Telefono Móvil

Get ready for a rant!
Ok, so this time I would like to discuss how much I hate at&t. While I recognize that it would have been much easier to get this done in the US I still don't think the process of unlocking a cell phone to put an international SIM card in should take 5 days.

Day One, Friday September 19th: I call at&t and tell them I want to unlock my phone to put an international SIM card in. They ask for the last four digits of the Social Security Number on the account; since the account is in my mom's name I must contact her for the number, wait for a reply then try again.

Day Two, Saturday September 20th: I call at&t and tell them that I would like to unlock my phone so I can put a different SIM card in. The fist call gets dropped, but when I finally connect with someone they tell me there is "a past due balance on the account and customer service will probably reject my request" this individual suggests that I pay the bill first then try to unlock the phone. I contact my mom and she tells me the bill was due on the 18th. Yep, 2 days late and they will reject your request. Payment is posted on the bill.

Day Three, Sunday September 21st: I call at&t and tell them I want to unlock my phone so I can put an international SIM card in. The guy asks if I have the phone, and I tell him that I am talking to him on it. He tells me that I will need to hang up, press a series of keys and write down the number that pops up, then call back with said number so they can help me. I follow his instructions and call back. I explain to a new person what I want to do, and give her the number i collected. She takes my mom's email address (since it is technically her account) and tells me the code i need will be texted to my phone and sent to that email address.

Day Four, Monday September 22nd: I wait most of the day for a text from at&t, i'm guessing because of the time difference they didn't start working on my claim until mid-day Spain time.

Day Five, Tuesday September 23rd: 2 AM i get a text from at&t that my claim has been resolved, but it does not include the unlock code. Next I email my mom to see if they emailed it to her. Nope. She said she would call them and get back to me. In the afternoon I checked my email, but there was nothing from Mom. So I called the international customer service center for the billionth time. The woman who answered the phone told me the code had been emailed, but it was sent to the wrong email address. Thankfully she could give it to me over the phone. I stayed on the line with her until I knew my phone was unlocked and had accepted the Spanish SIM card Molly had given me.

The moral of this story is that I was an idiot and didn't take care of this simple task whilst in the US, which made it turn into a big freaking deal. Also I have a cell phone in Spain. My Spanish number is (including international dialing codes from the US) 011 34 634 011 413.