Forum Discussion
Activating an old expired never used sim card for use on an old phone?
Hi Everyone,
I have an older relative with cognitive issues that was using a Motorola flip phone she was trained to use. One day she dropped it and the phone's battery cover opened with the battery and sim card flying out and sim card not to be found. We got her an LG V40 with the newer sim card but she couldn't quite use it well. When we put the LG V40 sim card into the old Motorola phone it wouldn't work not because of the sim card size (used an adapter) but apparently the gold colored connectors on the new sim card have a different design than the old ones. I was able to locate several older new and unactivated but expired T-Mobile sim cards. Any way I can get T-Mobile to activate one? I keep getting told that expired sim cards can no longer be activated as they've been removed from the database and no way of activating them or entering them into the database again for use.
Absolutely, it didn't work but when I put it in my newer LG V60 device it did. Do you have any older devices such as a Motorola flip or similar? Thanks
I do! I have 3 T-Mobile Sidekick's, a Samsung Galaxy Nexus, and a Samsung T219 (is a flip phone), just to name a few. I have used the Samsung in Canada on two different carriers and the Sidekick LX Carbon in the UK, Canada, and on T-Mobile. My Vodafone UK SIM, my Rogers Canada SIM, and my T-Mobile SIM all look slighty different. The Vodafone SIM is from 2010 and has been trimmed down to fit in modern devices. Those devices can't access today's networks with no 2G or 3G to rely on and my Sidekick 4G does not support VoLTE. The last Motorola I owned, was a Nexus 6, which I used with my Telus Canada SIM and T-Mobile SIM.
I don't currently own any modern Motorola devices because the RAZR (2019) was not to my liking but I still have a Motorola KRZR K1 Red, but that is alao too old to connect to today's networks.
Thank you for replying. We just got done trying a new unexpired sim on it. T-Mobile activated the card but unfortunately the phone keeps saying check sim. A friend of ours who also has a special needs person in their household has a different T-Mobile flip phone using the older sim card like the expired ones I have. When we placed that card in our unlocked Motorola flip phone it worked smoothly so I know it's a sim card design issue and not network. If compared the design of the golden colored connectors on the new and older sim cards you'll see there are slight differences.
Having a stockpile of sim cards used to be useful because then you knew you had a backup when something happened. Unfortunately, now the sim cards do have an expiration date at which time that sim number would no longer be available in our system. If someone from our care teams tries to activate an expired sim card, they get an error, and it does not proceed to activation.
To syaoran's point, the new (LG) sim card should still work in that motorola phone. Are you using the adapter from the credit card sized card that the sim card was popped out of? Those adapters should place the gold contacts in the right place on that Motorola phone.
Thank you for replying. We just got done trying a new unexpired sim on it. T-Mobile activated the card but unfortunately the phone keeps saying check sim. A friend of ours who also has a special needs person in their household has a different T-Mobile flip phone using the older sim card like the expired ones I have. When we placed that card in our unlocked Motorola flip phone it worked smoothly so I know it's a sim card design issue and not network. If compared the design of the golden colored connectors on the new and older sim cards you'll see there are slight differences.
SIM cards are compatible with all devices. How those gold contacts are layed out should not make any difference and should work in any device that can be used on the T-Mobile network. Once a SIM card that has not beem activated has passed its expiration date. It can not be activated. My guess is that old Motorola phone is no longer compatible with US service providers. Devices must be VoLTE compatible to work on the T-Mobile USA and all US networks. Devices can no longer connect or make calls using 2G/3G service. There are modern phones that work like the old devices and are usually referred to as dumb phones, because they lack pretty much everything modern devices have.
I am going to disagree. I have SIM cards with different designs for the gold contacts. All that means is that they were made by a different supplier. Behind the gold contacts, everything is still the same. Did you try your new SIM in their device?
