So, I decided to upgrade my wife's phone as a birthday gift, ordered a nice new Pink Iphone 15 Plus, stupidly didn't check it was the correct storage size and got the phone sorted and delivered within days. Realised it wasn't big enough but went about deleting pictures, backing up and moving, anything to allow me to make it fit which I managed finally, then the new esim activation happened and everything seemed fine until it came about that she was no longer receiving messages from any one they were still going to her old phone which I was about to start clearing... however I held off. I disabled all networks, removed the SIM (which was disabled at this point) Went through the new phone ensuring it was primary device, only this one to be used for IMESSAGE etc etc, still no go. updated it, refreshed all the apps, nothing. Even Apps wouldn't work, figured it was due to the backup being too full still so did a fresh restart with no backup, still nothing. it would allow calls out but not in and no messaging still. Reactivate the SIM card, still no luck, re installed in the old phone, reactivate all network and primaries, works fine. Figure it was either my backup or something with the phone so went to start the return process. Couldn't do it online due to a apple watch I purchased in 2020 (I no longer own it anymore) being on my account apparently now linked with this brand new iPhone so I had to endure the phone call, couple of hours waiting and I get through to someone who helps generate the return, walks me through the replacement phone and the credit questions again due to tech issues their end this whole process takes nearly 2 hours, not counting the wait time. Call ends and I start packing up the new phone for return, print the 24hr Return label and then notice the return forms states that there in no insurance on this label that covers the return and if lost I would be responsible and I should purchase increased insurance for my own peace of mind... fair enough. I take it to the post office the following Monday, pay for Special Delivery, £12 or so and try and believe that this will be sorted easily. Package is delivered and signed for at 8.46am on the Wednesday, by the Friday I am still unsure as to why I have no O2 email to confirm arrival. So I call again because the Mobile App chat utility is a wholly pointless exercise of waiting hours for what looks like cut and paste responses. After another couple hours including waiting time I am finally given piece of mind, my return is confirmed as received and my new phone delivery confirmation should be sent soon. Roll on Monday, still no official confirmation, decided against calling because i am in work and rely on the message service, nearly 6 hours of messages just to tell me that they are still awaiting the delivery of my return and that I should wait 10 days to ensure it arrives. At this point I have already uploaded my new tracking number but this was ignored and I was told it will be at most 10 days. No help what so ever. How hard is a Return? Do they purposely issue uninsured labels so that should you choose to insure they can play the card that it is no longer tracked by their systems so it will take 10 days to find it and if you use their labels and it gets "Lost " in the post you still have to pay for the non-existent phone.
I have been with O2 for over a decade and thankfully have never had to do a return before, can now understand why they have such a poor customer service record.
6 days since the Package had arrived at their depot and still not had any confirmation.
Disappointing work all-round.
