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(UK) Vodafone Apple Watch Cellular Issues

I received my watch from Apple yesterday, I then called Vodafone last night around 9pm and it was active by around 11am this morning.

Seems to be a staff training issue. The guy I spoke to had only just received his training & knew straight away what to do.

I can't fault my customer service experience this time!
 
I finally got my watch sorted yesterday. Only after an email to their CEO - not about the watch issue by itself but because in trying to sort it they accidentally cut my phone off for 48 hours! All sorted now though. It really sounds like they haven’t had enough time to train this out to everyone which is understandable.
 
I called Vodafone this afternoon to add my new Series 4 (purchased from Apple) to my SIM only contract. After reading comments on here, I was expecting it to be a bit of a nightmare, as I have two SIM only numbers on my Vodafone account, both of which were renewed December 2017. I feared they would make me renew my existing plan & move to a more expensive SIM only plan in the process, as I thought I read somewhere on here, that they could only add Watches to plans taken out from 1st September 2018? None of the currently advertised SIM only plans are as good as what I currently have (currently pay £13.50 per month for a plan which includes for 5GB of data, but the closest SIM only plan they are currently advertising is £15 per month for only 3GB of data)

Anyway, the goods news is that I was not asked to switch to a different SIM only plan. The call was fairly lengthy & involved speaking to two members of staff, but they were polite and explained/apologised each time that they placed me on hold. I was told that Secure Net would need to be added to my account, free for 3 months, then £1 per month, but that I could log into my account and cancel Secure Net before the 3 months was up.

Being totally honest, when I ended the call, I was sceptical as to whether they had set everything up correctly, as all I received was a text towards the end of the call, which randomly said ‘Just to confirm, we've switched the age-restricted content bar for your mobile number back on as requested’.....I did not receive any text about Apple Watch being added to my account. However, 10 mins after the call, I tried powering my phone off, switched it back on, went into the Watch app & found that I was able to activate Vodafone (prior to the call, the setting in the Watch App just said something along the lines of ‘mobile operator/plan was not supported’).

Cellular now working fine on Watch....amazed that I got it working first time, that it was up & running 10 minutes after my call & that I did not have to change or renew my existing SIM only plan!
 
MagicTorch said:
I called Vodafone this afternoon to add my new Series 4 (purchased from Apple) to my SIM only contract. After reading comments on here, I was expecting it to be a bit of a nightmare, as I have two SIM only numbers on my Vodafone account, both of which were renewed December 2017. I feared they would make me renew my existing plan & move to a more expensive SIM only plan in the process, as I thought I read somewhere on here, that they could only add Watches to plans taken out from 1st September 2018? None of the currently advertised SIM only plans are as good as what I currently have (currently pay £13.50 per month for a plan which includes for 5GB of data, but the closest SIM only plan they are currently advertising is £15 per month for only 3GB of data)

Anyway, the goods news is that I was not asked to switch to a different SIM only plan. The call was fairly lengthy & involved speaking to two members of staff, but they were polite and explained/apologised each time that they placed me on hold. I was told that Secure Net would need to be added to my account, free for 3 months, then £1 per month, but that I could log into my account and cancel Secure Net before the 3 months was up.

Being totally honest, when I ended the call, I was sceptical as to whether they had set everything up correctly, as all I received was a text towards the end of the call, which randomly said ‘Just to confirm, we've switched the age-restricted content bar for your mobile number back on as requested’.....I did not receive any text about Apple Watch being added to my account. However, 10 mins after the call, I tried powering my phone off, switched it back on, went into the Watch app & found that I was able to activate Vodafone (prior to the call, the setting in the Watch App just said something along the lines of ‘mobile operator/plan was not supported’).

Cellular now working fine on Watch....amazed that I got it working first time, that it was up & running 10 minutes after my call & that I did not have to change or renew my existing SIM only plan!
Click to expand...

Still working? Many of us had it working for 24 hours from the activation then hasn't worked since! :(
 
So, I got my S4 from directly from Apple. I got the error that my Vodafone plan was not eligible for Mobile Data so I contacted Vodafone. I gave them my EID, they set me up with the £5 per month plan, and said it should work in about two hours... But it didn't. When I called back they said that my mobile plan with them needed to have Wi-fi calling and that I would need a NEW PLAN... I explained that I didn't want Wifi calling but I wanted cellular calling - and they said its all bundled together. So I guess I will need to bite the bullet and upgrade to a Red plan... £20/month for 20GB... Ho hum
 
logib said:
Still working? Many of us had it working for 24 hours from the activation then hasn't worked since! :(
Click to expand...

Touch wood, still working for me. I feel bad that all is OK for me, but that my fellow MacRumors friends are still having problems ☹️. Really don’t know what to suggest, other than maybe the following recommendations:

1. Check, check & check again that you are providing Vodafone with the correct EID number. It is a 32 digit number, so easy to get one or more digits wrong when reading the number out to Vodafone. Also, it is quite possible that even if you provide the correct EID number, that the member of staff at Vodafone will get a digit wrong (when they type in the EID number on their system). Ask the operator to read the number back to you to double check

2. Ensure WiFi is Switched OFF on your phone when speaking to Vodafone & whilst waiting for the cellular option to be activated. I think this possibly a key point

3. Power your phone on & off around 10 mins after Vodafone tell you that they have processed your request

For info, I did points 2 & 3. I did not do point 1, but guess I was lucky, in that I must have read out the EID number correctly & that the person at Vodafone must have taken down the EID number correctly

Some general info which may also be of interest to people on here. Yesterday, I thought that I had a problem, as text messages were not coming through to my Watch, whilst my phone was switched off. However, after a bit of investigation (via the internet), I quickly learnt that although you can make & receive cellular calls (via the Watch) when your phone is switched off, you can only receive SMS messages, if your phone is switched on. Your phone does not need to be near the Watch, but needs to be switched on somewhere (from example, if you leave the house with only your Watch, you would leave your phone at home, with the phone powered on). In addition, you also need to have iMessage switched on (on your phone). Tested this all out today by going out for a walk with just my Watch & phone powered on (left my phone at the office, powered on)....a couple of text messages came through fine to the Watch
 
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Is anyone’s Apple Watch still not working with Vodafone? I raised a directors complaint after they cut my phone off trying to fix it - no service for 48 hours. It worked for maybe a day and never again. Terrible
 
I don’t know you guys are having so much trouble with setting up your cellular plan with Vodaphone. My experience with EE last year with the Series 3 and recently switching it over to the Series 4 has been pretty much seem less and straight forward.
 
mcgoldrickster said:
Is anyone’s Apple Watch still not working with Vodafone? I raised a directors complaint after they cut my phone off trying to fix it - no service for 48 hours. It worked for maybe a day and never again. Terrible
Click to expand...
I'm still not working - since day one - the symptoms seem to change daily as to what I'm seeing which to me indicates they're playing around on the network side and haven't really got a clue why it isn't working. I'm being dealt with by the Director's Office though - who at least appear to be able to actually communicate and call back when they say they will...
 
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Mine started working yesterday - just over three weeks after receiving it
 
MagicTorch said:
Touch wood, still working for me. I feel bad that all is OK for me, but that my fellow MacRumors friends are still having problems ☹️. Really don’t know what to suggest, other than maybe the following recommendations:

1. Check, check & check again that you are providing Vodafone with the correct EID number. It is a 32 digit number, so easy to get one or more digits wrong when reading the number out to Vodafone. Also, it is quite possible that even if you provide the correct EID number, that the member of staff at Vodafone will get a digit wrong (when they type in the EID number on their system). Ask the operator to read the number back to you to double check

2. Ensure WiFi is Switched OFF on your phone when speaking to Vodafone & whilst waiting for the cellular option to be activated. I think this possibly a key point

3. Power your phone on & off around 10 mins after Vodafone tell you that they have processed your request

For info, I did points 2 & 3. I did not do point 1, but guess I was lucky, in that I must have read out the EID number correctly & that the person at Vodafone must have taken down the EID number correctly

Some general info which may also be of interest to people on here. Yesterday, I thought that I had a problem, as text messages were not coming through to my Watch, whilst my phone was switched off. However, after a bit of investigation (via the internet), I quickly learnt that although you can make & receive cellular calls (via the Watch) when your phone is switched off, you can only receive SMS messages, if your phone is switched on. Your phone does not need to be near the Watch, but needs to be switched on somewhere (from example, if you leave the house with only your Watch, you would leave your phone at home, with the phone powered on). In addition, you also need to have iMessage switched on (on your phone). Tested this all out today by going out for a walk with just my Watch & phone powered on (left my phone at the office, powered on)....a couple of text messages came through fine to the Watch
Click to expand...
[doublepost=1539877533][/doublepost]I just want to say a huge thank you for your post!!

I received my 40mm Apple Watch today and after reading some of the threads in the Vodafone forum was very nervous about how it would work and if it would be set up properly.

I came across your post this morning and when the watch was delivered I followed your guidance to the letter. Within ten minutes I had a fully working watch which included a carrier update and mobile data coming through.

I have copied and pasted your instructions into the Vodafone forum post I had been reading to help other people out, being this is the most sensible post I have read in days, and linked it back to this thread.
 
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You’re very welcome. Pleased to hear that you have your Watch up & running and that my post was of help. Enjoy your new Watch
 
I received my Series 4 watch from Apple (not Vodafone) on the 11th October. Tried to activate cellular data via Vodafone on the same day. To cut a very long and very boring ongoing story short, 12 calls, over three hours on the phone to 191 and multiple clueless call center operators later - cellular data and the eSIM is still not activated on my watch! To say I'm knobbed off with Vodafone is an understatement. Been with them for 25 years and customer service has never been at such a low point and its been pretty low!
After waiting another 7 days and three more calls later am told to wait another 72 hours! Vodafone really haven't a clue what their network is doing. As far as I can see they were totally unprepared for this launch. Given that they had two years or more while EE had a head start on them just makes their incompetence even more stark.
 
I found the hardest process was to actually get a pac code from my old provider three, quite a frustrating experience for such a simple task.

Once armed with a pac code, I joined vodaphone with the red entertainment plan and rung to add the watch. They took the Eid but did say they would only process it when my number swap had gone through. True to their word on the day of swapping, they left a message (must have rung) to say they were processing the Apple Watch. It took just over a day from then for it to work. I received some carrier update settings and hey presto.

Overall quite easy.
 
I've had the Apple Watch S4 for 3 weeks now but still not able to get the data plan activated. The plan is activated on my Vodafone account as I have the additional mobile number there and am in the free 6 month trial period of it. In the Watch app on my iPhone, I press Mobile Data. Vodafone is already there, and it starts 'Activating' it, then brings me to a white page asking me to wait, but this pops up quickly then it just brings me back to the front menu screen on the Watch app, and nothing has happened on my Watch, no cellular.

I've been on the phone about 6 times now to Vodafone and each time, I get through to the call centre in Egypt and each time I'm being asked to reset my iPhone and Apple Watch back to factory settings. I've done this twice already and still no luck. I've even been on to Apple Tech Support about it where they have run some hardware diagnostics but couldn't find any fault. They advised me that it's most likely a fault with Vodafone.

Each time I ring Vodafone, I'm told that their next level support will take a look at it, and call me back within 2 days. Never have I received a call back from them. They have the correct EID number and acknowledge that everything is set for the Watch plan.

Can anyone tell me am I missing something!?
 
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