You can bet that there are lots of iPhone fans out there counting down the days until Christmas hoping ol’ St. Nick will be stuffing an iPhone in their stocking. Last year there was a glut of holiday purchases for the original iPhone along with problems finding devices in some areas and crowded stores.

AT&T has announced that it is already gearing up for holiday sales of the iPhone 3G by streamlining the buying process and allowing shoppers to do the glut of the work online. AT&T has started a system that allows customers to pre-qualify for the iPhone online.

With the system shoppers can get the credit check out of the way and verify that they can port an existing number from another provider to AT&T. Existing AT&T customers can also verify their eligibility for an upgrade. Once the process is complete, the only thing left is to go to the store, pay, and get the activated iPhone 3G.

AT&T