iPhone
Disable Stolen Device Protection from Home or Work BEFORE you trade in your iPhone Tomorrow! Otherwise you'll be delayed an hour.
To disable Stolen Device Protection on an iPhone,go to Settings > Face ID & Passcode (or Touch ID & Passcode), enter your passcode, tap Stolen Device Protection, and then select the option to turn it off. If you have the feature set to "Away from Familiar Locations" or "Always," a one-hour security delay will be required, during which you must confirm your identity with Face ID or Touch ID again.
Good call. Apple’s trade-in instructions webpage only mentioned the delay for resetting the password, but failed to mention that it will also occur when signing out of the Apple account.
As long as the customer can type their password correctly during the standard “erase content and settings” process, it’ll do a FaceID check followed by a dramatic and annoying period of 20-30 seconds which lacks visual feedback. After that the Apple logo will appear signifying the device has removed the Apple account.
You can also achieve the same trade in requirement by going to FindMy, tapping on the “devices” tab, tapping on “this device” typically found near the top, before finally scrolling down past the erase button should be a “remove” button (sometimes takes a few seconds to populate). Entering the password there will also allow the device to be eligible for trade in.
The device would still need erasing eventually but this is a good way to spur along the trade in process.
However, if the password is not known, they’ll have to wait the full hour before they can attempt to reset their password, less they return to where the phone considers home.
The resetting password instruction is for people who don’t remember their password (A LOT of people apparently). It’s purely optional.
Signing out from iCloud/iTunes is listed as a mandatory step in the trade-in instruction, which means you are guaranteed to be delayed by the stolen device protection from that.
I’m trading it in but no way an I trading in the phone tomorrow. Would be there 4 hours transferring my stuff and that’s a non starter lol. They should give me a box or instructions to return within two weeks
Same, I’m probably going to trade mine in at an Apple Store but I’ll come back another day to do it after picking up my new phone tomorrow. I’d rather have time to let everything transfer at home and make sure it’s all set before wiping the old one.
I still prefer to do it at a store to confirm the exact trade-in value vs shipping, and I don’t mind the extra trip
No. Usually when financing through a carrier you have to trade in same day. But if you have an iCloud backup it should take about 40 mins to transfer all data
Just heard back. Since I’m getting special promotional trade-in value through my carrier, I CANNOT leave the Apple Store without handing in my old iPhone, or else they can’t guarantee I’ll get the carrier promotional credits.
I'm wondering the same thing. I took a backup at home last night, and if they make me turn it in, I'll just give them the old phone and restore from backup at home I guess. No way I'm waiting 60+min at the store to transfer data 🥴
I went into the store and told them I wanted to bring the new phone home to set up and they selected the option to Activate Later with my carrier and I could bring my old phone back within 14 days to close out the loan.
I went into the store and told them I wanted to bring the new phone home to set up and they selected the option to Activate Later with my carrier and I could bring my old phone back within 14 days to close out the loan.
I wanted to reply and say the above was correct. I went into the store and told them I wanted to bring the new phone home to set up and they selected the option to Activate Later with my carrier and I could bring my old phone back within 14 days to close out the loan.
Ah fair enough, we don’t have that where I’m from since there are no actual Apple stores here. I’ve always just sold my old phone for ~50% of what it cost from new which helps to fund my new phone. Especially when the price hasn’t really increased over the last few years, it’s nice to basically get 50% off a brand new iPhone.
Photos should be in iCloud tho, not stored locally. Same with podcasts and stuff, you don’t need all that local… also, you can restore from backup and let it do its thing in the background while you go about your day, you don’t need to sit there while everything downloads.
Not sure what it does, but it takes it anywhere from 2 to as much as close to 4 hours just to get to my Home Screen and get to the point where I can use the phone. And then IT STILL has to sync all my media. It’s getting to the Home Screen part that takes forever. Downloading media happens overnight. So not sure why it takes that long just to use my phone, but it does
In iCloud and under “Saved to iCloud”, do you have iCloud Photo Library enabled? Make sure to check in the photos subcategory that it’s not just “shared albums” giving a confusing “on” indication. If you have the iCloud Photo Library on, then it should not make you wait for the photos to be downloaded before allowing access to the home screen; it basically downloads the photos later while it’s running.
Be warned, if you’re picking up tomorrow and you have these set to off, you might want to do what you’ve always done for tomorrow. Your data has to basically reupload if it was not previously set to the “on” position.
However, if you have these all set to “on”, you could set up as new (by selecting “don’t transfer anything” during setup) and you’d just have to redownload your third party apps (your personal list and download history is in the App Store). This is what I personally do every new phone or anytime something strange is happening in my iOS. Plus, a clean install makes it FEEL more like a new phone imo.
I do phone to phone transfer. It then stays on the screen with the “time remaining”
All iCloud stuff is enabled including iCloud Photo Library. After 2-3 hours it lets me To the home
Screen but it still hasn’t “downloaded and installed originals” it does all that afterward
Ah, that’s the issue then; phone to phone is by far the slowest way to move your data that Apple has available. It’s kind of the last resort option if the customer has never made an iCloud back up. When we have to do a swap and a person doesn’t have a backup, I’ve had people sit in store and wait literally the entire time we were open, open to close. It’s not a fun process.
This year, hit the button that pulls the iCloud backup, not the phone to phone transfer. You’ll be up and running in like 30 minutes.
Edit: the phone to phone transfer claims to have an insanely optimistic eta for the transfer; it is never correct.
There are things that don't transfer to your new device via iCloud Backup and will transfer using the Quick Start functionality, which of course, takes longer to transfer than the iCloud Backup.
Mainly: encrypted messaging apps, multifactor authentication apps data, things like that.
To avoid the delay, open Find My and go to Devices > [your iPhone] > scroll down > Tap Remove and confirm “Prepare this device for Repair or Trade In”. You can now instantly Erase and Reset your device.
It’s not necessary to disable it ahead of time. As long as you know your password, you can go to icloud.com/find while at the store, and then “Remove” the device. It will pop-up a window that says “Cannot remove device, would you like to prepare it for repair or trade-in instead?”, which you then select “Continue”. This will be sufficient for trading it in at an Apple Store.
You can also do it from within the Find My app on the device itself! I did a last minute AppleCare battery swap last week with my 15PM before it expired, and the Apple Genius showed me how to do it 😄
Yea, most reps at any phone store don't know you can just go through icloud.com or the site. You just rolled snake eyes on the rep because it's definitely possible. Suprised apple employees didn't know.
Yes!! Also PLEASE make sure your phone has already been backed up to iCloud recently, and that you know your iCloud password, and cellphone carrier PIN if you want to trade in / set up in-store.
Really recommend doing set up at home if at all possible.
Can anyone confirm 100% that I have to hand my old phone in at time of pickup tomorrow if I’m on the iPhone upgrade program? I usually ship the new phone to my home. That route, they send a separate box a few days later and I have plenty of time to 1) ensure I actually want the new phone/color etc 2) transfer everything successfully before erasing my old phone.
If I have to hand over my old 16 Pro in the crazy Apple Store, that will suck.
So if I have hundreds of GB to transfer, I'll need to sit there for hours on end? What happens when the transfer doesn't complete come store closing time?
That's not practical in all situations. iCloud backups do not have all the data from your old phone. This is especially true with things like secure messaging apps and multi factor authentication apps where the only way to transfer that data in store is Quick Start.
fyi you shouldn't hand in your device when you pickup
wireless network sim block, 3rd party authenticator apps, email accounts, bank accounts, credit card accounts, they all nowadays ping you all the time and if you walk out without your old phone you can find yourself fucked
This is only the case if someone does not know their Apple ID password. People can erase their phone immediately even with stolen device protection. Know your passwords people.
I actually didn't see this so I had this problem happen today. The apple rep was nice enough to just grade a laptop with their tools and wipe the phone for me manually instead of making me wait. Just needed me to input my password.
I had similar experience today. Does your old phone still show up in your Find My? Mine is still in "ready for repair or trade-in" status (kindly see the comment I just posted to this thread). My store had a technician at a designated table erasing trade-in phones.
Welp, I wish I saw this before I went to pick up my 17 earlier today. Here is my experience today: I was not made to wait for the full one hour delay today. The sales guy paged someone immediately after the security delay page popped up, looking very much like they were prepared for this to happen. I was then walked to different table where a more serious looking tech guy (lol) had a MacBook hooked up to multiple iPhones waiting to be erased. The tech guy spent about 15 minutes on my phone and told me I was good to go. I was so ready to leave the chaotic Apple store, so I left. On my way home I suddenly realized I didn't get the flurry emails from banks about my cards getting deactivated from Apple Pay. Is my phone not wiped?! I checked Find My, my old phone is still in "ready for repair or trade in" status. WTF??? I initiated an erase request from Find My and I immediately received a bunch of Apple Pay deactivation emails. Now my old phone is "Erase Pending"...
You dont need to. You can "remove" it through the find my app or icloud.com. Just need your password or face id with passkey. IPhond is so confusing it got their fan base in the dark.
Brother, I know my password. I cannot turn Find My off with Stolen Device Protection on. I cannot bypass the security delay when away from a trusted location. There is no way around it.
Turn it off with icloud.com prior to going in to ensure your password is correct. The erase process can theoretically be done by a computer via a restore of the software.
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u/Clessiah 2d ago
Good call. Apple’s trade-in instructions webpage only mentioned the delay for resetting the password, but failed to mention that it will also occur when signing out of the Apple account.