Unlock my Sprint phone, please: The Saga

Wednesday December 11th 2019, Morningish

(as in carrier-unlock, not get past the lock screen)All times and dates are Pacific Time.

Unfortunately I do not have a log of this conversation. The following is all paraphrased.

I opened up sprint's chat support and told them I wanted to unlock my phone, immediately giving the IMEI. After confusing the bot, I was forwarded to an agent. I asked how much it would cost, and they assured me it would be free. They seemed to try one thing and then wanted to connect me to their supervisor. I said I needed to go anyway and I'd simply open the chat support again later. The agent assured me it would be “quick”, so I agreed. I was tranferred to Samantha, the supervisor. The time it took for Samantha to look over the previous conversation and create a reply was long enough I would not consider it “quick”. Samantha then asked if this was “my Sprint phone”, or something similar. The phone was mine, I owned it. And it was a Sprint phone, so I said “yes”. Retroactively, I believe Samantha misinterpreted this as me being a Sprint customer. I have used MVNO's that use Sprint's network, but I have never purchased a plan from Sprint directly. Samantha then spent a long time trying to find my account, I gave my old phone number, the phone number and MEID that showed on the phone's information screen in the settings, and my full name. She seemed to find an account she believed was mine, and then asked me to authenticate with a PIN. I had no memory of a Sprint PIN, and told her as much. She encouraged me to try anyways, I did. None of the PINs worked, and so I was instructed to go to a Sprint store in-person and bring my government ID and SSN. She emphasised that “The Sprint store can only reset your PIN, you have to contact support to unlock the phone”.

Same day, Eveningish, at Sprint 12545 Totem Lake Blvd NE

Again, all quotes are paraphrased as I do not remember exact conversations.

I walk into the Sprint store and wait awhile as the only employee is helping someone else. Unfortunately I do not recall his name. After he was finished with that customer, he asks what I need help with and I tell him I need to reset my PIN. He tells me “I don't think I can do that, but I can try”. He then calls someone (presumably his supervisor) who also tells him that they can't change PINs. The employee still attempts to find my account, based on Name, SSN, MEID, and phone numbers. He cannot find my account, which makes me wonder what Samantha found. He also informs me that the store I had visited was a “third-party” store, even mentioning the name of some company I don't remember. He suggested I may have better luck at a “corporate” Sprint store, and told me the two closest were:

Sprint 2028 148th Ave NE and

A store in Lynnwood. Unfortunately, while he was more specific than just Lynnwood, I did not write down the details and so I don't know which Lynnwood location he was talking about; There are four.

After all this, he tried to sell me on a new Sprint plan and phone. I was not amused, and politely declined.

Sometime inbetween, don't remember

I contact Sprint chat support again. I start the conversation with “I don't believe I have a sprint account. I bought this phone used and used it on MVNO's but never directly through Sprint. I want to carrier-unlock my phone...” and the MEID. (again, paraphrased).

They told me I needed to walk in to a Sprint store to create an account, and then they could attach the phone to the account and unlock it.

Friday December 13th, Eveningish, Sprint 2028 148th Ave NE

I went to the “corporate” store in hopes I might have better luck

This time there were two employees. The first one I talked to, I told a sumarised version of this whole story so far, and he tried to find my account; No luck. He then tried to sell me a Sprint plan and new phone. I politely declined. He then said I'd have to wait for the employee to finish.

After waiting for over half an hour, the other employee came up to help me. His nametag said Jay. After telling him I wanted to unlock my phone, Jay told me that I had to have 60 days of active service on the account to unlock the phone. I asked if he would create an account anyway, but he refused unless I agreed to start a plan.

Monday December 16th, 5:40 PM

I am in the process of creating this site you see. I have looked into Sprint's official unlocking policy, which is sadly lacking in information on devices that were bought used, and/or people who don't have Sprint accounts. That page likes to the CTIA Consumer Code for Wireless Service. This page is also a bit confusing, as I'm still not sure whether this phone is a prepaid or postpaid device. However the page does say “Each wireless provider will abide by the following standards regarding the ability of customers, former customers, and individual owners of eligible devices to unlock phones and tablets, (“mobile wireless devices”) that are locked by or at the direction of the carrier.” This would seem to imply that if I am not a “customer” or ”former customer“, then I am an “individual owner”. I worry about one particular line, “Additionally, unlocking a device may enable some functionality of the device but not all (e.g., an unlocked device may support voice services but not data services when activated on a different network).” Hopefully data services are unlocked as well.

If this device is a postpaid device, then “Carriers upon request, will unlock mobile wireless devices or provide the necessary information to unlock their devices for their customers and former customers in good standing and individual owners of eligible devices after the fulfillment of the applicable postpaid service contract, device financing plan, or payment of applicable early termination fee.” Now this being a used device, I don't know the exact history. However, given that I was able to use this device with MVNOs, it would seem that the device is not on any MEID blacklists, which is usually what happens when the bill isn't paid or the device is stolen.

If this device is a prepaid device, then “Carriers, upon request, will unlock prepaid mobile wireless devices no later than one year after initial activation, consistent with reasonable time, payment or usage requirements.” I have had this device for more than a year, so it is without a doubt been more than a year since the original owner initally activated it. Who knows what “reasonable” is; Frankly I think not having a web form where I type in the MEID and get an unlock code is unreasonable.

And there's one more fun part: “Carriers reserve the right to charge non-customers/nonformer-customers with a reasonable fee for unlocking requests.” So, the very first chat support said it wouldn't cost anything before asking if I was a Sprint customer, but I've gotten so much conflicting information I don't trust anything.

Same day, 6:02 to 6:40 PM

This time, I put in my email for a transcript. I have redacted the MEID, but otherwise you can view the full transcript here.

Abby tells me that I need to contact the owner. Not the owner of the phone (that's me), but the owner of the account that the phone is apparently still attached to. She dropped an absolute gem during the conversation: “Yes, you are the device owner but the device is owned by a person with a Sprint account.” Interesting, I thought I didn't have a Sprint account.