VZW iPhone 4S is not unlocked as CS rep claims. What to do?

[michaelbr]

Hi, I've called VZW for 5 times yesterday and visited VZW store in NYC trying to get help in unlocking my old iPhone 4S that was purchased on postpaid account many years ago, then used on pre-paid, then was powered off for a year or so.

According to CTIA's "Consumer Code for Wireless Service", the phone should be unlocked by wireless provider.

My phone will not accept either H2O, AT&T, or T-Mobile SIM card. I visited their retail stores yesterday with no success. Below is the message I receive every time I put a GSM carrier's SIM card, and activate the phone over Wi-Fi or iTunes (since no cellular service available).

VZW Customer Support and retail store rep all say: "all iPhone 4S have been unlocked". But MY IS LOCKED. I also called Apple Technical support to find out the phone is fine, but needs to be unlocked by Verizon.

Thus, my question is: can you please send my case to the department that has authority to review and make a change, or should I file a formal complaint?

Thank you,

-Mike.

[michaelbr]

Just want to add that I have reset the phone to factory defaults, performed Recovery as a new phone, and loaded the latest iOS software - still no go.

[pherson]

You would have to call verizon international to unlock the phone; however the 4s on verizon is not a 4g lte device and is not global. It only works in CDMA countries and or CDMA sim cards. A gsm sim card will not work

[michaelbr]

Thank you for your answer, but I cannot agree with anything you said. CTIA act has nothing to do with international support, and yes, VZW iPhone 4S has GSM SIM card (not UICC), can work on any GSM network in the world, and on many UMTS networks.
But now we are talking ONLY about activation on Apple Activation Servers, managed by wireless carriers, with a SIM card from non-VZW carrier.

I'd like to get an answer from a higher level VZW manager.

[Tidbits]

That's on Apple regardless of what they say. There are various instances showed that Apple has to push an update for the affected changes. If you do a search on these forums it is out of Verizon hands.  If you can't find the info I will get it for you.

Verizon does no coding and it's up to Apple to make those changes. Which people have shown they did the changes and everything works fine.

[Weth]

Your 4S was probably not online when the unlock code was sent out to all Verizon 4S phones, from Apple. What has worked with others and you need to do is hook the phone up to itunes on a PC or Mac and do an update. If it fails the first time (about 50% of the time), do it again and you get the updated unlock from Apple servers.

I had detailed steps on how to do this in another post that I do not have time to find right now, but if you do a search you may come across it if above is not enough info for you.

[Weth]

I found the post:

Re: I need to unlock my phone to use while I'm deployed to Europe for the next two years. What do I ...

The iPhone must be activated by Apple servers with the SIM you want to use installed. If it is active with another carrier before the unlock, you must enter the correct Apple ID and password for that previous activation, whether you activate over WiFi (with later iOS versions) or using iTunes. After the first valid attempt, you may get a message like this: "This iPhone could not be activated because the activation information was not correct. Please try again later." Unplug the iPhone from iTunes and plug it back in, or just re-enter the previous Apple ID and password if you are using WiFi. iTunes will show a splash screen with an Apple logo that reads: "Congratulations, your iPhone has been unlocked." (bold type) Below that: "To set up and sync this iPhone, click Continue."

[vzw_customer_support · Accepted solution]

michaelbr,

I'll be happy to help you out. If you have an iPhone4S that was not unlocked when you last had it on your Verizon account, it will still need to be unlocked. Unlocks for all iPhones happen at Apple after we send them a request to do so. However, we can only send a request to Apple to unlock a device if it is currently active on our network. If your phone has not been active on one of our accounts for a year or so, it will still be locked and you'll need to either activate the phone on a Verizon account so that we can request an unlock for you from Apple, or reach out to Apple for the unlock. I hope this helps. Have a great night.

EricW_VZW

Follow us on TWITTER @VZWSupport If my response answered your question please click the _Correct Answer_ button under my response. This ensures others can benefit from our conversation. Thanks in advance for your help with this!!

[pherson]

You're wrong. But must consumers are ignorant in regards to their devices. You see yours doesn't work now, obviously it's due to the info I provided you.

Best wishes. But your phone won't work.

[Weth]

The Verizon 4S can work with GSM SIM card. It is an international GSM phone in addition to Verizon CDMA. The SIM card is only used for GSM. You are correct, it does not have LTE. The process I posted above has worked by report on others.

• CDMA:
  • 800, 1900 MHz
• GSM:
  • 850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz
• UMTS:
  • 850, 900, 1900, 2100 MHz
• Data:
  • HSDPA 14.4 Mbit/s, HSUPA 5.76 Mbit/s, UMTS, EDGE, EV-DO Rev.A