

Sigh.. Still stuck here.


i also still stuck.... I'm gonna call it a night and see if i have the 'magic' email in the morning.... i won't get my hopes up though

they told me on the phone to keep my computer connected to the internet and my iphone plugged in with itunes running.... does that really matter if i'm just waiting for an activation email?

[Tazzy531]

Still on hold with AT&T...
At least this time, I'm making the CSR wait for me until I get connected. Someone to keep me company...

[sigh]
29 hours and 14 mins since I bought the iPhone.. and still no service...

[uNext]

Cll att they might have your emei number mixed.

I have 1 question i have been trying to unlock it but is like my touchscreen is not working..

can you unlock the iphone while you wait for activation?
i have tried to slide the unlock button but nothing happens it is not responsive
the phone is activated i recieved the email from att and apple but i have no service....

anybody with this problem? i think my touchscreen is bad

I even tried to slide to power off and nothing

[Zolk]

can you unlock the iphone while you wait for activation?
i have tried to slide the unlock button but nothing happens it is not responsive
the phone is activated i recieved the email from att and apple but i have no service....

anybody with this problem? i think my touchscreen is bad

I even tried to slide to power off and nothing

Sounds defective, I'm afraid.

[uNext]

Sounds defective, I'm afraid.

Wow is this the worst apple release or am i just seeing it like that?
Lucky thing i did not wait inline for it
but the iphone is far from your typical apple release....

I dont know who to blame for it att or apple...just my luck

[macaddict158]

So according to at&t my account is active and working although my iPhone still tells me to connect to itunes to sync and I have tried all the previous tips to get it to re-activate but no luck, should I keep calling at&t or wait like they keep telling me I have to do?


Thanks

[ashleym]

After 30 hrs & 9 mins - IT'S WORKING!!!!

Once I received the order number 69XXXX via email I called 877-800-3701 option #1 and asked the rep to find out what's taking so long. She put me on hold and after a few mins I received the following email:

"Congratulations, AT&T has successfully activated your iPhone service."

Then she came back on and said that my account was setup wrong and she fixed the problems.

I clicked the link in the email which unlocked the phone and then she did a test call.

If it matters, she was located in the Bridgewater, NS AT&T call center.

[uNext]

So according to at&t my account is active and working although my iPhone still tells me to connect to itunes to sync and I have tried all the previous tips to get it to re-activate but no luck, should I keep calling at&t or wait like they keep telling me I have to do?


Thanks


well i got it activated finally only to find out my touchscreen is dead lol
go figure

[justcallmepete]

just wanted to let everyone know i finally got it working. i actually had it about 2 hours ago, but i got so excited that it worked that i just got lost in it.

i was on hold for LITERALLY 3 and a half hours. i just watched tv with it on in the background. a woman finally picked up and told me that my number was rejected (i was porting from TMOBILE). so i told her just to forget it and let me just get a new number. she said "ok i will reset your account". and while i was on the phone with her i put my iphone in the dock and it showed up on the first registration screen. i put in all my info again, and it activated right there. not even a minute wait.

so thats my suggestion. have them reset your order completely. ive read that some people couldnt have it done. maybe its a different situation....but i know that when she reset mine, it worked instantly.

good luck to everyone. i know i keep seeing this...but its true. its DEFINITELY worth the wait.

[Patster66]

The ATT rep said that the "MMV1" feature was holding things up. He took that off my account and activated the iPhone while I was on the phone with him. He gave me a number to call tomorrow to put the MMV1 feature back on -- he wasn't entirely sure what the MMV1 feature was -- maybe "multimedia or voice mail?"
It's synching now...

[elgruga]

Apple Insider has a 'workaround' for a specific number transfer problem - might be worth a look.....



http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/07/06/30/how_to_port_ineligible_mobile_numbers_to_att_and_iphone.html

[boeingair]

Hey Guys,

Hang in there! I just got mine sorted through!

I called 877-800-3701. This line has a lot longer hold time than the other line, but it's WORTH IT. The guy looked at my account for about 10 minutes, came back and said everything 'looked fine', and that he was 'setting my status to activated'. As he said those words, the activation email arrived in my inbox, and off I went.

Best of luck to you all still trying--you'll get there! Give the above number a try--they seem to be able to do the most.

[Aniej]

The ATT rep said that the "MMV1" feature was holding things up. He took that off my account and activated the iPhone while I was on the phone with him. He gave me a number to call tomorrow to put the MMV1 feature back on -- he wasn't entirely sure what the MMV1 feature was -- maybe "multimedia or voice mail?"
It's synching now...

which AT&T number did you call to get this done? I have the activation ID but nothing will happen.

[kemper28]

I have read every message on this boat I was 5th in line to get a phone and been talking to tech support all day... Here is the REAL DEAL. AT&T does not understand that itunes has to activate the phone. (there is really 2 activations itunes and the cell service) Your goal should be to get the phone activated with itunes once you do that you are home free. Here is what I did.... 28 hours with the message saying need more time. today I went to at&t and demanded 2 sim cards my Girlfriend has a phone also with the same problem. Tonight after I really figured this out I stuck the new sim card in and plugged into itunes it started a new activation process. I picked the first option not the one that says add a new line. In 5 seconds it said were are adding a $20 data package to your account ok... continue... 10 seconds later you are activated... Did the same thing on the GF's phone an she is activated. She does not have service but that is no big deal, can fix that tomorrow at the store. The biggest problem is that at&t does not have any clue how to get itunes to activate the phone and it will never happen.. Days from now at&t will say all you guys have to get new sims and redo the process... There is no bottle neck, it does not take a long time... nothing.. I was a new customer no porting. Yesterday 30,000 people got screwed because itunes crashed and they did not get activated but you cell service is activated with at&t... If you do not believe me just go into a store tomorrow pull the sim card out of your iphone and stick in the jerks phone that works there it his phone will work perfect with your sim card. I did that at 11am today but it took me this long to really understand the process... Good luck to everyone and I could have not done this without reading all your posts... Now to play with the phone... You guys that get your phone working PLEASE POST what you did to help the others!!! Everything I read helped me... You guys are on your own... It is not a wait and see time issue... REDO your activation...

[ahmedrah]

If my new apple iphone included sim card is active (working in my old phone), do any of you think it would be possible for att to reset the activation process in itunes?? the sim card is now active, and Im curious how it would start from 'scratch'??? I can't believe apple would do this!! AT&T i do!

[ahmedrah]

I have read every message on this boat I was 5th in line to get a phone and been talking to tech support all day... Here is the REAL DEAL. AT&T does not understand that itunes has to activate the phone. (there is really 2 activations itunes and the cell service) Your goal should be to get the phone activated with itunes once you do that you are home free. Here is what I did.... 28 hours with the message saying need more time. today I went to at&t and demanded 2 sim cards my Girlfriend has a phone also with the same problem. Tonight after I really figured this out I stuck the new sim card in and plugged into itunes it started a new activation process. I picked the first option not the one that says add a new line. In 5 seconds it said were are adding a $20 data package to your account ok... continue... 10 seconds later you are activated... Did the same thing on the GF's phone an she is activated. She does not have service but that is no big deal, can fix that tomorrow at the store. The biggest problem is that at&t does not have any clue how to get itunes to activate the phone and it will never happen.. Days from now at&t will say all you guys have to get new sims and redo the process... There is no bottle neck, it does not take a long time... nothing.. I was a new customer no porting. Yesterday 30,000 people got screwed because itunes crashed and they did not get activated but you cell service is activated with at&t... If you do not believe me just go into a store tomorrow pull the sim card out of your iphone and stick in the jerks phone that works there it his phone will work perfect with your sim card. I did that at 11am today but it took me this long to really understand the process... Good luck to everyone and I could have not done this without reading all your posts... Now to play with the phone... You guys that get your phone working PLEASE POST what you did to help the others!!! Everything I read helped me... You guys are on your own... It is not a wait and see time issue... REDO your activation...

so your saying get a new sim card, and start from scratch with the existing att account you already have??

[Freakk123]

Just got off the phone again with a csr, she said that they are currently going through an unexpected upgrade so they can't see account information, and unfortunately it seems as that's where my problem lies. So I get to wait until tomorrow.

Fun.

[kemper28]

goto at&t get a new sim card and have them setup your account with it. Just say you want your account info setup on a new sim. Then plug into itunes and it will look like it did the 1st time you plugged into itunes but now you are an existing customer. Hope this help I can not keep my eyes open and brain is shutting down...

[Tazzy531]

GRRRR!!!

So after 30 hours, I call and they said there was a problem with the porting from TMobile and they restarted the port at 10PM June 30th.

I asked them whether it would be faster to wait for the current process or cancel and start anew and she said start anew. I went through the cancellation and tried to reactivate. Got the dreaded "Your Activiation Requires Additional Time to Complete" message.

I'm now where I was 28 hours ago...

AT&T is definitely fckin' this up big time...

[plumbingandtech]

my tmobile number now forwards to my att.

I am golden.

I went out tonight and used it 4 times

a) check a bookmark (iphone had it)
b) write down the name of a hearburn pill. (iphone notes.)
c) checked if a dvd my friend rec'd was in my netflix que
d) got emails.

I love this thing. It is already a part of my life.

[blackbook]

ok... i called at&t for what i hope is the last time.

i spoke with a really tired sounding, really helpful guy who tried to activate my phone. he then told me that, even though t-mobile said they released my existing number, it was ineligible for porting. so, i caved. he sent me an email stating that all i had to do was insert (or reinsert) the iPhone and redo the activation process without asking to port a number.

so, i did that, and received my first email after the initial three minute wait that they will email me when the activation is complete.

the CRS told me that it should not take me the 26 hours i wasted with trying to port and should have it "very soon".

i'm quite happy with this progress, although i did have to compromise a bit. so, people will have to change their phonebook entries for me. that's all.

i might even sleep tonight.

:)?

[joegomolski]

It's late, 28 hours late. Before this iphone activated. AT&T sure put one over on us!

This is what I did to finally activate my phone.

We have an AT&T family plan, with 3 phones. My intent was to activate my iphone using my current cell phone number.

I filled in the activation forms in iTunes, and I was told to wait for an email. The email, of course never came. 28 hours and counting.

I spent hours on the phone with AT&T trying to get my phone activated. I wasted a whole day.

It's late on Saturday night. I tried something really odd. I took my wife's sim card out of her phone, a Motorola v551. Then I popped out the sim card from the iphone, and replaced it with my wife's sim card.

Connected to iTunes, and the activation process popped up! So I filled in all the forms, and, and, my iphone activated! With my wife's old sim card in the iphone.

This is so weird. Love to hear from someone else, if the works for you.

And we are trapped for 2 years with AT&T!


Joe Gomolski

[kevinwiz]

well i'm going to bed i give up. assuming there is no magic "your iphone has been activated" email in my inbox tomorrow morning, i will go to the att store. by then, it will have been 40 FREAKING HOURS since i first plugged iphone into my macbook. i'd say theres a 20% chance my iphone will magically activate itself.

[ElBerserko]

This is for everyone porting from another carrier. Cancel your activation and start over by getting a new number from AT&T. Tomorrow you can call their porting department to get your old number transfered over. My phone is activated now.

I was instructed to do this earlier today. Now my account has been completely butchered. I am getting two sets of emails referencing different Activation IDs, the original ID now says I am activated, the other one is says it needs more information. At first my second activation attempt even reused my old activation ID, which the customer service rep said he 'never seen before'. The original order was never canceled properly and now my existing Verizon phone has been cut off. If I didn't happen to receive a Blackberry last week from work I would be without a way to even call AT&T support. I had one agent say there is problem at the porting office (which is closed till tomorrow morning), but I am not completely convinced the fact that I have two activation requests for the same phone isn't screwing something up.

[SteveM8]

It FINALLY activated after 25 hours. I got the emails and plugged it in and its all set and working. I gave up hope at 24 hours and then at 25 it happened! Hopefully everyone else will get set up ASAP. Good luck!

[economist]

I just got off the phone with AT&T and they told me that my port is scheduled for July 10th... and which by the way puts me on the edge of the 14 day trial thing.. Oh yeah if I chose to return the phone now base don the horrible experience, I would have to pay the re-stocking fee.

This sucks.

The rep mentioned that if they try and cancel my activation request they might screw up things more...

Any suggestions?

Did I say this sucks - this absolutely sucks.

[avkills]

My Apple store trip did not help one bit. I am going to go to the ATT store and get a new SIM card, going to bring my laptop also; and I am not going to leave until it starts working.

Man, talk about the biggest pooch screw.

-mark

[TheSlush]

During my iPhone activation, on the "iTunes Account" screen where it asks for my account name and password, it won't let me sign in. Instead it gives me this strange red error message: "This person record requires harvesting."

But when I log in through the iTunes Store (with no problems) it shows that all my information is complete, accurate, and up-to-date.

So what gives?? Anybody?? :confused:

I got the same message. I ended up creating a new account.

Well, I figured out what this harvesting thing means (no thanks to Apple Support, who claimed that they had "never received this complaint before.") It means your account requires additional information that apparently can only be submitted via Apple's website. I logged in at apple.com using my iTunes account name and password. It then asked me for my birthdate and an if-you-forget-your-password question+answer. Filling out this additional information at apple.com apparently is the key to "harvesting your person record." After this, I was able to proceed with the iPhone activation process.

This harvesting error is very cryptic, unclear, and user-unfriendly... very un-Applelike!

[greenBabe]

22 hours and counting. This is so depressing.

[aimfire]

Just wanted to remind people to try this - it worked for me and wanted to share. And judging by the most recent posts, it seems that iTunes may be part of the problem by not recognizing the activated sims, and you have to force it to read the new info on the sim....

This works ONLY if your *SIM* has already been activated by ATT and your account has been set up - BUT you are still awaiting "iphone activation" after many hours...

I read this trick over on the Apple forums - it worked for me!!
My iphone is finally activated after 20 hours!!

Ok, you need an extra SIM card - one from your old deactivated cell phone, or someone elses. In my case, I used my old ATT sim card which had been deactivated.

- Take your iphone out of the cradle, turn it off, remove sim card

- Put the other "spare" SIM card in iPhone

- Put iphone back into cradle, turn it on and launch iTunes

- In iTunes and on the iPhone, you'll get an error message saying that the sim is not valid with the iphone - this is what you want!

- Take out the iPhone, shut it off, and then put back the original SIM that came with iphone

- Put it back in the cradle, it will show up in iTunes

- In my case, I got a "Your iPhone has been activated!" message and my iphone is actually working - wooohooo... about damn time!!


Not sure why this works exactly... almost like iphone and itunes need to be forced to start from scratch or something...

Let me know if it works for you... I waited for 20 hours for activation and this finally worked. Good luck!
Now I'm also wondering, if you don't have a spare SIM on hand, what would happen if you removed the iphone sim, and turned it on, put back in the cradle (without a sim), and then relaunched iTunes? Assuming that you'd get a simaler error message - then put the iphone sim back in the iphone and back on the cradle, you may be able to get the same results....

It's really looking like iTunes needs to be "reset" and acknowledge an activated SIM card.... Sorry, it's late, so hope this makes sense, lol

[wstohner]

Just wanted to remind people to try this - it worked for me and wanted to share. And judging by the most recent posts, it seems that iTunes may be part of the problem by not recognizing the activated sims, and you have to force it to read the new info on the sim....

This works ONLY if your *SIM* has already been activated by ATT and your account has been set up - BUT you are still awaiting "iphone activation" after many hours...


Now I'm also wondering, if you don't have a spare SIM on hand, what would happen if you removed the iphone sim, and turned it on, put back in the cradle (without a sim), and then relaunched iTunes? Assuming that you'd get a simaler error message - then put the iphone sim back in the iphone and back on the cradle, you may be able to get the same results....

It's really looking like iTunes needs to be "reset" and acknowledge an activated SIM card.... Sorry, it's late, so hope this makes sense, lol

I just tried this... no luck. Although, it might be because itunes pops up an error box and does not even attempt to connect to the network like it usually does. I'm thinking that the itunes servers never get word from your computer that you hooked up an iphone sans sim card. However, I bet in your case, it checked with the itunes servers.

*According to AT&T, I was activated almost 24 hours ago. 38 hours and counting total.*

[goon315]

Im with you.

38 ***** hours and NOTHING

this is such a letdown.

none of the numbers ive called have helped me

AT&T store hasnt helped me.

im just sitting here, waiting for what?

:(

[wstohner]

Im with you.

38 ***** hours and NOTHING

this is such a letdown.

none of the numbers ive called have helped me

AT&T store hasnt helped me.

im just sitting here, waiting for what?

:(

Did you try to get a new sim card from at&t and start the process over? I was thinking of trying that. I will open a whole new account. Then, call after the fact and cancel the first account.

[AsymptoteDesign]

ok, so after 39 or so hours, and about 50 calls to att asking them to make sure my information is correct, I get the "att has identified a problem with you account" email.....Lady said she's giving it to manual processing and could take up to 6 hours. UGH

[Zolk]

Now on 22 hours and still no activation. If nothing happens in a few more hours, I'm going to head to an AT&T store and try to get a new SIM.

Being an old "blue" customer, I currently have absolutely no cell phone service. My old SIM is deactivated and my iPhone SIM will not work in my legacy AT&T Wireless device.

[maveness]

My last round of interaction with AT&T involved 3 hours on hold. They claim the phone is "activated," yet I never received the activation email, and it is still functionally a brick. Furthermore, my previous (other carrier) service has yet to be disconnected.

The last bit of counsel was: remove the iPhone from the dock, turn it off, wait 20 minutes, turn it back on, reconnect to iTunes, and you should receive the activation email after 5 minutes.

Needless to say, this absolutely DID NOT WORK.

I am taking the phone in to an AT&T store this afternoon, and I will not leave until I have satisfaction.

What a royal MESS.

[badtz]

FINALLY, after 18 hours! Been using it, it's beautiful. Not sure if there's anything that can be done [credit?] for the 18 hours down time!

[wstohner]

Just called and canceled my activation. Started over without porting a number, and no text messaging package... Still needs more time to activate. For people that canceled and started over, how long did the activation take without porting?

[greenBabe]

23 hours now. AT&T was no help whatsoever. On hold with Apple now. If this doesn't do it, I'm heading to the AT&T store at noon. I expect I'll have lots of company.

[spiders22]

after 24 hours of waiting, I took the sim form my old phone, put it in the iPhone and started activation process again. Three minutes later (or less), I was up and running:) :)
PS. existing ATT customer

[inc77]

So how long on average is it taking people to port over their numbers (for those who are successful that is)? I just received the email with my order number and to wait for the activation email. I am on T-mobile... I should've came here first and read about not porting first and doing that after activation... :(

[ichris2]

took 40 hours but I'm finally up and running. Had to call ATT and get them to manually push the activation. The girl I was talking to on the phone almost sounded like she was going to start crying when I told her I got the activation email....what a cluster.

[dshadownyc]

Now on 22 hours and still no activation. If nothing happens in a few more hours, I'm going to head to an AT&T store and try to get a new SIM.

Being an old "blue" customer, I currently have absolutely no cell phone service. My old SIM is deactivated and my iPhone SIM will not work in my legacy AT&T Wireless device.

I am in the same situation, i'm now on the phone with apple..

All I know is that apple/itunes logs our phones via our sim number. Since our iphones had to be activated manually from AT&T, the auto message, the one that would be sent to apple/itunes to tell them everything is set, was never done.

For former at&t blue customers it appears that both apple and at&t are to blame. They didnt prepare incase of the need for manual activations. :mad:

[AtariAge]

Well, you can now add me to the

FINALLY!!!!!!

category. An hour or so ago I got an email from AT&T stating that, "Your current AT&T rate plan is not compatible with the iPhone." This, after I *know* the plan was changed yesterday at about 1pm since I was an old AT&T "blue" customer. I called the number in the email (877-419-4500) and spoke with someone who said the plan looks fine, but that she was going to transfer me to their technical department to see if they could help.

She first gave me the number she was transferring me to (the 877-800-3701 number), and after about 40 minutes someone finally answered. I was expecting another, "Your plan looks fine, you just need to wait" response, but after putting me on hold twice, she finally found a problem with the account. She said a feature was missing that was preventing the activation from going through. She first asked me to make sure the phone was off, then put me on hold again to fix the account. When she came back a few minutes later she asked me to turn the phone back on and to report what I saw. The "Please activate phone" message. She then asked me to plug the phone into the computer. Upon doing so, the phone activated right away! I could not believe it! She then called the phone to verify that it was working, which indeed it is..

So, after nearly 40 hours, I now have a working iPhone! For those of you who are original "blue" AT&T (pre-Cingular) customers, I suggest calling the 3701 number and asking the rep to make damn sure there are no conflicting options on your plan and that you have everything needed for the iPhone to be properly activated. If so, it would seem they can manually activate the phone and wait on the line to verify that your phone activated. It's definitely hit and miss--of several calls I've made to AT&T, this was the first one where a rep even acknowledged that the phone could be manually activated.

I also immediately received the "Activation Complete!" email once the phone was activated, so the holdup here really does seem to be AT&T and not Apple (at least in my case this is certainly the fact).

I hope everyone who is still waiting is able to get their phone (or phones) activated today. I know how frustrating it is, especially since my old phone had already been deactivated and my new iPhone SIM would not work in the old phone. If you have time I would keep trying the above number until you get a CSR who knows what's going on, barring porting issues from other carriers.. I will keep checking this thread.

..Al

[Zolk]

I've been hearing similar successes with the 877-800-3701 this morning on the AT&T forums. I'm currently on hold.

[goon315]

Did you try to get a new sim card from at&t and start the process over? I was thinking of trying that. I will open a whole new account. Then, call after the fact and cancel the first account.


after i fell asleep last night at like 2am, my girl got on the phone with them and apparently was mad as hell. the guy she spoke with was really cool, had her check my sim card. number was one digit off.

also, at one point, itunes said my activation had expired.

i have another sim card, but im not gonna mess with it until instructed to do so by someone who works for them, so if anything bad happens its their fault for giving the instruction!

:D

im on hold right now for the synchronous people, or ewoks, or something. hope we can get it manually pushed.

who knows at this point.

if i have to, ill gladly restart the activation process, new number or not.

im annoyed, but i have something to take the edge off.

:D

[rob214]

A warning to anyone who would swap out SIM cards.

I've been waiting over a day like everyone else... and read posts about swapping sim cards and decided to give that a try. I took my old sim card from my blackberry pearl, and put that in.

Well, I wish I could say it was successful, but it wasn't. I am now waiting for activation as well - with the all-too-familiar "Requires additional time" screen.

Another thing, this is probably going to affect billing for anybody who tries this. I am going to wait for a few hours to see what happens with activation, but I will be calling AT&T to see what they have on their system and make sure that they clean up my billing situation before the bill actually arrives.

Good luck,
~ Rob

[kevinwiz]

well its been 37 hours. when the att store opens, it will have been 40. i will go there with my laptop and i'm not leaving until i can make a call with my iphone with my old number.

[Tommyg117]

I was on a family plan with my dad on Verizon. I went to the Apple store, got my iPhone and plugged it in. I opened my own ATT account and tried to port my number over. 24 hours later, still no activation and all the phone calls have said is "just wait longer, there is nothing we can do at this point". I'm really kind of mad about this. My other cell on verizon still works, but I hate the fact that I paid 600 bucks for an emergency call phone.

[goon315]

I was on a family plan with my dad on Verizon. I went to the Apple store, got my iPhone and plugged it in. I opened my own ATT account and tried to port my number over. 24 hours later, still no activation and all the phone calls have said is "just wait longer, there is nothing we can do at this point". I'm really kind of mad about this. My other cell on verizon still works, but I hate the fact that I paid 600 bucks for an emergency call phone.


yeah, im in the same boat as you, only i been at it for 38 hours.

its frustrating as hell.

if i was one of the AT&T people who have no phone at all, i'd be even more furious.

i think it is a good sign that my voicemail says that it hasnt been set up yet, instead of "not taking calls," and that a lot of you guys have gotten up and running.

ill be happy as a clam when i DO, its just been tarnished by this process, which i blame both parties for. they just didnt have they ish together at all and that SUCKS for us.

what can ya do, ya know? i wouldnt take the be patient and wait thing seriously anymore, it sure isnt working for me.

[Rendition]

Keep the faith guys. After 16 hours from starting this crappy process, I just got my activation email and I'm syncing now. I am a new customer (no porting).

[jnava]

Ok, good news for everyone that's waiting...I started the process yesterday at 9:33 AM - Activation and a Port from Verizon. Finally at 9:49 this morning (24 Hrs, 16 Mins Later!), I got the everythings good text message! Activation and Port are complete! And, for the record, it's worth the wait - iPhone is awesome!!!

[Tommyg117]

All I'm saying is that I BETTER not lose my old number because the last four digits spell out my last name and I can't get that again. I would be furious. I really just want this thing to start working so I can justify spending 600 dollars on a phone.

I've been looking forward to it for a while now and will be EXTREMELY happy with it when it starts working, but I just wish that they could have gone with regular activation instead of doing something they weren't prepared for.

[drnen]

I've been following this site forever but never registered. After following the last few days and everyones iphone woes, I thought you might enjoy my story.
Got the iphone friday- a nice woman in line way ahead of me decided she didnt want one last minute and gave me her spot- i was the 8th one in, great start!
Got home, did the initial activation stuff around quarter to 7, got the 24 hour wait thing that most people got. That didnt sit well with me obv, so i started calling ATT. The first day and well into the second day all they could tell me was "your account appears to be processing fine, all you have to do is wait. I see nothing wrong with it." Hours and hours go by, more calls, they kept telling me the same thing as I read on here that people in the same boat as me are getting activated finally (porting from Verizon). Finally, at around 6 last night, someone at att tells me.. "oh wait.. it appears that your number isnt portable, you'll have to call verizon and clear that up." I call Verizon. Not only IS my num portable, but they'd already received and approved the ATT port request. Back to ATT, "oh ok, porting now. As soon as you hang up with us, turn off your verizon phone and your iphone will be active in 30 mins." 2 hours go by. I call again. From my verizon phone that was supposed to be deactivated. I talk to them again, they finally get my verizon phone turned off. Nothing happens the rest of the night. I go to ATT this morning and they tell me that its a porting issue. I ask them, then why is my num already in your system? "Oh.. well then yeah man you just gotta wait." I have no phone at all right now. Nothing. I asked the ATT guy at the store how they plan on compensating people like me and he said they're not.
SO, the gist of this long story is- this has been the worst experience dealing with a company IN MY LIFE. I was lured away from verizon by my love of Apple and now I'm miserable.

[inc77]

Ok, good news for everyone that's waiting...I started the process yesterday at 9:33 AM - Activation and a Port from Verizon. Finally at 9:49 this morning (24 Hrs, 16 Mins Later!), I got the everythings good text message! Activation and Port are complete! And, for the record, it's worth the wait - iPhone is awesome!!!

Ah nice... I guess I'll wait till tomorrow till I give AT&T a ring...

[plumbingandtech]

now I'm miserable.

I predict it won't last.

This thing is wonderful in the most zenlike, huggable, humpable sort of way...

Hang in there. I wait 15 hrs which is nothing compared to you but it is worth the wait...

[ahmedrah]

It's late, 28 hours late. Before this iphone activated. AT&T sure put one over on us!

This is what I did to finally activate my phone.

We have an AT&T family plan, with 3 phones. My intent was to activate my iphone using my current cell phone number.

I filled in the activation forms in iTunes, and I was told to wait for an email. The email, of course never came. 28 hours and counting.

I spent hours on the phone with AT&T trying to get my phone activated. I wasted a whole day.

It's late on Saturday night. I tried something really odd. I took my wife's sim card out of her phone, a Motorola v551. Then I popped out the sim card from the iphone, and replaced it with my wife's sim card.

Connected to iTunes, and the activation process popped up! So I filled in all the forms, and, and, my iphone activated! With my wife's old sim card in the iphone.

This is so weird. Love to hear from someone else, if the works for you.

And we are trapped for 2 years with AT&T!


Joe Gomolski

Did actually activate all the way through with her sim card, or did you put yours back in??

[robhedin]

Got up this morning to an email with an order number anyway; called 3701 to check status (#3) and was told the "we're working on activating it" but not that there were any problems.

Still no phone... tried using option #1 (please leave a message), option #2 (we're closed). Checked my account online and sure enough, it has iPhone data plan on it. Of course I also see Media Max blah blah on there too, which makes no sense.

I've got an appt setup at at the Apple store, maybe I'll at least get some sympathy there if nothing else... am very much considering returning the phones and, if they try to hit me with a "restocking fee", file a dispute with the CC company...

rob.

[Zolk]

877-800-3701 worked!

I was a former blue customer. Just talked to someone who checked my account, putting me on hold several times. He then said he was going to activate it. Once done, he told me to disconnect my phone for an hour, reconnect it, and I should be good to go.

However, a few minutes after getting off the phone I got the activation complete email. I immediately connected the phone and now I'm all set!

Even if you called 877-800-3701 previously like I have several times, give him another shot today. It looks like they know how to deal with these issues better this morning.

[Aniej]

i don't know that I can take this anymore. I am so mad and the att people are disgustingly poor at taking care of this and their customers . I have always been tolerant of customer service people since they get yelled at all the time, but I am at a loss. I have been waiting over 41 hours

[bfkidd]

Call 877-800-3701 wait on hold for a long time and tell them you want them to manually activate the phone. IT WORKS!!!

I am an existing cingular customer and had to go through cingular to have them manually update my plan and tweak my account.

Then in all irony I received the email with my order number but it went to my junk mail folder in Mail! I noticed it about an hour later when I thought to look there.

After following the advice here, I called the 3701 number for the umpteenth time and asked them to manually activate the phone. Read some numbers from the box and the email arrived quickly.

She had me go through iTunes again and everything went without a hitch. She kept telling me I didn't have to hurry and she called the phone and had me call someone to test it. Was a nice experience after all this.

So call that number, it seems that they are really trying now to get people going.

[ob81]

Don't see how people are surprised to see that its taking a few hours to open several thousand accounts over the weekend. :eek:
That being said, AT&T seems like they were a bad choice.

[nevesis]

After 24 hours of waiting, an AT&T customer representative was able to activate my phone for me. After she did, she told me I would be able to make outgoing calls but its been 12 hours now and my phone is still coming up with a No Service signal.

Anyone else having this problem? I am porting from Verizon and my Verizon phone still works! :(

[paja]

This is the worst customer service I have ever experienced. Just unbelievable. Way over 24 hours at this point. I'm exhausted from dealing with AT&T. Even my old cell phone is a now a worthless brick.

I hate AT&T. I'm very, very concerned that Apple has chosen AT&T as it's carrier.:(

[pherplexed]

After 24 hours of waiting, an AT&T customer representative was able to activate my phone for me. After she did, she told me I would be able to make outgoing calls but its been 12 hours now and my phone is still coming up with a No Service signal.

Anyone else having this problem? I am porting from Verizon and my Verizon phone still works! :(

yes...i'm in the exact situation you are. old verizon phone still works even though my guy said he had just activated the phone. It's been 40 hours for me and i have the same screen you do. :(

[Aniej]

877-800-3701 worked!

I was a former blue customer. Just talked to someone who checked my account, putting me on hold several times. He then said he was going to activate it. Once done, he told me to disconnect my phone for an hour, reconnect it, and I should be good to go.

However, a few minutes after getting off the phone I got the activation complete email. I immediately connected the phone and now I'm all set!

Even if you called 877-800-3701 previously like I have several times, give him another shot today. It looks like they know how to deal with these issues better this morning.

what the hell are you talking about there is an automated voice mail that says at&t is not accepting clls please leave a message?

[mattz0r]

New AT&T customer, no number porting, just got the basic $59 a month with no options - simplest setup that AT&T could ask for..

All I've received is the "your activation requires more time" message, no emails with the order number or anything.

Gave the 3701 number a try and waited 30 mins on hold. The girl said my account had an invalid option and pretty much everyone was getting that and it was holding up the activation. She fixed it and resubmitted with a "red ticket" to expedite it. She also gave me my order number.

This seems to be the only way to get anything going on the activations.

They are still saying they have been told to tell customers there is a minimum of 24 hours to wait for activation.

[goon315]

for the record, i did expect some delays, but nothing like 41 hours.

im sure that once they get it running, the service will be fine and everyone will be happy. I will be...6 months of waiting (plus years of speculation) is a lot more than a few more hours.

Im still on with the 3701 people and we're not getting anywhere. im LOL'n at the fact im using Verizon's free weekend minutes to talk to AT&T.

:D

the madder people get at the CSRs, the easier it will be for me!

:D

[ciscokidd]

i just woke up and once again to NO EMAIL!! :mad:

i'm calling this 3701 number again to see if they can manually activate my phone... my old sim is still working though?

[the_ron]

Ok, I called the 1-877-800-3701 and eventually got through to a rep. She took my order number and then put me on hold to look up the account. Once she got back she said that she could look at my account but couldn't edit it, as someone was already working on it and that hopefully it'll be available soon. Has anyone else heard this? I'm just trying to figure out if its true or a stall tactic.

[mattz0r]

Ok, I called the 1-877-800-3701 and eventually got through to a rep. She took my order number and then put me on hold to look up the account. Once she got back she said that she could look at my account but couldn't edit it, as someone was already working on it and that hopefully it'll be available soon. Has anyone else heard this? I'm just trying to figure out if its true or a stall tactic.

I am sure they are using a few different explanations/excuses depending on what you bought. I had the "invalid option" even tho I chose nothing during signup.

I wouldn't buy it.

[jmacdonagh]

Ok, I called the 1-877-800-3701 and eventually got through to a rep. She took my order number and then put me on hold to look up the account. Once she got back she said that she could look at my account but couldn't edit it, as someone was already working on it and that hopefully it'll be available soon. Has anyone else heard this? I'm just trying to figure out if its true or a stall tactic.

Same thing happened to me. Nothing ever happened :(. I can't get through to 3701. I called 1-877-419-4500 and the guy said that there's nothing going on with my account, so he took all my Verizon info down and apparently submitted a "Comitment" to get it done by 11 PM Mountain. So now I play the waiting game.

[Aniej]

Ok, I called the 1-877-800-3701 and eventually got through to a rep. She took my order number and then put me on hold to look up the account. Once she got back she said that she could look at my account but couldn't edit it, as someone was already working on it and that hopefully it'll be available soon. Has anyone else heard this? I'm just trying to figure out if its true or a stall tactic.

yes i heard that at 7:30 PM last night. I am still waiting!

[djbeeker]

I'm on the phone with them right now too... the 3701 number. My rep (in Canada) said someone is logged in working on my account too.. but she did offer to keep me on hold to see if they would log out so she could see what they were doing. She is being extremely helpful... Praying, Crossing fingers, etc. Hopefully she will get it figured out! I'll post when she comes back on.

[imagineer2000]

Finally!
it took 30 hours from when I tried to activate. AT&T had to cancel my 1st activation and enter a new plan into the system. At 12:02am I tried again... Success!

I am posting this on my iPhone now.
:D :o :D :o :D :o :D :o

[avkills]

well its been 37 hours. when the att store opens, it will have been 40. i will go there with my laptop and i'm not leaving until i can make a call with my iphone with my old number.

You and me both. This is totally unacceptable. Even if they are manually entering them by hand, say you have 100 people doing that, how long would that really take, I'm guessing not 40 hours.

I love the message at the bottom of the receipt; "AT&T is looking to hire GREAT people!" No ****, because the ones you have now stink of donkey balls. (Actually everyone at the store seemed to be nice, I'll find out later this afternoon).

I really don't think the Apple store liked me when I walked to the genius bar and said I wasn't signing up for no damn appointment and they were going to attempt to help me. (I say a customer sort of smile, I think she liked that I wasn't going to take any ******** from them, I've taken enough already from other issues of which I knew the problem but had to be stupid so the genius looked like he was doing his job).

-mark

[wwward]

I'm a new AT&T customer without a number port. I have an existing family plan with another carrier that I'm not ready to lose yet.

I started iPhone activation at 12:15am Saturday morning. Initially it went to "requires more time" but later bounced to a screen detailing three options based on my credit (my credit report is clean as of this morning.) I restarted activation and went to sleep after seeing the "requires more time" error.

No further emails after the original "requires more time" email. This morning, I spoke with a very pleasant Canadian CS rep at the 877-800-3701 activation number. She was able to look up my account by name, as I did not receive an order number.

She pointed out that the account was stuck in a credit hold mode, and that she would need to "Red Flag" the ticket for resolution. After reading this forum, forums at Howardforums.com, and the Apple forums, I believe the "red flag" queue is very long.

I asked her to cancel the activation request. She cancelled the request, and I hung up. I have to admit, she was one of the nicest CS reps I've dealt with in awhile, so kudos to her for keeping it cool and professional despite what must be a pretty tough day.

So I restarted activation, and again my account is bouncing due to credit check issues. I selected "PrePay" as a stop-gap for now. The price of minutes on pre-pay is horrific - but the data plan is unlimited and I don't tend to use more than 200 minutes a month.

After everything settles down, I will evaluate my options and switch to a more price-friendly plan.

So - if you're still waiting on activation, you MUST give these people a call and find out why you're waiting.

Bill

[SeattleMike]

Others have said this but I'm reiterating because it works...

...call the Activation Hotline and ask them to cancel your Activation Request. It might take a while for them to find it but tell them to track down a supervisor and cancel the Activation Request.

Then restart Activation on your iPhone, DO NOT PORT A NUMBER - JUST HAVE AT&T ASSIGN YOU ONE, and you'll be activated in a matter of minutes. Then call back later to the regular AT&T Customer Service line and start the porting process separately.

Worked for me after 26 hours of Activation hell.

[maximus1323]

People...after almost 48 hours, I can safely guarantee that 99% of the problems are due to APPLE and NOT AT&T.

I have a family plan with two numbers, activated the main number in 3 minutes and still waiting on the second number. Spoken to countless people with no real answer besides "wait". Just a little while ago, I have swapped the old sim card from the old phone and put it in the Iphone to start the application again. Same result..."at&t is now processing the application..BS..Blah blah", no further email after that...yet.

Took that old sim card (which was deactivated once I tried to activate the Iphone the first time with the sim that came with the Iphone) and it is now back working on the old phone. What does that tell you??

It means that AT&T is doing their part in promptly activating the sims but it is friggin APPLE that's dropping the ball BIG TIME!!!!

The activation email that everyone is waiting for comes from APPLE, not AT&T. They are the ones that are bogging down the process and they are the ones to keep us on hold for hours. I have called the 877-419-4500 (at&t) multiple times and the hold time has been seconds, and they have been very nice and helpful. The only unhelpful a-holes I have encountered were Apple employees.

I say it again....IF YOUR OLD SIM (OR THE NEW IPHONE SIM) WORKS IN YOUR OLD PHONE IS BECAUSE AT&T HAS DONE THEIR PART PROPERLY. NOW WE ARE WAITING ON APPLE AND IT'S TOTAL BS!! THANKS STEVE JOBS....GREAT LAUNCH....NOW YOU'RE GETTING EVERYONE PISSED OFF WITH ACTIVATIONS....GREAT WORK.

If this thing is not working by tomorrow morning, I am mailing it back to Cupertino with a love note in it.

[avkills]

Damn I'm tired of hearing their back patting ******** on hold VO and music. Sheesh, I hope I get this thing going today.

I can tell this is another call center though from yesterday, the VO and music actually works and doesn't cut in and out and sound like overdriven muck.

-mark

[sikuss]

I've tried several times to call the 3701 number this morning after hearing some of you say you got through today. I've had no success as it always says their offices are closed when I choose option 2.

[avkills]

People...after almost 48 hours, I can safely guarantee that 99% of the problems are due to APPLE and NOT AT&T.

I have a family plan with two numbers, activated the main number in 3 minutes and still waiting on the second number. Spoken to countless people with no real answer besides "wait". Just a little while ago, I have swapped the old sim card from the old phone and put it in the Iphone to start the application again. Same result..."at&t is now processing the application..BS..Blah blah", no further email after that...yet.

Took that old sim card (which was deactivated once I tried to activate the Iphone the first time with the sim that came with the Iphone) and it is now back working on the old phone. What does that tell you??

It means that AT&T is doing their part in promptly activating the sims but it is friggin APPLE that's dropping the ball BIG TIME!!!!

The activation email that everyone is waiting for comes from APPLE, not AT&T. They are the ones that are bogging down the process and they are the ones to keep us on hold for hours. I have called the 877-419-4500 (at&t) multiple times and the hold time has been seconds, and they have been very nice and helpful. The only unhelpful a-holes I have encountered were Apple employees.

I say it again....IF YOUR OLD SIM (OR THE NEW IPHONE SIM) WORKS IN YOUR OLD PHONE IS BECAUSE AT&T HAS DONE THEIR PART PROPERLY. NOW WE ARE WAITING ON APPLE AND IT'S TOTAL BS!! THANKS STEVE JOBS....GREAT LAUNCH....NOW YOU'RE GETTING EVERYONE PISSED OFF WITH ACTIVATIONS....GREAT WORK.

If this thing is not working by tomorrow morning, I am mailing it back to Cupertino with a love note in it.

Are you sure it comes from Apple? I am not doubting it, but my new SIM will not work in my old phone, so I have no way of testing that. However, Apple reps led me to believe all they did was provide a front end to AT&T servers.

But I would not doubt it; since it seems to be a iTunes issue in unlocking the phone.

-mark

[SteveM8]

I waited 25 hours and it finally activated and the email (yes, from apple) came in and said to hook it up to Itunes for activation. Once I did that, it took only a couple of minutes to be up and running. My guess is that they will have mostly everyone up by tomorrow. Sucks though as they shut off old phones before the new one can be used. Can cause trouble for a lot of people.

Im heading to the apple store today again and wonder how many unhappy campers will be there.

I was not being very patient after 15 hours but now that it is all done, I am so happy and it WAS worth the wait. Hang in there!

[avkills]

I waited 25 hours and it finally activated and the email (yes, from apple) came in and said to hook it up to Itunes for activation. Once I did that, it took only a couple of minutes to be up and running. My guess is that they will have mostly everyone up by tomorrow. Sucks though as they shut off old phones before the new one can be used. Can cause trouble for a lot of people.

Im heading to the apple store today again and wonder how many unhappy campers will be there.

I was not being very patient after 15 hours but now that it is all done, I am so happy and it WAS worth the wait. Hang in there!

You think the web activation ID comes from Apple also?

[jmyhasuk]

Hi Folks,

Just wanted to share my experiences so far. I attempted to port my number through from T-Mobile, but after 12 hours, I'm still waiting. After receiving an iTunes message saying, "iPhone activation has expired", I called AT&T.

According to the porting technician, Demarco, "...something went terribly wrong in your activation process", and the only way to fix it is a new SIM card from AT&T, which I'll have to pay for. Absolutely unacceptable. Anyone else share similar issues?

[Novataglio]

It took my iPhone two and a half hours to activate last night. Just wanted to share my experience.

[avkills]

Hi Folks,

Just wanted to share my experiences so far. I attempted to port my number through from T-Mobile, but after 12 hours, I'm still waiting. After receiving an iTunes message saying, "iPhone activation has expired", I called AT&T.

According to the porting technician, Demarco, "...something went terribly wrong in your activation process", and the only way to fix it is a new SIM card from AT&T, which I'll have to pay for. Absolutely unacceptable. Anyone else share similar issues?

So go to the store and demand a new one. I am certainly not paying extra for anything that was THEIR fault. In fact, I am going to get them to GIVE me extra for hosing my whole weekend.

-mark

[orderedlist]

yes i heard that at 7:30 PM last night. I am still waiting!

Same here, almost exactly. And nobody seems to know what to do about it. Unbelievable.

[NIHMacAddict]

After 36 hours of nothing... I called 877-419-4500 (the number they used to post under the "requires more time" message in iTunes -- interesting, they took it away a couple of hours after this fiasco started). Anyway, I reached a rep within a minute, very helpful. She searched through the system based on my SSN#, and discovered that a phone number had been reserved for me, but nothing was happening.

Turns out that when I had to go back to the AT&T store to get a credit check number (after I had first started the activation), they reserve a number for the credit check. I have no idea why -- but the rep said the number was reserved from the store, not from iTunes. I think what happens is that when you go back to iTunes with that credit check number, the system fails if the original rep did not release the number or whatever they do -- in other words, it tries to reserve a number but one is already reserved, etc etc etc.

Maybe some of the credit check processes aren't reserving numbers and those activations go right through?

Anyway, this helpful rep asked me for the IMEI and SIM card numbers, associated those with the phone number that had been reserved, and said that now the application was put in. She warned me that it could take 1-24 hours from this point... but I'm hopeful that the block was released. It's been 5 minutes, no magic email yet.... but at least I now know my new phone number and I have a small hope.

For those of you who are still awaiting activation -- try calling the number above, have them search for any accounts associated with that, and ask them to associate your IMEI and SIM number with reserved numbers and put through the activation.

UPDATE: a few hours later, I got the magic email... I activated... I am happy...!!!!

[Tazzy531]

GRRRR!!!

So after 30 hours, I call and they said there was a problem with the porting from TMobile and they restarted the port at 10PM June 30th.

I asked them whether it would be faster to wait for the current process or cancel and start anew and she said start anew. I went through the cancellation and tried to reactivate. Got the dreaded "Your Activiation Requires Additional Time to Complete" message.

I'm now where I was 28 hours ago...

AT&T is definitely fckin' this up big time...

GODDAMMIT! Woke up hoping that it would be activated at this point. Still fubar and nobody's giving me answers. This is ridiculous!

Anyone else having any success?

[ciscokidd]

the 3701 number must be really busy right now... ive been waiting for an answer for almost an hour - can this get any worse?

[goon315]

was on the phone for right at two hours, nothing happened. i was told I would get a call back in ten minutes....15 minutes ago.

im calling back.

[avkills]

Well it looks as though Apple has been the one pooch ****ing me the whole time. The CS agents on right now for At&t actually have a clue as to what is going on; and not once made up some lame ass excuse. Did not even flinch that I had no Web ID number. It is about time they actually put real employees (I suspect) on the case.

-mark

[jess123]

I got my iPHONE Sim Card Activated from AT&T....

As informed by them, I removed my sim card from iPhone and placed it in my old phone... BOOM.. MY PHONE IS WORKING. BUT IPHONE NOT YET ACTIVATED!!!

AT&T is doing their job very well and being very couteous. BUT APPLE? NO ANSWER EVEN AFTER HALF AN HOUR OF WAIT...