Help re. Unlocking AT&T iPhone 5S after Upgrade

[JulesK]

I'm upgrading an on-contract AT&T iPhone 5s this Friday, so I'll pay an ETF as part of the process. I'm selling it to Gazelle, which will more than offset that cost, but I need to unlock it first.

I have a link to the AT&T unlock request form, but had a few questions:

(i) Do I need to wait 14 days before putting in the request (the AT&T rep wasn't clear on that)?

(ii) Can the phone still be unlocked even after I've switched my line to the new phone? I assume that whatever signal that needs to be sent to the phone can still be sent, but I'm unclear about the process.

(iii) I expect a lot of requests to come in after the 19th, but generally how long does the process take?

Anything else I should be on the lookout for?

Many thanks in advance!

 

[webbuzz]

I'm upgrading an on-contract AT&T iPhone 5s this Friday, so I'll pay an ETF as part of the process. I'm selling it to Gazelle, which will more than offset that cost, but I need to unlock it first.

I have a link to the AT&T unlock request form, but had a few questions:

(i) Do I need to wait 14 days before putting in the request (the AT&T rep wasn't clear on that)?

Some requests have been denied, mine was approved last night, contract eligibility was bumped up a few days and contract was supposed to end on the 15th.

(ii) Can the phone still be unlocked even after I've switched my line to the new phone? I assume that whatever signal that needs to be sent to the phone can still be sent, but I'm unclear about the process.

AT&T only mentions the original SIM that was provisioned with the device be in the phone.

(iii) I expect a lot of requests to come in after the 19th, but generally how long does the process take?

I did mine online, it took ~ 10 minutes from request to approval. The approval email says to wait up to 24 hours to try the restore. I did it an hour later.

Anything else I should be on the lookout for?

You should be fine.

eta: After you backup the phone and restore to unlock, make sure you select "restore iPhone" and not "restore from backup."