Locked sim

[eva_02]

I was receiving no service today and so I took my sim out and in again. When I put my password back in to unlock my sim, it says waiting but never does anything. I am now locked out of my sim. Can you help?

[dalyer]

What password?

Or do you mean PIN?

Is it your PUK that you need?

I forgot my PIN or need my PUK

Hope this helps.

[eva_02]

Sorry I meant PIN.
Usually when I put it in it says PIN sucessful and it unlocks the sim in about 3 seconds.
When I put it in now it doesn't say PIN successful it says waiting… and it does nothing.

[dalyer]

You seem to be using an iPhone?

If so then it could be that taking the SIM out and putting it in again is causing the iPhone to try to activate again?

(Due to the stupid way that Apple do things unfortunately).

Try putting a small amount of cash credit on your account and then power off and on again and see if that makes any difference.

The reason I suggest this is that iPhone activation involves the phone unilaterally sending a UK SMS which costs 25c and will not go if you don't have any cash credit on your account.

And unfortunately the iPhone will not tell you what's happening (or not) in this context.

If that doesn't help then you may need to contact 48 support for more advice:

http://www.48months.ie/help#contact-us

Hope this helps.

[eva_02]

Yes I am using an iPhone 5s.
I don't think that taking the SIM card out and in again is what the problem is, because I was receiving no service at all previously in the day.
Also I have taken my SIM card out before and never had this problem.
But I will try what you said about cash credit.
Thank you

[dalyer · Accepted solution]

Is this the behaviour that you're getting?

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4532364?start=0&tstart=0

http://osx-sos.com/iphone-unlocking-please-wait/

[eva_02]

Yes that is exactly what I have.

[dalyer]

Seems to be a common problem with iPhones.

I googled the exact message and get lots of results.

But I haven't seen a specific fix for it.

Unfortunately this is typical of how Apple do things to make things difficult for end users.

Similar problems with iPhone/faceTime/iMessage activation (on some networks), roaming etc.

I don't know why they do things this way to cause problems for so many end user.

I've never seen similar problems with other phones - e.g. Android etc.

[dalyer]

One option might be to put the SIM in another phone, disable the SIM PIN lock and thep put it back into the iPhone and see if that helps.

I always disable SIM PIN locking myself but I guess that some people might like to retain it for some reason.

Hope this helps.

[eva_02]

Thanks for that link. I tried something that someone on that website mentioned and I finally got my sim unlocked and I now have service and can send and receive calls and texts again.
What I did was shut my phone off, take out the sim, start my phone again, put in my sim when it asks and when I put in my PIN it worked!
Thank you