Unlocked iPhone Technical Support?

I suppose its no surprise to find out that one of my work colleagues has asked me to ‘help’ him unlock his recently purchased (from the US) iPhone? Of course, what this means is that he openly admits he has no clue technically and I will be the one doing ALL the work. But is he just the tip of a rather large iceberg?

Clearly, in developed countries where the iPhone has not been released, there is a huge appetite for the device - mostly from people who have some cash to spare but are not very technically minded. From my previous articles, it should be obvious that there is plenty of room to screw up the unlock process! (The technical ‘geeks’ have probably already tried to source a phone and unlock it themselves if they wanted one.) So is there an opportunity here for iPhone ‘Technical Support’ services?

Quite possibly, the answer is yes. However, I personally would not be interested in a charge-per-hour model. At any rate, this would be costed-in as part of the total purchase-price of the phone in the mind of the ‘consumer’ and the numbers just wouldn’t stack up in terms of value.

But… for a busy senior executive you just ‘had to have one’, perhaps a more on-going support relationship might be workable?

In a previous life, I was involved in directly supporting ALL the IT needs of a very senior executive in a Fortune 100 company - from building his PCs to connecting up his Internet connection at home. And this was actually quite a fun role! Sure, I was at his beck and call pretty much all hours, but this guy was intelligent, loaded, and had impeccable taste - he simply didn’t have the time to learn how it all worked himself. We ended up developing a fair amount of respect for each other. He was also absolutely passionate about consumer technology and how he could make it work for him. So while he demanded a high standard of knowledge and ability, he was also pretty generous once I got everything working for him the way he wanted it.

Eventually, this role was contracted out to a large Global IT Services company for a substantial annual fee. But perhaps this type of model might work for some busy, non-technical executive types - for whom unlocking an iPhone was just part of an ongoing support arrangement? Almost a person IT Trainer/Coach?

Let me know if you have any thoughts in this area. Also, if you’re in New Zealand, and this type of arrangement sounds like something you might be interested in - drop be a line by leaving a comment below or by using the Contact form.