Where is the Samsung Galaxy i7500?

Handset proving difficult to track down

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8 September 2009 16:54 GMT / By Duncan Geere

Samsung's Galaxy i7500 Android appears to have hit even more delays, Pocket-lint can confirm.

The phone, which has been stuck in a perpetual delay quagmire for some time, is still out of stock in all O2 retail stores across the country, despite being available on the company's website.

First announced in April, O2 and Samsung at the time announced that the handset would be out in June. With the phone not showing over the summer it wasn't until August, that several O2 stores told The Register that it'd be in stock "next week". The phone eventually surfaced at the end of August as available to buy on the O2 website, but not in store.

Some customers have said they managed to get handsets then, but a number of posts on the official O2 customer message boards suggest a lot of people got stuck with "out of stock" problems, even once they'd placed orders on the website.

Following further requests for information from Pocket-lint, O2's PR department told us it'd be on sale in retail stores on 7 September. However, when calling up multiple O2 stores today (8 September), including the company's flagship branches in Oxford Street, Pocket-lint was told that the handset wouldn't be appearing until the middle of the month. With staff reassuring that "it won't be long, so keep checking back!"

Internally at O2, the company also seems confused as to the availability of the handset. Multiple calls to the company's customer services call centre resulted in answers that ranged from "not available in retail stores yet, but fine online" to "it isn't available on the phones or on the website, and will show up in retail stores on 14 September."

Both Samsung and O2 have told us that it'll be a few weeks before review handsets are available.

Once we get any more info, we'll make you're you're the first to know.