Switching phone numbers, how long?

Posts: 27 · Vonage Forum Junior Joined: Jan 07, 2004 Posts: 27

I see stories about people who have been waiting 25 or 30 days. I was wondering if there were any success stories on people who brought their existing phone number over to Vonage? How long did it take and what carrier did you come from?

Thanks!

Michael
EVDO Info :: EVDO Forums

Guest

I signed up on Dec. 8th and today I finally received notice from Vonage that my telco had accepted the transfer and would happen tomorrow Jan. 9th. I think most of the delay is with the Telco. I can imagine they're not too keen on giving up customers.

--Justin

Posts: 27 · Vonage Forum Junior Joined: Jan 07, 2004 Posts: 27

Thanks for the info.

What carrier did you switch from?

Guest

MCI received my transfer request from Vonage on 11/13/03 my number was transferred on 1/6/04.
Good Luck

Guest

Took me a little over 60 days with Bell South... I was pretty pissed and they (Vonage) eventually credited me one month.

Tim

Posts: 6 · New Forum Member Joined: 1066062440 Posts: 6

I'm still waiting, LOA acknowledged on 11/25/03. From my status page:

November 24, 2003 Awaiting Letter of Authorization
November 25, 2003 Letter of Authorization (LOA) Received
December 22, 2003 Transfer Sent to Carrier

Why it took almost a month for the xfer to be sent to the carrier, I don't know. All I do know is that if they don't get it together this month, I'm gone from this service.

15-25 days is what they have on their site. My ass.

Jonathan

Posts: 9 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 17, 2004 Posts: 9

Two data points: A friend of mine, with Qwest service, signed up, and his order went through five days after the order was submitted.

I went through the process and my order took almost four months. Sadly, a lot of this was due to problems on the Vonage side with me. After almost two months with no scheduled date, I finally worked my way up to talking to a live person at Vonage. After some research, they concluded my order had never been sent to the carrier (Pac Bell).

Wasn't very happy, but, I have my old number now and am receiving and placing calls in my old locale from clear across the country.

At this point, probably the best way to describe Vonage's service is "experimental". They're still getting the kinks out of their internal processes and so forth. As this all matures, things will improve.

--Bill

Posts: 9 · Posted: Mon Jan 19, 2004 3:52 pm Post subject:

Hey Bill,

The entire time you (and anyone, for that matter) waited for the number to be transferred, you still had to pay for your POTS line and Vonage, correct? I just received my package (well, about 2 weeks ago), and I'm not too sure how long it's going to take to have the number switched over, but I don't want to pay $50/mo to Qwest AND my monthly fee to Vonage.

Posts: 220 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: Aug 19, 2003 Posts: 220

Mine transferred in about four weeks once I got all the paperwork in. Appparently I hadn't sent my phone bill, but they didn't let me know that until I called to follow up with them.

If I had it all to do over again, I would have immediately dropped my BellSouth plan down to a bare minimum the day I ordered Vonage. I ran them both for about a month anyway, just to be sure I liked it. Once you start the transfer, you can't change anything. I was paying for a complete answers package. That was a problem for two reasons. One, it's high-priced, unlimited long distance. Two, you can't forward a complete choice number, so I couldn't forward it to our Vonage account and really test the incoming calls on Vonage.

But I don't think there's any way around having some overlap. I got back what I spent on the overlap the first month I didn't have to pay the POTS line, though.

laurel

Posts: 9 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 17, 2004 Posts: 9

The entire time you (and anyone, for that matter) waited for the number to be transferred, you still had to pay for your POTS line and Vonage, correct? I just received my package (well, about 2 weeks ago), and I'm not too sure how long it's going to take to have the number switched over, but I don't want to pay $50/mo to Qwest AND my monthly fee to Vonage.

Sadly, that's the way it works. You have to pay your Qwest bill the whole time, or they'll disconnect you and the number is then ineligible for transfer. You didn't hear this from me, but if your transfer drags on a while, politely make some noise. I got a free month, and suspect if I politely make some further noise, another credit may be forthcoming.

I strongly suggest riding herd on this process. Frankly, the number transfer process at Vonage is kinda the weak link in the entire process. Vonage doesn't seem to have the volume, yet, to justify electronic bonding with the local exchange carriers. So, the process is all manual. Any time human beings are involved, errors are inevitable. Plus, dealing with this volume of paper, things will get lost, etc.

--Bill