More Truths about iPhone 3G Activation

So after reading all the threads buzzing around IPTF forums concerning how activation will really take place, I got inspired to find out for myself from the source. So me and three of my friends all called AT&T from our own home phones and asked them the same question. How will iPhone 3G activation work for Current as well as New AT&T Customers. We all got the same answer:

If you are a current AT&T customer and buy the new iPhone from an apple store. You will be able to activate the phone from home as well as upgrade your data plan. No additional credit check will be required for current AT&T users. If you are a new AT&T user, you can still purchase an iPhone from the apple store, but you will have to go to AT&T to activate and get a data plan. Meaning that instore activation is only required for new customers.

She then went on to tell me apple is doing this to reduce the number of people unlocking iPhones.

In my mind i'm thinking how will this setup stop unlocking, if I received her information correctly. Both current and new AT&T users will be able to walk out of an Apple Store without signing a contract or activating the phone. However, she didn't mention if there would be a penalty for those who don't activate their phones within a certain amount of time.

So this kind of cleared up some of my questions, but it still leaves me partially puzzled. I was just wondering what your thoughts were and if I interpreted her information correctly?

Hope this is true. I want to get the new one, but since I'm already on at&t, no problem for me

Would it even be legal for them to charge us a fee because we didn't activate the device within a certain amount of time. Even if that was stated in the contract it wouldn't matter because we wouldn't be signing the contract until we were activating the device anyway. If we buy the device in the apple store and don't have to sign the contract there. Then technically, the phone is our property and we would be allowed to do whatever we want with it, rather we do something illegal or legal with it.

If they state on their contract that you will be charged a fee and you don't activate it, then it's completely legal.

I know but I'm saying, from this information, we don't have to sign a contract until we activate it. So there would be no need for a fee if we aren't seeing the contract until activation anyway. If this was saying we have to sign the contract when we buy the phone at the Apple Store then obviously the fee would come into play.

But what if while you're buying your new phone, you're actually accepting some terms and conditions without even having to make a contract? That would be legal. That as soon as you buy it, you're screwed, but that's just my 2 cents.

True, they would have to update it to be like that sometime soon though, because i've bought several phones for family members and cousins and what not for christmas and they never charged me a fee....but then again this is the iPhone 3G we are talking about

Unless you signed that dotted line they can not charge you.

hey I made a phone call to. Apple told me that you can not leave the store without either having a AT&T contract or purchasing one there when you buy the iPhone. They were very firm on that if not rude about it.