Following the statement from Samsung that 'first activation' with a sim card from the country of purchase (paraphrasing here quite a bit) will unlock a phone, one of my mates, who is a huge Samsung fan, bought the Note 3 from London, activated it with his Three UK Sim card and then went to Hong Kong on business on Saturday. I got a message from him that when he tried to put his HK sim card in the phone, it rejected it and asked for an unlock code. Now he has an expensive brick and no other phone to use out there unless he either purchases another one or agrees to the ridiculously high roaming phone charges from the UK (which is the reason he has an HK sim in the first place, plus his clients and colleagues out there have that number, not his UK one).
He is livid and intends on taking the phone back when he gets back to the UK and demanding his money back. Samsung lost another customer...
Now I have a friend, who I trust, experiencing this issue, the Note 3 is dead to me. Time to move on.
The XDA thread has gone up to 65 pages with a vast number of people all experiencing this exact same issue, irrespective of what is alleged to occur after a first correct activation.
For shame, Samsung, for shame.
FURTHER EDIT: My friend asked me to phone Samsung UK and get their response and they said (and I recorded the call but not sure on the quality yet) that there is no 'first activation' and any phone is region locked regardless of whether it is activated correctly and that I can get it unlocked by visiting a Samsung Service Centre and paying a fee.
My nearest Samsung Service Centre is over an hour away from where I live. This will cost me upwards of