1. xandermac's Avatar
    I'm currently under contract using an iPhone 4S. I wanted to unlock my phone and the only option, believe it or not, was to cancel my service pay the early termination fee and move to another carrier then get the unlock.

    I decided to go straight to the top found the personal email of Randall Stephenson. I'm guessing he got it because he had his office contact me.

    After a conversation with Kelly in the office of the Pres. AT&T are
    Allowing me to buy out of my contract and unlock my iPhone 4S and remain a customer.

    Not only that they are now going to change their policy to allow all current customers under contract to pay their early termination fee, remain as a customer and unlock their current iPhone.

    She is drafting the guidelines as I type this message and she will send it to customer service for disbursement among the departments.
    Last edited by xandermac; 04-26-12 at 01:14 PM.
    04-26-12 01:08 PM
  2. Rockdog97's Avatar
    they are "allowing" you to buy out of your contract for the "privilege" of remaining as their customer? Wow.. that's freaking awesome.. Not only do you pay them the ETF, but now you get to keep paying them your monthly fee to keep their service.. all just to be able to unlock your phone?

    That's bull-hookey if you ask me. If I'm going to pay an ETF for something that they should be offering anyways, I sure as heck wouldn't stay with them and keep paying them their monthly fees.. but that's just me...

    Way to go AT&T... figured out another way to milk more money from your customers...
    04-26-12 02:58 PM
  3. xandermac's Avatar
    I didn't think it would appeal to a huge demographic. Travelers mainly that want to unlock while they are overseas.

    Also a cheaper way to get an officially unlocked phone. $199 upfront $325 etf (less $10 for each month of service).

    It actually worked out well for me. Plus T-Mobile is in the process of their 1900mhz HSPA+ update (support for iPhone 3g) so soon i'll switch over to them, still get "faux"G and save $45 per month to boot.
    04-26-12 03:43 PM
  4. Rockdog97's Avatar
    If it works for you then awesome. I just dont get the whole "you can't unlock" your phone with AT&T. I know when I had my previous BBs with AT&T they'd unlock them pretty much anytime you asked them to.. or just got an unlock code from some vendor..
    04-26-12 04:41 PM
  5. xandermac's Avatar
    Yeah. Its a stupid policy that's for sure. They'll unlock anything during a contract term except the iPhone.
    04-26-12 07:38 PM
  6. tedzone's Avatar
    By "buying out your contract" all you're doing is repaying them the amount they had subsidized on your phone. ie.. your phone costs alot more than the 150 or so dollars you paid for it. So yeah-- makes sense.
    04-27-12 06:25 AM
  7. xandermac's Avatar
    By "buying out your contract" all you're doing is repaying them the amount they had subsidized on your phone. ie.. your phone costs alot more than the 150 or so dollars you paid for it. So yeah-- makes sense.
    Exactly. However, they did not have a policy in place to allow this. Their policy was for me to cancel my contract and move to another carrier at which point they would unlock the phone. Made no sense!

    Also, The ETF also goes down by $10 per month so if a customer is 18 months into his contract and needs to unlock for overseas travel his ETF will be $180 cheaper.

    I don't imagine too many people will take advantage of this but it will be helpful to some.
    04-27-12 06:45 AM
  8. tedzone's Avatar
    Yeah. Cool. And as for the permanent unlock. I believe it's done through itunes, right?
    04-27-12 08:15 PM
  9. xandermac's Avatar
    Yep. You have to plug into iTunes and back up your phone. Then restore the phone at the end of which iTunes will report it unlocked, then restore your backup. Takes a while depending on how much data you have to sync.
    04-28-12 07:52 AM
LINK TO POST COPIED TO CLIPBOARD