I have fought the very same battle as you twice over and finally won. I am active duty military stationed outside of the US and they still gave me absolute hell even though the requirements are suppose to be waived for military. I bought the phone in May and was very specific about my need to have it unlocked for deployment purposes. Of course they assured me that it was not problem for military. After all, this wasn't the first phone I had unlocked in my 9 years of service with TMobile.
I got to my overseas location and requested the unlock then they told me I need to pay outright for the phone first. My small military salary didn't allow me to throw $400 at Tmobile so I took my time and paid it off over the course of 5 months. I called in October very excited to finally use the $500 phone that had been sitting in a drawer for 5 months. I put in the request and got the same response you did. I needed to use it in the last 7 days. I called and got a supervisor and asked that she employ common sense in this situation. How can I use it if it's not unlocked unless of course they wanted me to pay large roaming fees for Africa. She did go above and beyond to help me out and took my service off of military suspend and instructed me to make some calls for a day or two so they could see they phone being used. She even agreed to waive the charges ($90 in total for a couple of short calls and sums). She was able to contact the SIM unlock team and have them unlock the phone for me. I was truly grateful for her help!
Couple weeks later, I come back to the states for vacation (which I am still on right now) and realize my phone is giving me the green screen of death and needed to be replaced under warranty. What do you think happened next? Yep, I received the new phone locked of course, told to submit another request and denied once again for the same reason plus I now didn't meet the 40 day requirement. You can imagine how irate I was! I called on 3 different occasions and had to practically beg them to understand the plain logic here. If I gave you a phone unlocked and you replaced it with the same kind of phone, logically I am entitled to get it back to the same condition it was in! Well, my last call to them was with a promise to cancel both lines (I have also had their at home service for 5 years) and take my business to ATT who states specifically that they cater to military needs for an unlocked phone. I got my unlock code yesterday (less than 24 hours later).
Here is the big problem. The Sim unlock team does not correspond with customers much less customer service reps. It takes an "escalated request" from a supervisor for them to see anything between the lines. They strictly operate in black and white until someone persistent enough steps in. It's a real shame and I keep retiring to the supervisors when I call that the Unlock Team is really hindering their ability to provide the best customer care and prompts unnecessary repeat calls from customers, especially those 8 time zones away that have to pay to call back to the states.
You will be happy to know that the FCC is fighting carriers ability to keep these phones locked, especially for military members.
I would try to call one more time if I were you and request a supervisor that is willing to contact the SIM unlock team themselves.
