Unlocked phones in shops

towel401

back a few years ago it was possible to buy every phone unlocked, now places like the CPW often refuse to sell particular phones unlocked or at least they will sell them at an extremely inflated price. is this to encourage people to buy the phone with lock + sim card? do phone shops get a ´kick back´ from the network for every locked phone they sell?

things like the iPhone and other carrier exclusive deals appear to me as an attempt to usher in a new era of phones being permanently bound to a single network or am I just being paranoid? like those little vodafone-brand phones, is it even possible to unlock them?

talkingclock

i never understood why you can't buy an unlocked phone here.

it's like buying a car from a car dealer who has an exclusive contract with Shell and only the Shell filler neck is compatible with that car's fuel nozzle.

who would buy such a car????

BTW i got the NOKIA 6110 Navigator as PAYG from vodafone unlocked out of the box. surely a mistake...

towel401

i´ve got phones that were unlocked out of the box before - usually nokias that are very easily unlocked anyway. series 40 stuff, got a 3510i and 5210 that was unlocked but the more obscure stuff is nearly always locked. and nokia have been playing up to the networks recently by making their high end phones harder to unlock

ever since i bricked a 3310 while trying to unlock it i tried to stay away from the damned things.

120_Minutes

The iphone didnt usher in anything.

Phones have been locked for years, i dont remember a time when you could buy a phone (i'm assuming the OP means PAYG phones here)and it was unlocked.

and its very simple why: money

Yes of course phone shops make money from the networks, but the networks subsidise the cost of the handsets when they sell them to you, expecting some of that money back in revenue. they dont want you using someone elses sim now do they? Common sense really.

now the price is another debate altogether, and for another thread.

On PAYG the network expects some money back from you so they wont unlock it for you unless you've spent 100+ on credit (not on that particular phone, just since you've been a customer) and in threes case pay an extra fee.

On bill you can get the code straight away.

and the "inflated" price you speak of is the unsubsidised price, therefore sim free. hardly "inflated" (phone shops will usually be more expensive than online for sim free handsets however)

and places like CPW dont "refuse" to sell a phone sim free, they cant. they get them locked like every other shop. they also get a small stock of sim free handsets.

some handsets slip through unlocked though, such as the first batch of n95's on vodafone.


hope that clears it up.