Despite hiring nearly 1,400 temporary staffers to deal with the iPhone launch, O2 CEO Erksine says he had no grand dreams of an unprecedented iPhone launching day demand. Sticking to modest estimates in the tens of thousand, he begged to disagree with initial iPhone sales estimates in the 100,000 range.

It had taken Apple 74 days to cross the 1 millionth iPhone sold threshold, a staggering number compared to the measly 10,000 iPhones sold in Germany on its first day alone. You do the math, it just ain’t happening.

However, O2 will have to thank the Glitch Gods for taking over the Carphone Warehouse systems on launching day. Its chip and pin network experienced technical difficulties at its peak, slowing down sales to only 3 iPhone purchase every 45 minutes. Most of the potential customers shipped out a few blocks from Carphone Warehouse where they were able to get their hands on a brand new iPhone from an O2 store in less than five minutes.

Carphone Warehouse had a credit card identification system set in place that would

verify holder’s identity. Unfortunately, it could only process “Further Identification Required” replies, to which it’s chip and pin were supposed to be accepted, reducing all Carphone Warehouse staffers to manual processing of all credit sales which was time consuming and tedious.

Frustrated customers deluged the internet with reports of the fiasco. Carphone Warehouse later apologized for the temporary glitch, noting it was caused by a massive logging in by all its branches into the central server system at 6:02 pm, which was the official iPhone launching time on Friday. All services are reported back to normal functioning mode.

Bargains were still to be had despite iPhone sales exclusivity to O2, Apple and Carphone warehouse shops. The eBay UK is selling iPhones at almost two thirds its original price and without the lock in period. Sweet deal? Sweeter yet is it’s unlocked version. Or you might go as far as nicking one, as a handful of teenagers have been caught doing. SO what’s the iPhone hype all about? Whatever it is, it must be worth getting locked up in jail for.

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