Sounds like they make a lot of money since I believe they are paying around $150 to buy a used 5S, probably less for a 16 Gb model. For $399 you could have bought one of the new iPod Touch with the A8 processor and used it for testing the iOS 9 beta. Just my thoughts.
-----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Vicky Collins Sent: Sunday, July 19, 2015 8:56 PM To: [email protected] Subject: I purchased a used iPhone 5S from Gazelle Yes, I know, grin, this is of course not the best time to be buying a phone. But, well, seeing as I wanted to test iOS 9 without risking my iPhone 6, and then I thought I might give the phone to a family member once I was done testing, I decided to go ahead and make the purchase from Gazelle. I got a used 5S 16GB AT&T model the site claimed to be in excellent condition for $413.99, which included two day air shipping. The Gazelle site was easy enough to use, as I mostly opted to use it with my computer running Windows 7. However, I never could seem to create an account after adding something to my cart as their FAQ claimed. But, rather, I had to finally create the account first, then add the iPhone to my cart and then go through the checkout process. Also, I never could get my debit card to go through, getting some error message about fraud. but, then when I switched to paying via PayPal, even with using the checking account the previously attempted debit card was tied to, the purchase went through without a problem. I could have chosen various shipping methods, but I opted for the two day, as I wanted to be sure the phone would arrive while I was off on vacation. Although, since I'm in Indianapolis, and the package shipped from Louisville, I'm almost thinking I may have delayed it getting to me, as it spent a whole day in Louisville doing nothing before it was shipped to me on that second day. I also opted for their excellent condition model phone for $399 plus shipping, as opposed to the one they termed in good condition for $329 plus shipping. The box seemed to be packed well enough, as I had to pretty much tear up the box to get to the phone. The phone was in a zip lock bag, and that bag was sandwiched between two pieces of foam. The package also contained the lightning cable, the wall adapter and a thank you card for buying from Gazelle. I had no trouble at all getting VoiceOver to start and in setting up the phone. It came with iOS 8.3, but I updated to iOS 8.4, and then to the 9.0 beta. Although, grin, with this first public beta, I very quickly decided to get my education in entering recovery mode and restoring back to 8.4. And, 8.4 works great on the 5S, by the way, can't tell much difference than on my 6. Surprisingly, I was able to use the AT&T site and request that the 5S be unlocked, and I got back within just a couple of minutes the congratulations message that the phone could be unlocked. Thus, I followed the instructions in the email and did the backup and restore with iTunes and indeed got the congratulations message on my PC that my phone had been unlocked. But, not surprisingly, grin, when I went to the Apple support site and checked the warranty status, of course I was told there was no active phone support or warranty for the device as those had expired. The AT&T site had a captcha, for which I used FireFox, but the Apple site did not have one. By the way, the Apple site for checking if find my iPhone is turned off on a device does have a captcha, but the audioit finally offered me was reasonably clear. All in all, although I was kind of surprised to learn I could buy used phones from Gazelle, as I thought they just purchased used phones, I am so far very pleased with my purchase, as well as with the timely shipment notification and shipping of the product. -- The following information is important for all members of the viphone list. All new members to the this list are moderated by default. 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