On hold…

Kickass Canada Girl is the proud owner of a mobile phone of the ‘i’ variety – more specifically a version with a ‘4’ in it. She acquired this in the UK some time ago on a contract – indirectly – with one of the major mobile telecom providers here. I say ‘indirectly’ because she actually purchased it through one of the UK’s largest retail outlets – formerly just a food store but these days – like everyone else it seems – dabbling in all manner of services.

When she realised that she would be re-locating to Victoria the Girl took steps to ensure that the handset would be appropriately transportable – a process apparently known as ‘jailbreaking’, though one which is – I am reassured by Wikipedia – not actually illegal. She had no clear picture at the time as to what exact use she might make of the phone in Canada, but wanted to leave her options open.

On taking up her new post (if you need to get up to speed on all this please do start here) the Girl found herself the proud possessor of a company Blackberry. (Cue stirring rendition of ‘O Canada’!… Incidentally, I had always been slightly sceptical of the Girl’s claim that very few Canadians actually know more than the first line of of this rousing roundelay, but she and I recently attended a rugby match in Victoria and it has to be said… she’s not wrong! Still, Wikipedia reveals the following: “There are no regulations governing the performance of “O Canada”, leaving citizens to exercise their best judgment”… so that’s alright!).

Where was I? Oh yes…

I am sure that there are some very good Blackberry handsets – in fact I know that there are. This one, unfortunately, was not one of them. Put frankly, this one was a crock of… well – I am sure you get the idea. Let’s just say that after the iHandset this left something to be desired – or so the Girl forcefully informed me.

We dug out the iJailbreak and visited the charity’s telecom provider. ‘No problem’, they said, and happily sold us the required microSIM. They also informed us that we would need to activate this SIM – online or by phone – but that we would have to wait for three days because their network management was ‘undergoing annual maintenance’ over the Easter weekend (huh?!). Wait we duly did, however, and I subsequently found myself endeavoring to activate the new SIM the day before I headed back to the UK. That’s where things became tricky.

The online activation appeared to work, but the phone could not find the network. I called the helpdesk. They were closed for the night! I called the next morning. I was taken through an extensive diagnostic process, at the end of which the (most helpful) techie informed me that though the phone was jailbroken it was still actually locked to the previous network. They could see the SIM across the network, but the handset itself could not.

Two possible courses of action became apparent. We could try to find someone in Victoria to ‘unlock’ the phone or we could wait until I returned to the UK, where I could contact the carrier there to ask for the unlock code. Not being willing to leave the iPrecious in the hands of the type of uber-geek with which I am (sadly) all too familiar we opted for the latter course. The only problem, of course, was that now that the microSIM had been activated and the old SIM terminated we could not use either handset.

Back in England I called the network operator. ‘Yes’, they said – ‘because you have had the phone for more than a certain time we can arrange for the unlock code to be sent to you’. Naturally they made it sound as though they were doing us a huge favour. ‘But’, they continued – ‘it may take up to 28 days’. Twenty eight days?! This was not going to go down well with the Girl, who is pretty fiesty at the best of times!

One of my bright young things at work suggested that we should – in the meantime – purchase an adapter for the microSIM so that it would fit the Blackberry. At least then the Girl would have a working mobile. As I could see samples online for only a few pounds (dollars… much the same!) I suggested this to the Girl and she went hunting in Victoria. After being bumped from one store to another and back again she was on the point of giving up when the incredibly helpful assistant at the Fido store on Yates Street (name check for going above and beyond) pointed out that the adapter – merely a small piece of plastic designed to make the microSIM bigger than is really is – was strictly unnecessary, and that by judicious insertion and a bit of jiggling the microsSIM would actually work just as well in the Blackberry!

Kudos to Fido for being massively helpful for no real gain (other than attracting a potential future customer) – boos and hisses to Apple for adopting the microSIM in the first place (sheer bloody-mindedness I reckon) – to the UK carrier for taking 28 days to send a few digits by email (what on earth do they do all the time!) and also to all carriers who do not automatically unlock handsets once the initial contract has expired, thereby indulging in what I consider to be absurd and restrictive practices.

Phew! Time to lie down in a darkened room…