PAYG Phone Stolen Sunday Night, Anything Else I Can Do?

LouLou

My mobile phone (Samsung S3) was nicked early Sunday evening 5.30pm in Glasgow city centre (Glasgow Cross). Basically I was lugging a load of Xmas presents downstairs, slammed shut the boot, and made my way off in the car. I was literally outside for a minute from my building to the car. It must have fell out my pocket at some point.

Anyway, at first I thought I'd left it at home..but my sister got a four-minute answer machine message from a woman saying stuff like, "I cannae work it!" around 8.30pm. So it's definitely gone.

I tried phoning all night, it rung out and went onto the answer machine each time. Even sent a few messages asking if they could take it into the local police station (hey, I've got to try).

The phone was still ringing until I put a bar on the handset and SIM around 1pm Monday. I've no idea if the thief/thieves couldn't get the shockproof case off or whether they've gave up and dumped it in a bin. It's PAYG, though I could watch the amount of minutes/credit/data I have online as I'm with GiffGaff..it didn't budge a bit.

GiffGaff got back to me and said the only activity logged on my account was that one rogue answermachine message.

I phoned the police, got a crime report and gave them the IMEI and serial number. Logged it on a site called immobilise (www.immobilise.com).

What else can I do? Looks like it's a goner. Should I go round the local, ahem, unlocking shops with my details?

I've read that the IMEI lock renders it useless here, but the handset could still be used in Europe or further abroad.

What advice do you have for the future? I'm an Android fan, so I'll go for another 'Droid...do you recommend any tracking apps or extra precautions I should take? Thanks for reading.

Missing my phone

LouLou

From another thread I'm reading, I can see these two apps:

Plan B: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lookout.labs.planb

Android Lost Free: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.androidlost&feature=search_result#?t=W251bGwsMSwxLDEsImNvbS5hbmRyb2lkbG9zdCJd

Anyone with any experience of these? Btw, I loved the thread about the taxi driver who nicked a mobile phone and uploaded his personal pictures to the original owner's Dropbox. What a dum-dum.

banger9365

see if you can get in to samsung dive http://www.samsungdive.com/agentappN/logOut.do?mobileCheck=Y
it will do the same as above
you might have turned it on with out knowing
and it do's not matter which sim its using or country its in,it might need credit if payngo,but they all might need credit to use the net on payngo

LouLou

My phone doesn't have any tracking devices or anything on it. No Google accounts, nothing. I'm assuming Samsung DIVE would have to be installed on the phone already, anyway.

Mickyk

There is the possibility of remotely installing apps, but I think you need a google account synced to the phone, which you would have had, if you downloaded any apps at all.

banger9365

its on by default if stock ,its part off the software samsung put on the phone ,
but by the look it might not be active ,unless you have download any apps from samsung app store and you have registered on there sotore

Mickyk

My idea is worth a shot, as I said your default google account will be linked to your phone as default, you would have needed to create this if you downloaded any app, even fbook.

Vid showing how: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uA6tcTdCQt8

LouLou

All my apps were third-party apps. Unconventional, yes, but that's how I did it this time around. I don't see the point of having a gmail I don't want when I have too many email addresses already.

I'm thinking more about what I should do to cover myself in the future. As the IMEI and SIM are both blocked, I assume all I can only really rely on now is the goodwill of the thief, or someone handing it in as lost property, etc.

SnowTiger

LouLou wrote: »

All my apps were third-party apps. Unconventional, yes, but that's how I did it this time around. I don't see the point of having a gmail I don't want when I have too many email addresses already.

You don't have to use the GMail address.

Anyway, you can also set up a Google account without GMail, using an email address you already have: https://accounts.google.com/newaccount?hl=en.

LouLou

On here http://www.amta.org.au/pages/amta/Check.the.Status.of.your.Handset it says "Your SIM is currently unblocked" (I blocked my SIM yesterday) though I'm not sure if it takes a while to register? I realise it's an Australian site so I don't know if that makes a difference.

grumbler

Just try to dial your number and you have to get a message that the sim is blocked (or something like that).