Shhhhhh… don’t tell Cingular, but I just pulled a bit of a trick on them to make the transition from an AT&T Wireless to a Cingular account. Now I got me some rollover minutes!
Following on the lead of Phone Boy, I bought a Nokia 6340i on eBay. This is a mobile that was out a few years ago when Cingular were first making the network switch from TDMA to GSM. The sexy part about this phone is that it works on both networks for a maximum network coverage, even in reaches where the GSM network isn’t fully built-out. My parents’ house is a perfect example of such a place. The 6430i I bought had been a Cingular phone, so there was no need to have it unlocked or anything. The sales rep at my local Cingular store dutifully transferred my account and gave me my Cingular SIM card.
One fun bonus of having such a big phone for a day was that whenever someone would comment on the size of the phone I would put on a faux fashionista accent and say “Big is the new small.” Hey, it was either that or make a bunch of “size queen” comments.
You may remember a few weeks back that I had paid for the codes to unlock my Nokia 6820 which I had purchased from AT&T Wireless. While European and Asian carriers seem pretty comfortable with the notion of customers having unlocked phones, this seems to scare the daylights out of US carriers. Regardless, I’m happy to say that when I installed the Cingular SIM into the unlocked AT&T Wireless Nokia it worked like a charm. My signal strength is now strong like bull. All in all a good deal without having to buy a new phone.
Now I just need to hope Cingular offer the Apple/Moto iPhone when it comes out.
