Right, I am sick of the mobile contract ethic! I've had enough of 24/18 month contracts and network branded phones blah blah blah.

I walked into a Vodafone store and the deals were rubbish, the sales guy actually said when I mentioned a few deals I had seen online "We just can't compete with the websites". I know stores have trouble with website sales but way to sell it buddy!

The online deals actually aren't that good either though so I have decided to go SIM free.

I have found a £15 monthly rolling SIM deal from 3 which is really perfect(1gb data per month), I am already with them and I know the service is good. The next thing I need to do is actually find a deal for the phone.

I would like to hear the experiences people have had purchasing the N900 SIM free in the UK. Whats the best deal people have found so far? Any horror stories and things to look out for?

i did the same and took a sim free deal from vodafone. 3 not great in this phone in my area so voda offered a £15 per month deal 600 mins unlimited text and 500gb to stay with them from £20 which i was paying. 3 then tried to offer a better deal until the arrogant rep to me i was "talking rubbish" about wot voda offered. at that point i cancelled my contract wit 3 and wont ever give them my business again! got n900 direct from nokia for £500 when it was released.

Sounds like me

I managed to get an unlimited Walk & Web deal (with 100 minutes talk + 100 SMSs inclusive) for £10 per month at the end of my previous 18 month T-Mobile contract. I snapped up the deal because I knew I wanted an N900 when they became available.

Bought mine from Nokia UK website direct in January for £499 with free shipping.

Would I recommend Nokias direct website sales? Hmmmm.

Problem 1 - Despite claiming to use 'verified by Visa' etc. the website does not. When I entered my Credit Card details the order was initially accepted..... only for me to receive an email about 30 minutes later telling me that the payment had been refused by my Credit Card company.

The next day I received calls from my credit card company saying that there had been attempted fraud on my account

Of course it wasn't - it's just that the credit card companies seem to see Nokias web shop as being a prime location for card fraud. It was a right pain having to convince them otherwise, and afterwards I could not re-place the order via the website because it was not taking any orders from me - I had to phone Nokia for them to reinstate the order.

This is not the first time I've had problems with the Nokia UK website - had exactly the same problem when ordering a (much cheaper) phone case two years ago. So it's not the value of the purchase that's the problem, just the sites reputation for card fraud Nokia deny there is a problem, but I can't understand why they don't implement Verified by Visa / Mastercard to stop it happening. Maybe Visa / Mastercard don't trust them with it?!

Problem 2: The delivery was promptly dispatched from Holland via UPS. However, no-one was in when the delivery was attempted, and the UPS driver decided to leave the £499 phone on my doorstep, in wet weather, in full view (and access) of the street 8 metres away

It was there for 8 hours before we came home. Amazingly it was not stolen, and the outer box only got damp. The phone inside was fine. But I was hopping mad at UPS who you would expect to have higher standards. Upon complaining I was shown a laughable attempt at falsifying my signature by the driver. Of course if it had been stolen I would have had a nightmare trying to prove it with UPS claiming that it had been delivered to me in person

So no, not a good experience. If I were you I would either go to a store and buy it SIM free in person, or use a more reliable seller, perhaps like Expansys.

But the N900 is definitely worth the effort when you get your hands on it. No probs working with my T-Mobile SIM-only account.

i also had two orders cancelled due to nokia they have pants customer service. first its accepted then they email u to tell u its cancelled durr

good experience here

Acctually got the same SIM only deal on 3 and paid £420 for the N900 from Nokia (search by posts for staff discount)

Works great no issues.

I managed to pickup a Vodaphone PAYG deal from mobilephones direct back in September. Paid £395 for the phone.
This came as an unbranded/unlocked phone with a Voda PAYG sim put in the box. I've never put the SIM in my N900 - it's sitting in my E71.
The point is many of the independant web shops feature these sorts of deals, they get an allowance from the networks for selling a PAYG sim and pass it on to the customer in various ways - one of them being a discount on a SIM-Free phone.
If you can find a deal like this, make sure that the shop confirms that the phone is unbranded\unlocked before you buy.