Unlocked PAYG seems to have locked to three network

diver10

Hi
I'm hoping that someone can assist with this?

Last year I bought a Huawei G6 payg from CPW, it was sold as an unlocked phone and I started using it with my three mobile contract SIM. This worked fine, I had to buy an EE payg SIM with £10 credit but just stored it in the handset box.

I know have a new phone and I thought that I would test the unlocked status in anticipation of it selling on eBay. To my surprise, it takes a 3 mobile SIM (wife's) but when my friend tried his o2 SIM last night, it did not work.

I have been into CPW today and they said it was sold as an unlocked phone but maybe 3 mobile have somehow locked it? Is this possible, i.e. when the SIM is first used? The assistant also tried her EE contract SIM in the Huawei and it does not work. In addition, she said that the EE payg that I bought with the phone in Sept 14 would now have expired? I didn't have a lot of faith in the assistant.

Any ideas help would be greatly appreciated. I don't want to post it out locked, but at the same time, don't want to waste a fiver+ on an unlock code!

mije1983

diver10 wrote: »

she said that the EE payg that I bought with the phone in Sept 14 would now have expired? I didn't have a lot of faith in the assistant.

Can't help on the locked/unlocked situation, but I'd say the above is almost certainly true. SIMs usually expire after 6 months of non-usage. Even non activated ones normally have to be activated by a certain date.

grumbler

diver10 wrote: »

...I have been into CPW today and they said it was sold as an unlocked phone but maybe 3 mobile have somehow locked it? Is this possible, i.e. when the SIM is first used?

For some iPhones only.

diver10

Many thanks, at least I can rule that out.

Bogof_Babe

grumbler wrote: »

For some iPhones only.

Do you know which ones? I've got a previously unlocked 5S with a 3 contract SIM in it. If it is now locked to 3 this will reduce the trade-in value.

Are they allowed to do this? I didn't buy the phone from them.

grumbler

If it was unlocked properly it won't get locked again.
It used to be mainly 'sim free' new iPhones sold by CPW and it's daughters that locked themselves to the first network they connected to. They used to have a special warning on the website, but I don't see it now.

Are they allowed to do this? I didn't buy the phone from them.

Who 'they'? In fact it was Apple that supplied the phones preset to do this.

sdduk

If it is locked to three Afaik three unlock their phones for free anyway
https://www.three.co.uk/Support/Device_Unlock

d123

grumbler wrote: »

It used to be mainly 'sim free' new iPhones sold by CPW and it's daughters that locked themselves to the first network they connected to. They used to have a special warning on the website, but I don't see it now.

It's still there, lovely small grey print right at the bottom of the iPhone pages.

iPhone will lock itself to the network of the first SIM card that is used in the phone. Subsequently attempting to use it on any other network, for example by replacing the SIM card, may mean it becomes permanently unusable. SIM free iPhones can only be used with a UK-network SIM card, and will not accept foreign SIM cards.

http://www.carphonewarehouse.com/apple/iphone-6s

grumbler

They couldn't hide it better.

IIRC, it used to be at the top of the page - near the photo and the price, at least when checking out. Nothing now.

Bogof_Babe

Makes you wonder how Game and CEX can have older models of iPhones in their window, marked as "any network".

Sometimes I hate Apple :mad: .

jem16

Bogof_Babe wrote: »

Makes you wonder how Game and CEX can have older models of iPhones in their window, marked as "any network".

Probably because they are "any network".

If you buy an unlocked iPhone directly from the Apple store it will always be unlocked and will not lock when you put a sim into it. There will also be plenty of locked iPhones that have been later unlocked before being sold onto Game, CEX etc.