iPhone activation hell ends

I bought the iPhone on Friday evening, eagerly awaiting activation. On Saturday I called activation support and was told to keep waiting. On Sunday, I called activation support and was told to keep waiting but make sure my iPhone was connected to iTunes at all times.

This morning I called, and the tech support person asked me a few questions. Then she said my account showed that AT&T needs more information from me, but she didn’t know what, and that there was another line I needed to call to take care of the problem. She also told me that line has a one hour wait. I called the other number, chose “iPhone Activation Status” and entered the order number I received via email, and then was told there would be a long wait. A few seconds later a support person connected, she asked me to confirm two numbers from the iPhone’s box, and the phone was activated a few minutes later. I have no idea what information they needed from me, since they already had the identification numbers associated with the phone.

I don’t know why this problem wasn’t caught the first two times I spoke with support.

Anyway, the iPhone is finally alive and kicking, but I haven’t had much chance to use it. I will say that the iPhone is as different from a regular cellular phone as the original Mac OS was from DOS. I haven’t used any of the smart phones that are available these days, so I can’t compare them with the iPhone.

In the course of dealing with these problems, I learned that the number for iPhone activation support is 877-777-4189, and the number to get your activation status (if you have already received your order number) is 877-800-3701, then option #2.