Help on Upgrading Phones.....

Hi,
I have a cell phone which I would want to upgrade. My service provider is ATT and I would like to get a new phone. I was thinking about purchasing a phone online that is unlocked. My phone is still activated and I was wondering if I purchase a new unlocked phone, will my sim card work in the new phone? Will I have to call ATT to activate it or will it work automatically once I slip the sim card in the new phone?

Thanks

Hello,
Ok couple things. How old is your phone??? Because the sim card technology is fairly new. Do you know if your phone really has sim technology or not? If your not sure then take the back off the phone or remove the battery. The sim card will be this little blue square of credit card plastic clipped into the phone some how.

Now if you have a sim card.
Yes you can just place your old card into the new phone and the number will transfer over, BUT this will do a couple things. ONE: your going to have to go into your contacts list and transfer them all to the sim card. By default all phone numbers are stored on the phone until that gets full then they move over to the sim card. TWO: If you plan on doing this your going to be taking a risk because 1: AT&T customer service won't help you at all if you have phone related issues they see that your on your old phone and when you call complaining about the new one your going to get laughed at. 2: Using a sim card linked to Phone A in Phone B voids the warrenty on both phones. Even though what your doing is technically feasible they can say it was a compatiblity issue. 3: I am not a SIM Card guru so I can't say for sure that it will work. I am basising it on my experience changing cards around in my store to transfer phone lists to new phones and just by playing around.

Also if you goto an AT&T cell store you can just buy a phone there that will be the same price pretty much as buying it online. The only way you get a discount on phones is if you purchase a new place.

Here are some helpful tips for you there. If your not currenlty in a contract or are within 3 months of the end of your contract ask the dealer how much your onelink credit would be if you resigned for 2 years. Also him to call customer service and see how much CUP Credit you would have. THese are two credits you would recieve for signing up for another 2 year contract and buying a new phone.

This is what I was asking about in my other post. Since you have At&t, they have an exchange policy to either replace your phone or allow you to upgrade. All cellular providers use a third party company by the name of lock-line. With at&t, you can order insurance exchange or warranty exchange programs to your services, here's the difference.

In insurance, i think it's $5 extra to your bill a month, plus a $35 deductible per claim. Depending on what phone you have, you can call and order a new phone. Here's the kicker tho, because we have GSM (im assuming ur not on At&t TDMA), when you get new phones, sim cards can be swapped to any phone. You could call and say you recieved a new phone that you want an exchange for, and it would take 24 - 48 hours for the exchange process to occur. The disadavantages include the $35 deductible and the fact that you can only make 2 exchanges per year. This generally covers lost or stolen phones so they don't expect your old one back. You could sell it on Ebay or something. They do take exceptions that you broke it or something.

My favorite of the two however, is the warranty exchange program. For $5 a month as well (be very specific when you call at&t to order this, warranty exchange and insurance are about the same but very different), you have the option to call lock-line and say you want to exchange your phone. If they no longer carry your phone in stock, they will replace it with the successor. Otherwise, you could say you want to upgrade, and they'll charge the difference in the value of your phone, and whichsoever phone you choose to your account (depending on your phone value, this could be could). Or, you can also find a broken or non-functioning model of the phone you want, call the warranty exchange, give them the imei of the phone, and they will send you a replacement for that. The thing about the warranty exchange program is that they really don't care what you choose to do with the phone, their only concern is whatever phone you call in for, you need to send the defective phone that you said you had back to them. If this phone is not what they are expecting, they charge the cost of the new phone to your account.

I love At&t for this. This is why i'll miss them when cingular takes over.

Hear what I heard about contract service.

If you want unlocked phone. Not that easy. Most time one carries dont let you use same with other services. It exclusive kind of thing.

Kind of like

Verzion/Sprint/Nextel/Cingular have manfucators make certain phones for certain carriers

Verzion - has LGS

Spring - I am not sure which ones "Ercissons or Sambien"

Nextel - Motoral

Cingular - Noxia


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Oh one other than you have make your contract up for what ever time you select to sign 1 or 2 or 3 at the most.

Other wise there early termation fee
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The sim card some can be change and others can't

Cingular you can change the sim card on Noxia

I dont know about the other providers.

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If you have warranty on it for 1 or 2 years. Insurance just say something wrong my phone giving them good excuse. Sometimes they have upgrade plans. You can phone for cheaper or no cost.

Forgive in spelling of each cell phone. its 2:30 p.m and i am kind of tired.

If you dont want AT &T when you services is up

You always keep the phone and have small shop activate it as pre-paid service.