Replacement iPhone procedure walkthrough

I picked my iPhone on launch day in the UK (November 9th) and after making a few calls several friends complained of a “creaking” sound coming down the phone.

I eventually narrowed the sound down to the plastic housing for the speaker and microphone, applying gently pressure to the sides of the housing when holding the phone caused the plastic to flex and creak. As the microphone is housed in this area the small sound was greatly amplified down the line to my friends.

I took a trip back to the Carphone Warehouse the next morning, explained and demonstrated the problem and they instantly agreed it was a fault and would issue a replacement. The problem was none of the sales staff were able to talk me through the exchange procedure for the iPhone as I was the first to return a faulty iPhone. They seemed to be under the impression when I connected the replacement iPhone to iTunes I would have to start a new 18 months contract and ask for a refund and termination of the previous contract. This seemed ludicrous to me so after an hour wait in store whilst they called somebody for advice they finally gave me a new iPhone but removed the SIM from my old faulty phone and installed it in the new one.

That was it as far as they were concerned, it should just work! WTF of course it won’t, I powered it on in front of them to prove my point, and sure enough the phone was in Emergency Call only mode until I connected to iTunes.

Somebody then reassured me that iTunes would recognise the phone as a replacement and I’d simply have to enter my old number to migrate my account to the newer handset. This brought up a new problem, since I was migrating from Vodafone to O2 and was porting my number, I had been issued with a temporary O2 phone number for 7 days. Did I enter this temporary O2 number or my number being ported across if iTunes asked?….blank faces from all the staff again!

I left the store and decided to just try it and see what happened, and for the benefit of anybody else wandering how the replacement iPhone process differs from the new sign up procedure I took screen shots at each stage:

Step 1: First Screen shown when replacement iPhone connected.

iphone_upgrade_01.png

Step 2: iTunes knows an iPhone is already registered to my account and asks for my existing mobile number. At this stage I decide to enter the temporary mobile number that I’ve been assigned until my number ports from my old network.

iphone_upgrade_02.png

Step 3: It then asks me to confirm my Apple ID and password.

iphone_upgrade_03.png

Step 4: A brief wait while it checks my Apple ID against the mobile number given.
iphone_upgrade_04.png

Step 5: I am then asked to review the Bill name and change to mobile number. I notice that it’s defaulted to the 9991231234 phone number for some reason but I go with it and see what happens.

iphone_upgrade_05.png

Step 6: I’m presented with an error saying the iTunes store may be busy!

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Step 7: I’m then present with the same review your O2 account information page but this time it’s picked up my O2 username and external email address I signed up to O2 with along with the temporary phone number I previously entered.

iphone_upgrade_08.png

Step 8: Another short wait while it processes my activation. You’ll notice that it didn’t ask me to agree to any T&C’s again, nor did it ask me to verify my tariff.

iphone_upgrade_09.png

Step 9: Activation complete it now asks if I wish to restore a backup taken from my previously faulty iPhone.

iphone_upgrade_10.png

Step 10: I chose the most recent backup and hit continue and it takes a few seconds to restore the backup. (note I didn’t have any music or photos in the backup simply contacts, calendar and email settings)

iphone_upgrade_11.png

Step 11: All done. The replacement phone is now connected to my iTunes and O2 accounts, the old phone contents have been restored on the new iPhone and I’m all set to go.

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