I am a long term O2 customer with an impeccable payment history and my 12 month contract is due to expire in a months time. I did them the courtesy of phoning up asking for the N96 as my upgrade. I was told that due to the fact I had just a 12 month contract, it was impossible to get N96.
So I haggled and haggled with them but they never budged. The minimum they said was a 18 month £45 pcm contract to get this phone free

. So I spat the dummy and demanded my pac code which they promptly sent.
However, and this is the interesting part....
I was browsing their website when I see upgrade online. After a conformation password etc I got to choose which handset I wanted. Low and behold the N96 was there and the price was
free. So I selected it, then it asked for new price plan. But at the bottom there was an option to just keep your existing price plan. So I selected that... price was
free. Surely cannot be that easy. So I entered account details, address and confirmed it. Phone was delivered next day.
So I now have a N96 on a £35 pcm 12 month contract and I am well chuffed. This is just to let everyone know that online upgrade is ******** free. Not like the retention department. They have been trying to get my 12 month contract up to 18 month for about 3 years now. No chance.