IPhone 4S Serious Water Damage?

Ok, so this is going to sound weird but I'm looking for serious answers, please.

My older son has an iPhone 4s on Three Network. He often lends it too his much younger brother to play games. Well, last night, his younger brother fell asleep with the phone, and somehow, managed to wet the bed with the phone!

The phone would have had a good few hours overnight of soaking there, and we shock a lot out of the ports but still had no luck turning it on, charging it, or anything. Just a black screen. We left it standing up against the wall in the airing cupboard for a good 6 hours and tried again. Nothing.

We're pretty sure that the phone is not insured by Three, and are wondering how we can solve this. Should we give it a night to dry in rice with the back removed? Claim that it was lost in a better chance of receiving a replacement? Someone please help!

I don't know

Replace the phone. Assuming the urine got into the phone ("shook a lot out"), the uric acid will eat away at the electronic components and connectors. Even if the phone manages to power up, the damage caused by the acid will cause the phone to fail in a few days/weeks. Better to replace it now - and get all the data backed up and transferred rather than wait for the failure - which will happen at the precise moment the needs to be working properly. Since you have not been able to power it up, you already know there's been some sort of failure somewhere inside…