How was your experience picking up the iPhone?

[slapple]

Picked up my iPhone 3G yesterday at the AT&T store.

I remember seeing a video of a guy who got the iPhone 3G and his box was still wrapped, so I was surprised when the AT&T guy opened the wrapping up. And he used a pen to cut open the wrapping, which is something that would freak some people out.

Then he took out the iPhone, and let it sit on the counter for a while. He took a really long time trying to get me converted from a GoPhone pre-paid account to a post-paid account. While he was trying to figure it out, he would sometimes fiddle around with my iPhone. At one point, he picked up a pen to write something, and then dropped it haphazardly onto the counter. The tip of the pen almost hit my iPhone!

I've also read that some people like to keep that thin plastic cover on their iPhone screen, but this guy took mine off and threw it away.

After an hour, they finally got my account set up and activated my iPhone. I guess that's why they needed to open the box, although I thought you could activate it from home? After all that, there were a ton of fingerprints on it. I even noticed a couple tiny scuffs and a faint scratch on the silver part.

Do Apple store employees treat their iPhones better?

 

[NiroshanMan]

That really sucks. Yea AT&T isn't so good at making the customer happy as much as Apple tries.
It took me a mere 15 minutes when i went into the Apple store on July 19th. The Apple guys told me to wait a minute and asked what one i wanted and notified me that 8GB were not available that day and made sure i knew. He got my 16GB Black promptly scanned the barcode did some stuff on his pda to add me to my parents account. He then brought me over to an iMac took off the wrapping of the box.

This is the part i loved he said, "You want to do the honors?" so happily i took off the box top and took out my iPhone, slipped over the plastic partially so it still was covering the screen. He carefully took the iPhone and opened the box and took out my USB cord to connect it to the iMac and after iTunes was opened he said it was ready. Then he put the usb cable back and let me put the iPhone back. I LOVE THE APPLE STORE! ha they are so nice!

 

[Cynicalone]

AT&T stores are full of these wonderful people.

I went on the 11th to my Local Apple store stood in line for a long time, about 7 hours. Got my iPhone 3G still shrink wrapped and went home and activated it myself. That also took about 3 hours with all the server problems that day. But it was worth it imo. I love my products.

If you wanted to activate it in the store that day you went to another line to wait on a free mac to use for activation. Now once you got threw that line the Apple employee's would ask you if you wanted to open the phone yourself or wanted them to do it for you. They where obviously trained to be very kind to your new $300 dollar investment. I asked a lot of people as they left the store and other than the activation problems most of them seem to think it was a good experience.

The worst part of being an iPhone and now iPhone 3G owner is AT&T.

 

[Sonicjay]

I had a great experience at the Apple Store as well; I opened the box myself, took the phone out and checked it out, then headed over to the activation station, where the guy was very gentle with it.

 

[Ozzhead]

Got mine like on the 28ths at apple, he scaned it with his pda thing. Then said here you go, go ahead and open it up. So i did and took the plastic off the screen handed it back to him and pluged in the mac and it worked.

 

[ki2594]

hahaha


me and my dad went on release to pick up 2 8GB 3G's for ourselves. So the employee did mine first (or tried). Took of the wrapping with his finger...not a pen? lol
so after trying to activate it for 30 minutes he said just unbrick it at home so i was like umm ok. And it was weird cuz i read a thing that was sent out to all AT&T/Apple employees 2 days b4 release stating to let the customer take out the fone and get a feel for it and then kindly ask them to hand it to you. AT&T just takes them out and connects it to there computers. But he didn't open my dads after that which was upsetting because i would have wanted to open mine myself at home :/

but yea AT&T<Apple

 

[DizzyBee]

Any O2 experiences? I am likely to be going in there tomorrow, but I won't have an hour to wait for it to be activated. Will I be able to pay for it, and take it away to activate it myself at home?

 

[SFStateStudent]

Pretty much step by step the same at the Apple Store and the AT&T Store (totally matches the OP's experience) for my two purchasing experiences. Monday, August 4, '08, at the Apple Store in Emeryville, California, the Genius had sold me a MBA in March '08, so we were familiar with each other, and he was quite funny; telling a few facts about people waiting in line experiences and their business well after July 11th, '08. I did notice that he allowed me to unbox my iPhone, and I asked specifically, to keep the plastic wrap on the front and back of the iPhone until I could get a case. He took care of my 3G White iPhone and had me out the door in about 5 minutes and handled my iPhone carefully and for brief periods of time. Apple Store highly recommended, despite the lines and the waiting.