Appletell

We thought this day would never come, but the moment is upon us. O2, the sole carrier of the popular iPhone in the UK, has officially announced its new Pay-As-You-Go plan for English iPhone users. 

Although you will be forking over a hefty sum for the actual device—£350 ($631) for the 8GB Model and £400 ($721) for the 16GB model—monthly costs will be reduced a fair bit. Should you choose to go the cheapest route, you will only be paying between £10 and £14 ($18 and $25) for 500 minutes that can be used to phone any UK land line or O2 cell number. One step up from that and you will be paying between £15 and £29 ($27 and $52) for 1,000 minutes, also only to land lines and O2 cells. The third and final option weighs in at £30+ ($54+), and nets you an unlimited number of calls.

Details (including add-ons) after the break.

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O2, the UK carrier for the iPhone, has released some updated information on the status of iPhone 3G availabilitiy. Anyone in the UK who is looking to purchase an iPhone 3G should check O2’s website for updates. The latest update is as follows:

Thank you for your interest in iPhone 3G. We are experiencing unprecedented demand for the device and while we are confident that all customers who want iPhone 3G will get one by the end of this summer, initial supply is limited and will be for some weeks.

O2 claim to be “working closely with Apple to get additional iPhone 3Gs.” They are expected to be “coming in on a weekly basis”, and O2 will be posting updates on the iPhone page on their website. “The amount of 8GB stock these stores have is still very limited, and will therefore sell out quickly,” the company adds. O2 promises availability should improve from today onward.

Via [Macworld UK]

Poor, poor, UK customers, first you’re offered an extremely buggy pre-order site to try and satisfy your 3G iPhone needs, then o2 tells you that you need to send scans of your most sensitive information (passports, bank cards) through e-mail, and now you can’t even pick one up from a shop hassle free.

It seems that that Apple’s flagship store in London has had huge trouble trying to activate 3G iPhones. iPhones must now be activated before leaving the store, a change from the previous method of customers activating when they got back home. The problems arose due to a web-based activation system from o2 that isn’t compatible with Safari! Ironic, no?

More after the break.

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I was awoken this morning by a text message from o2, which read, “iPhone 3G is here. The iPhone you have been waiting to early upgrade to. Order from 8am today.”

Yup! If you’re an o2 customer/wannabe customer, you can now pre-order the iPhone 3G at o2’s website! o2 say that pre-orders are on a first-come, first-served basis, and if you order sooner, there’s a bigger chance it will arrive on July the 11th via courier!

If you’re going through the upgrade route, you will need to visit the o2 iPhone upgrade page where you will be asked to type in your iPhone mobile number. You will then receive a text message with an upgrade code, which you must then enter before the upgrade process can continue.

The website is acting extremely erratically (at time of writing), whether this is due to traffic or o2 not getting their web page up in time is unknown. The upgrade site currently throws me between being able to order the phone and a maintenance page (8 a.m., ey’ o2?).

No word on how new customers are getting on, but I have a feeling they might not be having as much trouble. I haven’t as yet been able to pre-order my 3G iPhone. Come on o2, fix your website!

Happy iPhone 3G pre-ordering UK o2 customers.

A recent report has said that O2 will be offering iPhone pre-registration from 1st July, letting UK customers have their contract set-up and be given a unique registration code. Customers won’t be paying for the contract until they return to an O2 Store on July 11th to receive their iPhone 3G handset. O2 stores are expected to be open at 7AM on the iPhone 3G’s launch day, according to the MacRumors report—the source reportedly being an O2 employee.

O2’s Ireland website also shows the following message:

iPhone 3G will be available exclusively from O2 Retail, O2.ie and Carphone Warehouse stores. It will be available to pre-order from 1 July.

This adds some more legitimacy to the report. UK customers finally seem to be getting a good deal from O2, with reduced price plans, a pay-as-you-go option, and free Cloud and BT Openzone access.

Via [Macworld UK]

There have been various reports on the internet that the new iPhone 3G will be available exclusively from O2 and Carphone Warehouse, not from Apple stores (in the UK, anyway). The reports came after the UK version of the iPhone site listed only O2 and Carphone Warehouse under “Where to Buy.” But, it seems Apple will indeed be selling the new iPhone in their stores, after all.

MacWorld UK reports that O2 is working closely with Apple to enable them to sell the iPhone at the O2 subsidized cost throughout Apple stores in the UK.

Apple currently can’t sell the iPhone 3G at its stores due to the need for credit checks (which Apple can’t currently do in-store) and because their staff is currently not trained to sell contracts, which is required for the iPhone 3G because it will be activated in-store only.

“We are currently working closely with Apple to enable them to issue contracts in store. Full details are still to be confirmed,” explained a spokesperson for O2. The new iPhone, launching July 11th, will be available in the UK at O2 stores, The Carphone Warehouse, and, if all goes well, Apple stores too.

I had a feeling that Apple would be selling in store; after all, it’s their product!

Via [Macworld UK]

At WWDC last week, Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple, announced that the 8GB model of the new iPhone 3G will sell for a maximum of $199* across the world in any carrier. What pricing did each carrier choose? AT&T maxed out and will be selling it at $199. Outside of the States, some carriers will be offering it at the bare minimum or close to nothing (with a calling plan). In Germany, T-Mobile will sell the iPhone for only 1 euro to the customers who select the top plan. Another carrier, O2, who carriers the phone 3G in the U.K., announced the iPhone will be free for all customers who sign up for one of the top plans.

So, let’s do some math; an iPhone with AT&T would cost $199 for the phone and $69.99 a month for a two year contract, for a total of $1,878.76. An iPhone with a two year contract on T-Mobile in Germany would be a whoping $3,265.54 02, and the UK has a pretty good price of $2,107.44, only 12% more than AT&T’s plan.

By reading the first paragraph, you’re hooked onto getting a phone with T-Mobile. A euro for an iPhone? Come on, why not? Then, it’s $136 a month with T-Mobile… and $87.81 a month with O2. European carriers know what they’re doing.

* Prices in USD

[Via Apple 2.0]

O2 has done a great job of bringing the iPhone’s monthly tarriffs down in price, and now they’re about to give iPhone users free access to BT OpenZone and The Cloud. For those of you outside the UK, or who don’t know, BT Openzone and The Cloud are the two major Wi-Fi hotspot providers in the UK. Almost every restaurant, Starbucks, train station and airport has access to either one of these networks, and iPhone users will have the privilege of accessing them for free.

This addition from O2 brings the number of Wi-Fi hotspots available to UK iPhone users to 9,500. All of these hotspots will be usable by July 11th, when the iPhone 3G is launched worldwide. UK customers can find out more information about the iPhone 3G at O2’s website.

Via [Macworld]

With O2’s recent announcement that they will be offering 8 and 16 GB iPhones free with certain plans, AT&T may be following suit. While Apple and Steve were busy talking about the extremely well-received 3G iPhone, AT&T was announcing to its investors that its revenue sharing deal with Apple had ended.

From CNET:

At first glance, that development may not matter to most. After all, that agreement really only affected Apple and AT&T and consumers were still forced to pay the same price regardless of the revenue sharing.  But if you take another look, you might find that there may be more to this story than meets the eye.

After AT&T’s announcement, speculation started on whether or not AT&T would remain as the iPhone exclusive carrier. This, among other things, may be the benefit for the consumer from the end of the deal. Back in April, I reported about how great it would be if Apple ended AT&T’s exclusive carrier deal with the iPhone. I, for one, cannot get an iPhone because there is almost no AT&T service here in Vermont. 

Other portions of the deal may benefit the consumer, and maybe AT&T somewhat, but definitely not Apple. Now that there are no revenue sharing deals between the two companies, AT&T could put a subsidy on the iPhones that are sold through them and make them cheaper, or maybe even free. This would just be the icing on the cake if the iPhone went to other carriers, such as Verizon, and was free at the same time.

What do you think of the rumors? No matter how cool it would be to get an iPhone in Vermont, I am taking these rumors with a fairly sizable grain of salt. Do you think that these rumors hold any water?

Via [CNET News]

That’s what we like to hear. For those of you who are really cheap and think that $199 is still too much for an 8GB iPhone, and if you live in the UK, you’re in luck.  When you purchase certain calling plans for the 3G iPhone, O2 will be giving you your iPhone for free. Yes, you heard me correctly, for free!  Zip. Zero. Nada. The rumors started from dropped hints from O2’s parent company were confirmed the other day. Along with free iPhones with certain plans, there will be a pay-as-you-go option. 

God save the Queen, and here I come; I’m moving to England just for this.

Via [Ars Technica]