Vodafone wrongly blacklisted my handset over 1 month ago

5lilpigs

Last month my phone strangely switched to emergency calls only. Turns out someone had given the wrong imei number of their lost/stolen phone so blacklisting my phone. Now 4 weeks and numerous visits and phonecalls later, with promises of 2-3 days it will be back on line, it is STILL not back.

What can I do, it is beyond stupid now:mad:

bubblesmoney

5lilpigs wrote: »

Last month my phone strangely switched to emergency calls only. Turns out someone had given the wrong imei number of their lost/stolen phone so blacklisting my phone. Now 4 weeks and numerous visits and phonecalls later, with promises of 2-3 days it will be back on line, it is STILL not back.

What can I do, it is beyond stupid now:mad:

send them a letter before action for compensation for lost service and damage to your device because of their action / inaction. who gave the wrong IMEI, you might have a claim against them as well as your property (phone) was damaged in the process. speak to CAB if they can guide you in the matter. speak to complaints section of voadafone to see if an amicable settlement can be reached. was the IMEI mistake vodafones fault or another networks fault, you will have a claim against who ever made the error. send a subject access request and collect all the information, they cannot deny you a subject access request for your data. see what it says in the data you get. in the mean time use your sim in an old phone that you may have and then get compensation for your damaged phone. i dont know if a phone once blocked IMEI can be reversed. hope others can shed more light on the IMEI block reversing issue.

"Blacklist of stolen devices
When mobile equipment is stolen or lost the owner can typically contact their local operator with a request that it should be blocked. If the local operator possesses an Equipment Identity Register (EIR), it then will put the device IMEI into it, and can optionally communicate this to the Central Equipment Identity Register (CEIR) which blacklists the device in all other operator switches that use the CEIR. With this blacklisting in place the device becomes unusable on any operator that uses the CEIR, making theft of mobile equipment a useless business proposition, unless for parts." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Mobile_Equipment_Identity

"It is typically not possible to unblock numbers listed in error on all networks. In the UK, however, the IMEI can be unlisted, but the user who initially blocked the IMEI must quote a password chosen at the time the block was applied."

ps: have you tried querying this issue on vodafone forums. they might be quicker responding there. just a guess though. try sending a pm to the vodafone reps on here, they might not be checking all the threads here on mse but i have seen some official vodafone reps here.

5lilpigs

bubbles!!! Thankyou many times for a truly helpful post!! Maybe, as you have highlighted, the main error in unlisting is the lack of 'password' from the original blocker. I will be writing a letter/email? requesting the subject access request and I'll hunt down the vodafone forums to see what else can be done. I'm just sick of always being the personwho seems to by the tin of soup with the fly in, or the bike with the wonky wheel and doing nothing. Shame it wasn't my lotto numbers that were accidently picked out, lol.

Once again, many thanks bubbles:T

nickmack

bubblesmoney wrote: »

send them a letter before action for compensation for lost service and damage to your device because of their action / inaction. who gave the wrong IMEI, you might have a claim against them as well as your property (phone) was damaged in the process. speak to CAB if they can guide you in the matter. speak to complaints section of voadafone to see if an amicable settlement can be reached. was the IMEI mistake vodafones fault or another networks fault, you will have a claim against who ever made the error.

It should be quite difficult to give an incorrect but valid IMEI in error, as they contain a checksum value. My guess is the OP's IMEI was either cloned or the network messed up when they did the block.

5lilpigs

I sent an email and visited the store again on Wednesday 'Should be back on in 2-3 days' I wasn't surprised this morning that its not on though. And no response from Vodafone about the email either.

Now, I wonder, the handset was given as a refurbished handset in early June as the original, brand new, handset with contract was un fixable. Do you think that maybe this refurbished handset itself may be the cause of the trouble? ie the cloning/network error.