65 years old & very sad

valneal

My Nokia 3310 was knocked into thetoilet last night (don’t ask) and I haev absolutely no idea what to do. Pease help, in plain English. I have ordered a new one; the old one was dreid and left open in airing cupboard over night and is now in a bag of rice. I genuinely feel helpless. Can I rescue the hundreds of phone numbers? Will the old sim work in the new phone? I have no idea what to do. PLease help.

chinsndips

valneal If the number were saved on the sim (not phone) I believe they should work in your new phone as long as the sim card is ok. Please, correct me if I am wrong.

tonic98

valneal welcome
usually with the old nokias the numbers are saved on the phone I’m pretty sure

lmort57

valneal Thank you for contacting the giffgaff Community.

If the SIM did not get damaged when it got wet and works and your numbers were stored on the SIM and not the Phone Memory then you should be able to get to the numbers if they are indeed stored on the SIM, however, if the phone is dead and wont start when dried out and numbers are stored on it’s memory and if the SIM doesn’t work in a new phone and got damaged then this will not be an option, you will then need to do a SIM Swap to get your number working again on a new SIM in a new phone, but, you will have lost your numbers if you cannot get to them on the SIM or Phone’s Memory!

Carrying out a SIM Swap will keep your current number and any Goodybag or Airtime Credit that’s on your giffgaff Account, below is the procedure do this:

If you need to you can order a new FREE SIM card from https://www.giffgaff.com/free-sim-cards.

However, rather than wait for the replacement SIM to arrive by post you could do a SIM Swap straight away if you have any other giffgaff SIMs lying around (or can get your hands on one quickly) which hasn’t been already activated. This is faster than requesting a Replacement SIM by post and will get you back up and running faster. You can also pickup a giffgaff SIM for about £1 from a number of High Street Stores like Poundland, Poundstretcher, B&M Stores, Tesco and other Stores.

There can be a delay when you do the SIM swap, so do it during a non-important time! It should be done and fully Activated again that day though, please remember SIM Swaps cannot be done between the hours of 9.30pm and 4.30am. Please be patient the SIM swap usually is completed in 30 minutes however, during busier periods it can take up to 24 hours to fully complete. It’s a good idea you turn your mobile device off and on periodically to see if that helps.

PROCEDURE TO CARRY OUT A SIM SWAP

Once your new SIM is with you Login to your existing giffgaff account https://www.giffgaff.com/dashboard and then go to this page: https://www.giffgaff.com/profile/details#simswap

Enter the 6 digit activation code on your new SIM card and click “Activate your SIM”.

This is where SIM Swap starts. You’ll be told that you are about to carry out a SIM swap. You can make sure that the new SSN codes match the new SIM (it is the code on the back of the sim card). All good? Then, press “Yes, I want to replace my SIM”

You will then be asked if you are sure you want to do a sim swap. Click “Yes I’m sure” to complete the process.

Once you have pressed “Yes I’m sure”, you will be taken back to My giffgaff where your dashboard will read “We’re activating your SIM”.

Once the SIM is fully activated your phone number, goodybag and airtime credit will show.

If the SIM swap has not completed after 24 hours then you ask a giffgaff agent to investigate further. A giffgaff agent can be contacted simply by following this link https://support2.giffgaff.com/app/ask/SIM-and-number/Performing-a-SIM-Swap/form/.

Please note it can take up to 24 hours for a giffgaff agent to reply to your question. giffgaff Agents work from 8am until 11pm Monday to Friday and 8am until 10pm Saturday and Sunday.

See the image below for a visual guide on the steps for performing a SIM Swap…

Image showing the 4 steps of performing a SIM swap: ordering a new SIM, activating the replacement, confirming the swap, and waiting 24 hours.
^{^{Image from the giffgaff unofficial community help website.}}

figment_uk

valneal

Rescuing the numbers without a separate backup will only be possible if the phone turns on after drying it out, or the numbers are stored on the SIM (and it still works - it should as it’s solid state)

If you’ve bought another 3310 pop the SIM in and try it. If it doesn’t work, buy a giffgaff SIM from a local shop (£1 or less). Ignore everything printed on the SIM pack and activate the SIM while you are logged into the account your number is registered on.

lawhui

Hi valneal

That’s an unfortunate accident. Whilst the Nokia 3310 has definitely stood the test of time (and abuse) it is not invincible. Phone numbers can be stored on a SIM (and/or Phone)and has the capacity of up to 200. Unfortunately, contact details stored on the SIM will only be stored on that SIM (unless you opted to choose to store numbers on your phone as well). This means that if your SIM does not work you will lose all the numbers. Swapping a SIM (SIM Swap) only syncs the new SIM to your account, no other information (in your case, stored phone numbers) is (or can be) transferred. The SIM can survive the water if there wasn’t an electrical surge to it. Only by placing your SIM into another working phone will let you know.

Water damage will be one of the ways that can kill the phone. Whether phone will survive will depend on the severity of how much water went into the phone. You’ve done the correct thing by attempting to dry the SIM hopefully the phone too? Just to point out that a using a bag of rice to dry something is just an old wife’s tale, it’s as good as a chocolate fire guard.

Since you stated that you have hundreds of phone number it would suggest that you might have store it on your phone. Under no circumstances should you attempt to turn on your phone until it has fully dried. Make sure you take off all the covers, the battery and any casing you are able to and make sure to fully dry it, air dried. After you are satisfied the phone is dried after say a few days, re-assemble the phone and attempt to turn it on. With some luck, the phone can be turned on and works to some degree copy all of the phone numbers by hand.

If the phone does not turn on. Then you’re out of luck, I’m sorry but there is nothing much else you can do.

edb37

Hi, I have old nokia myself. It has a micro sd card, not certain but think the numbers are stored on it. May be worth checking.

usmahn123

if you had the numbers saved to the sim then it will be stored if not you would need to hope the phone works to get the contacts of it

valneal

Thank you to all of you who have replied; I have been distracted over the past couple of days mostly because my husband is in some fairly challenging treatment for cancer, so have not been able to get back to check for your helpful responses. Very grateful.

What I have done is stash the (thoroughly wiped-down + dried 1st overnight high in warm airing cupboard ) phone, all opened up, in a big bag of rice, checking every day or so to see if it improves. I trust old wives, being one myslef ;o)

There is essentially no improvment from the wy it behaved 24 hours after its brief swim. The phone gets as far as reluctantly booting up (with that horrid Nokia chime), and – maddeningly – stays alive for just long enough for me to be able to see that it still has on board all of my old phone numbers & even my most recent text messages. Then the phone screen goes black - it never stays awake for more than a few moments. Ths is with my old SIM in, plus either a freshly charged new battery or the battery that took a swim. Makes no difference.

Any further advice, anybody?

Meanwhile, have re-ordered, received & charged up a new Nokia3310 (to avoid some well-meaning person giving/forcing me to accept/buy a smartphone, which I absolutely do not want). The old Sim brought across to the new phone an unispiring 8 phone numbers (4 of them giffgaff’s; gee thanks…not what I would have prioritised, guys…).

So am, miserably, facing trying to reassemble decades worth of phone numbers - while juggling the rest of an already quite overloaded life.

Have tried to use Settings to convince the new Nokia to use as its preferred storage the 32G memory card (which was also in the drowned Nokia). But I have no faith in this working. Any advice on this too?

Am sure there must be a lesson in this somewhere…

alexmgg2

valneal

It looks like you’ve done all the right things, and achieved more success than most people - most phones that go swimming never work at all!. If might be worth continuing with the drying out process for a few more days, say up to a week. It’s unlikely to make things worse, and it just might improve things enough to let you recover the numbers. Don’t hold your breath though.

Unfortunately, unless you had previously set the drowned phone to store contact details on the memory card, it probably won’t have saved anything there. It’s also possible that the card may have been damaged. You could try using a data recovery app to see if you can get anything off it - I have had some success in doing this in the past, using very technical software, but I believe that there are more user friendly apps available now.

I quite respect your choice to not have a smartphone - it took me a long time to move into the 21st century! But I’ll just make the observation that most smartphones have the facility to automatically backup contact details to “the cloud” - a trendy buzzphrase meaning servers run by the manufacturer or Google, which allows (relatively) easy retrieval should anything happen to the phone.

Good luck!