Unable to activate AT&T BB
 

Hi, we are only allowed to perform a wireless activation on our network. We do not host the BES, it is in another country. Had a user replace her 8700 with a AT&T 8800 she bought on eBay. Everytime we try to activate it we get an error message. I'm not the BES admin, nor guru. I was told by the BB provider here that the AT&T BB is probably locked down and it won't be able to be used overseas.

Is this correct?

Sorry if this is posted in the wrong category.

TIA,

~n

She gets an error message? What is the error message?

I would think that the device is not provisioned for Enterprise Activation. I would have her call AT&T and have her verify it's provisioned correctly.

The error message when trying to activate is the classic "The server is not responding, please contact your systems administrator". It errors out immediately after entering the activation password.

This is a USA AT&T purchased BB from eBay we are trying to activate it on a South American provider.

Any other way we can find out if it's not provisioned for Enterprise activation?

Thanks,

~n

She would need to contact her carrier and verify she has the BlackBerry Enterprise data plan.

Enterprise plan
 

Hi, thanks for responding. We have several BB's with the BB Service provider, the BES server is hosted in another country.

We are usually able to enter the activation password and after a few attempts get it to synchronize, but as I mentioned I get the error message immediately.

Only difference with the BB and all of our others is this one was a prior AT&T BB. We have purchased other BB's from the USA but they had not previously been used with a provider.

I'm tasked with making the decision why it's not working, as the user paid $175 for it and does not want to buy another one if not necessary.

Thanks,

~n

First things first.. Who did she buy it from on EBAY? I just had a user buy a New In Box Pearl from Ebay. Had the same issues. Come to find out said blackberry was not NIB, and had been registered or tried to be registered with RIM for 20 people. Call RIM and have them check the PIN. More than likely the PIN is blocked because the device was at one point reported stolen.

Tell your users if they are trying to buy any device from Ebay to get the Pin from the seller and call Blackberry. They will tell you if it is available to be put on the BES. I think we should still lobby RIM to put a Pin check tool on their tech website. That would save us ALL alot of heartache. I worked on my users device for 8 hours back and forth with AT&T before they were able to find that the PIN had been blocked. Oh and there is no way to unblock the Pin once it has been blocked.

Good luck!

If your users are buying a used BB from any place, not just eBay, the advice above should be heeded.

Here is a FAQ article as well. Buying a BlackBerry off eBay - BlackBerryFAQ

W00t! Now I'm getting somewhere! I'll check on it today.