I’m on a train tomorrow, and thought it was a good opportunity to use my phone as a wifi hotspot.
This works flawlessly with the Samsung Wave 3 (though the GUI to turn it on is a bit suboptimal). It turns out it’s not so simple with the iPhone – because the network operators appear to have “upgraded” the experience for iPhone users.
On an iPhone you turn on Personal Hotspot by going to Settings, then General, then Network. You get a straightforward-looking button “Set Up Personal Hotspot”, like so:
Unfortunately, when I click on it, I get a prompt to visit my network operator’s website, at http://www.o2.co.uk/iphonehelp/modem:
Fortunately there’s a button “Go to Website”. Unfortunately, when you click on it, this is what you get:
That small text says “File not found“.
I opened the website in my desktop browser, and it redirects to http://service.o2.co.uk/IQ/SRVS/CGI-BIN/WEBCGI.EXE?New,Kb=Companion,question=ref(User):str(Mobile),T=guruCase,VARSET_COBJID=11820,Problem=Obj(11820) (that’s a nice URL). The page is basically a collection of FAQs, but rather surprisingly the first FAQ is not “How do I set up tethering?”:
While I was on that page, I got prompted to use o2′s online support chat, which seemed like a shortcut to solve the problem. I was connected to Guru Hayley, and encouraged to ask her anything. Turns out anything does not mean “how do I set up tethering?”:
“Our system isn’t working” is the new “my dog ate my homework”.
Ok, so reading through the FAQs a bit more it looks like I need an “Internet Tethering bolt-on”. According to the “My tariff & Bolt Ons” page on o2′s website, I already have “iPhone Web Bolt On (Unlimited data access in the UK on your iPhone)” and “Unlimited Wifi for iPhone SIMO (Unlimited Wi-Fi access on your iPhone at over 7,500 Wi-Fi hotspots from The Cloud or BT Openzone in the UK)“. Leaving aside whether it should be “Wifi” or “Wi-Fi” (doesn’t matter but at least be consistent), neither of these sound like “iPhone Internet Tethering”, so let’s have a look at the other bolt ons I can add to my account:
None of those sound like “iPhone Internet Tethering” either.
So if I want internet tethering on my iPhone it looks like I need to email o2 and wait 24 hours, or call them up at 5p a minute (probably to be told to call back when their system is working).
Or I could just stick my SIM back in the Samsung Wave 3 when I need tethering, and skip the “Bolt-On”. Which option seems easier, cheaper, and more likely to work in the time available – and less offensive to a customer who’s just wasted 30 minutes on what should be a perfectly simple task?
Perhaps I’ll just read a book on the train tomorrow…