No iPhone 3G for you

So I went to buy a new iPhone 3G on friday. After standing in line for two hours I was not able to buy an iPhone 3G. After getting to the front of the line I was told there was an error in my AT&T account that would prevent me from upgrading. Apparently some AT&T accounts were preventing users from upgrading to the new phone because of family account or business reference. In my case it was a business reference. Apple would not let me walk out of the store with one of the new phones. So I called AT&T on Saturday and tried to speak to a customer service representative who could help. After being transferred and hung up on about six times, I was able to speak to someone who handles business accounts, even though I do not have a business account. I was told I needed to speak to someone in premier support, the business account department was able help me figure out what was wrong.

It turns out that AT&T had thousands of customers who had errors in their database accounts that prevented them from upgrading. In the Apple stores, the account would show up with an "IRU not supported" error. If you got this error, you could not buy an iPhone.

So after I went back to the Apple store after the error had been fixed on AT&Ts side, I still got the "IRU not supported" error when I tried to buy the iPhone. I spoke to an AT&T representative again, and was told that it takes 24 hours for the records to get sent down to Apple's system.

So I went back to Apple store on Sunday, and all iPhones are sold out now. No Apple or AT&T store in Jacksonville has iPhones in stock anymore.

So now I am on waiting list for an iPhone 3G. All of this because Apple and AT&T require in store activations. If they did not have this requirement, I could have walked out of the store with an iPhone 3G on Friday.