If you’ve yet to buy or activate your iPhone, you might benefit from these 5 iPhone activation tips, based on advice given to me by a helpful AT&T employee working in the activations department.
1. Watch Apple’s step-by-step iPhone activation video to become familiar with the process.
2. Check & double-check your information. When you accidentally enter incorrect details, AT&T has to put a hold on the activation process, resulting in a frustrating experience for everybody.
3. Verify that your rate plan is compatible with the features you want.
4. If you plan to keep your current phone number but you are with a provider other than AT&T, call your carrier and tell them to port your number to AT&T. The iPhone can’t be activated until your phone number is “released” by your old provider.
5. If after inputting your personal details you get a message, as I did, telling you that AT&T is processing your activation, don’t go ahead and resubmit your information. That will just create more of a mess for AT&T employees to sort through, lengthening the time before you actually get your iPhone up and running. Plus, if a lot of people resubmit unnecessarily, it could cause a server overload, which already happened once.
Bear these iPhone activation tips in mind and you’ll take a load of stress off yourself, other iPhone users and AT&T employees. Plus, you’ll get to play with your new iPhone sooner rather than later… and I know you don’t want to wait.