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Do any high street mobile shops provide an unlocking service?


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Old 25-12-2008, 21:07
TelevisionUser
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As the title says, I would be interested to know if any of the major high street mobile shops, e.g. Carphone Warehouse, etc., offer a mobile unlocking service and, if so, how much does it cost?

Thanks for any advice on this one.
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Old 25-12-2008, 21:43
upnunder
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AFAIK CPW and P4U don't offer this, but you should be able to take your phone to your local market and someone there will be able to do it depending on what phone you have.
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Old 25-12-2008, 22:31
belleville1
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The large chains won't do it because their business is based around selling subsidised handsets and getting commission for new connections from the phone networks. They're not interested in the "service" side of the equation, so repairs are likely to be limited to phones they've sold and unlocks are out of the picture altogether. You're likely to have more success going to a local independent phone shop or market stall.

What it costs depends on what phone you've got--I'm no expert, but it seems that some phones require expensive equipment to unlock while others are easy. Some older Nokias can be unlocked immediately for free at home using a code generator on the web. What phone do you have?
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Old 26-12-2008, 07:58
kyussmondo
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My old Sony Ericsson K750i cost my £10 about 3 years ago to unlock. Got my Sony Ericsson W880i unlocked just over 1 year ago and cost me £20, took about 20 mins as well. So either the second place I went to ripped me off or they are making it harder to unlock phones now so the price and time required is increasing. If you are outside your contract or on PAYG you should be able to call your network provider and they should give you an unlock code for a fee (I am not sure how much this is though). Most markets though will have stalls offering mobile phone unlocking and there is usually a stall at most car boot sales offering the same service, best to shop around if you live in a large urban area though as prices can fluctuate a lot from stall to stall.
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Old 27-12-2008, 16:17
TelevisionUser
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Thanks to all above for their posts - appreciated. I have a Sony Ericsson mobile and from my initial research it looks like they are more difficult to unlock whereas there seems to be no shortage of websites saying that they can help to unlock Nokia mobiles!

Seems a bit of a restrictive practice to me - time to get the European Commission involved then. I guess they do that as they must offer PAYGo phones at cost price or below and recoup the money long term on the mobile charges hence the reluctance to allow you to easily change SIM cards, etc.
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Old 27-12-2008, 19:00
calvin&hobbs
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if youre with vodafone they offer a free service if the fone is over 12 months old, just call customer services, i just did it with my trusty k750i,all done over the fone, they give you a code and tell you how to use it.
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