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Yet More on Cellular Number Portability

Posted by michael on from the churn dept.

RadBlock writes "The Wireless Supersite has posted an interesting column analyzing number portability. Wireless carriers have been stalling on the availablity of number portability for years now. The final deadline is supposed to be in November, and it will allow you to keep your wireless phone number when you change carriers (one number for life... the ultimate!)"

6 of 211 comments (clear)

  1. Why is LNP such a big deal for cellular? by ckuhtz · · Score: 5, Informative
    LNP resistance in the U.S. is marketing FUD.

    Other countries are already doing this for a year or two now. Take Germany. The carrier is allowed to charge you a fee (something like 25-50 euros), which often gets comp'ed by the new carrier.

    This has nothing to do with technology. It's solved. It's carriers trying to keep customers hostage. Nothing more.

    --

    Poof.
  2. That's exactly why cell companies don't want it by FearUncertaintyDoubt · · Score: 5, Insightful
    One of the big reasons to not switch your cell phone company is that you lose your number, and have to deal with changing over to a new number.

    If I could keep my number, my incentive to stay with RipOff Cellular goes down, and I'm more likely to switch to UselessMinutes Wireless Inc.

    In the end, there's probably just as many people who want to switch from A to B as want to switch from B to A. But even though the numbers of subscribers might remain fairly steady, it is more expensive to lose one customer and gain another than to just keep one.

  3. One number by Nikkos · · Score: 5, Funny

    "(one number for life... the ultimate!)"

    One number to find you.
    One number for life.
    One number for the world to call
    And in the darkness (and light, and evening, and morning) bind you.

    Nikkos

  4. More Options Are ALWAYS a "Good Thing" by SUB7IME · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I have noticed that some people are complaining, "But if I always have the same phone number, then I can't avoid all those pesky telemarketers/ex-girlfriends/stalkers/parents/lawy ers/etc."

    What these people are ignoring is that you merely have the choice to keep the same number - not an obligation. If it behooves you to keep the same number, you may do so; if not, you can drop the number just like you do now.

    Giving the public more options is a "Good Thing."

  5. Welcome to routing problems with your phone by asmithmd1 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Recently the company I work for changed from the ILEC to a CLEC that only provided service within our LATA, of course we wanted to keep our existing number. Certain other people were not able to call in, we could call out but they couldn't call us, it turns out companies that used MCI as their IXC were the ones who couldn't call us. MCI had a problem with their LIDB. You are going to need to know this stuff to diagnose these problems. And you think service is bad now

    --
    Free cell phone tracking
  6. Re:The Ultimate? by Just+Some+Guy · · Score: 5, Funny
    I swear to God, I'm not making this up:

    My old data line was 833-8258 - 83FUCKU. When my wife and I got married, she called our telco to see if we could keep the number, but we were moving to a different part of the city and get to get a different prefix. She told the operator that was too bad, because we had this really great number that spelled...

    The operator panicked. She called her supervisor, who also panicked. The pulled all numbers containing "38258" from national (well, regional, I guess) circulation, which they apparently do for all numbers known to spell something bad.

    I felt kind of bad for causing that to happen. It was a good number.

    --
    Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?