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AT&T won’t unlock my deceased Mom’s iPhone

My mom passed away in July 2022 and after she died, my Dad brought her phone into an AT&T store in New York. The AT&T employee told my dad after he proved that she died that AT&T was closing my Mom’s account and that her remaining payments would be waived and take care of. My Dad was never given instructions on what to do with the phone so he gave it to me to eventually give to my teenage son.

Now in May 2024 I’d like to have my som use my Mom’s phone and AT&T is refusing to unlock the phone. I would like to unlock the phone so I can get my son a cell phone plan through another carrier.

This phone belonged to my Mom who passed away and it’s crazy that AT&T is refusing to unlock it. If they won’t unlock it the phone is useless. This is just very bad business and a horrible look for AT&T.

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formerlyknownas

ACE - Sage

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117.6K Messages

13 days ago

The AT&T employee told my dad after he proved that she died that AT&T was closing my Mom’s account and that her remaining payments would be waived and take care of.

This ⬆️

Is why AT&T will not unlock the phone. They do not have to unlock the phone. You cannot compel them to unlock the phone. It does not meet the first requirement which is the phone be paid off.

Your dad did have the option at the time to pay the phone off so that it could be unlocked. Most people choose not to pay it off because they can't use it. Often it is user locked without knowledge of the passwords to remove the user's lock making it unusable for anyone.

The phone can still be used on AT&T and will work on AT&T MVNOs like cricket, net10, and any other provider that uses an AT&T SIM card

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