New Wind SIM - PDP/activation issues
 

Hi all,

About 36 hrs ago, I purchased a Wind SIM in Venice to use in an iPad, with the Internet No Stop plan. I ended up paying 20euro for the SIM and plan. I'm not sure how the total worked out - 10euro for the SIM + 10euro for "RICARICA VSC Eur". Anyhow, after waiting until today to use it (because I had no way to get SMS confirmation of Internet No Stop activation), I figured out that the SIM still hasn't been activated:

• I kept getting a PDP authentication failure followed by multiple "Could not activate cellular data network" errors.
• I eventually made a sim adapter and put the SIM in my unlocked iPhone 3GS (which was successfully used with a new TIM card), and got the same errors. I also tried making calls to 4242 and 155 and got a message which sounded like the SIM is not active, and hung up.

I did complete the following steps after inserting the SIM in the iPad:

• Unlock SIM by entering PIN provided on card
• Change APN to internet.wind

At this point, I am in Bologna, and the guy at the local Wind store didn't speak any English (and wasn't very happy to work with us), and directed me to call 155. I don't speak any Italian, unfortunately. What can I do from this position to get the SIM activated or at least get a refund? Perhaps it might be taking extra time to activate the card, due to the weekend, or something? Can any of the customer service people on the 155 line speak English?

Now I'm wishing I had gotten a TIM SIM for the ipad as well, so I could have had immediate, confirmed activation!

It can take up to 48 hours to get the sim activated. You have to do nothing, just be patient. Usually it takes less than 1 hour, but it can happen it takes longer. Buying it on a weekend doesn't help, you're right. And buying it from a bad dealer (and finding and even worse one later) doesn't help has well... I'm sorry :(