Tesco Mobile is blocking the new iPhone 4 iOS 4.3 Personal Hotspot feature

This weekend I upgraded my iPhone 4 to the new iOS 4.3 software update. I was looking forward to testing the new Personal Hotspot feature that allows an iPhone 4 to create its own Wi-Fi hotspot. I thought this would be a useful feature should I need to go online with the iPad (not 3G) when I do not have Wi-Fi access. After looking through all the iPhone settings and not being able to find the Personal Hotspot feature, I hit the net looking for answers and found them.

TechRadar spoke to Tesco, which confirmed that as it doesn’t support iPhone tethering it hasn’t enabled the portable Wi-Fi hotspot feature either. ”Tesco Mobile doesn’t currently support the functionality for personal Wi-Fi spots but plans to be able to introduce this soon for customers.” said the spokesperson.

I never required the iPhone tethering function and I don’t believe it was made clear that Tesco Mobile does not support it when I signup. It is probably in the T&C’s somewhere, but even on their website it is not included in the excluded features.

Screenshot of the iPhone 4 excluded features from the Tesco Mobile site.

I hope Tesco Mobile introduces this feature quickly and without additional charges. I pay for 1Gb of data per month and never use anywhere near that, as most of the time my phone is on a Wi-Fi network. If I want to use that data by turning my phone into a Wi-Fi hotspot on that rare occasion, I should be able to without charge.

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UPDATE: 26th November 2011

I have now moved to the GiffGaff network, they still have the same restrictions on tethering. So no Personal Hotspot use, but I now pay less and have unlimited data. See post here