Number porting to GV - my experience
daibaan:
I followed waichai2000's procedure exactly, got almost the exact the same result:
Day 1: Called T-mobile's number porting dept (1-800-937-8997 then transfered to number porting dept), requested them to port my AT&T land line number to my prepaid SIM.
Day 3 (13:00): Received a phone call on my T-mobile phone, caller confirm she was calling my AT&T landline number
Day 3 (13:30): Create a new Google Voice account and request number porting. Provided the T-mobile account number and PIN.
Day 4 (00:31): Received an email from Google: porting initiated
Day 4 (00:32): Received an email from Google: incorrect PIN (I am sure I provided the correct PIN)
Day 4 (09:30): call T-mobile to confirm my PIN, CSR note that the newly ported in AT&T number has a port-out request attached and thought it was a mistake, I told her not to worry.
Day 4 (09:40): provided GV the T-Mobile PIN again for porting (a link was provided in the google email)
Day 5 (00:29): Received an email from Google: porting initiated
Day 5 (00:29): Received an email from Google: porting completed successfully
I suspect that the T-mobile system has problem handling a number being ported in and ported out on the same day. So if you get a "incorrect PIN" email from Google, just try again. Also it seems Google is performing all the number porting shortly after midnight each day.
Thanks waichai2000
PolynesianMedic:
Any thoughts on how this works without a T-Mobile phone or account?
SteveInWA:
PolynesianMedic: I'm not sure what you mean by "without a T-Mobile phone or account"? Do you mean porting into GV directly from a land line number (POTS or VoIP), or from some other (non T-Mobile) mobile phone number?
Currently, you can't port a land line number into GV; Google doesn't provide that option at all. You can get around this, as the OP did; port a land line over to a mobile carrier supported by GV (currently only Sprint, Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile, I believe), then port that number to GV. Users' experiences porting into GV vary widely, with many problems reported, depending on carrier, area code/prefix, etc, with no clear failure pattern and very poor support from Google.
The key to success is probably using either a T-Mobile or AT&T GoPhone prepaid number, and ensuring that you have the exact, accurate account information for that number before you attempt to enter anything into Google's porting system. For example, for AT&T GoPhone, you need to contact their customer service, and obtain the actual account number (which is NOT the same as the phone number).
There is a lot more information and war stories over on the GV help forum.
johng:
I also live in the bay area (my landline service is with Comcast), and am following the steps from post #1. Ordered my T-mobile prepaid sim card (with 10 minutes on it) at Amazon for $5.49 and free shipping (I have prime). If you search for "B004UI4WFM" (it's the product code) at the Amazon site it will bring you to the correct one. Got my phone at noon yesterday, called to activate it (took about 15 min), then called later in the day to start home number port (see tips below), and am currently waiting to get the text that the port is complete. I'll update this post as progress is made, but so far so good. Here are a few extra tips to help people out.
If you have an AT&T mobile account you can call 1-800-331-0500 and AT&T will give you the unlock code for your phone (as long as it's not an iphone) for free. Took me about 15 minutes to get the code, and you need an unlocked phone to put your T-mobile prepaid sim into (unless of course you are already a T-mobile customer).
The T-mobile direct prepaid customer service number is 1-877-778-2106. It took me 3 tries before finally getting connected to the right dept. Once you call and get to the options you want option #5 "manage account". I tried option #4 "technical support" only to be rerouted a number of times and then having the call drop. Next you want to say "representative", and once someone comes on they need to verify a few things and tell them you are trying to get connected to "pre-paid activation for number porting". Make sure you stress "pre-paid" as the first few times they connected me to the normal non prepaid account number porting and it's a completely separate department. I also verified with T-mobile that your prepaid account number is 1 + your new cell number (you need that later to give to google).
UPDATE: Got the email for google that the number port is complete at 9AM 7/23/11 which is less than 2 days from the activation of the T-mobile number (around noon on 7/21/11). Not sure if I can post links so if you do a search of "How to Port Verizon Landline to Google Voice" the first link will be a post from someone that did a landline port like these posts but he mentions the phone number 1-877-789-3106 which is a direct line to T-mobiles porting group. Call this number vs the other one and you won't have to go through a bunch of transfers. You still need to tell them you are porting a "pre-paid" number. I got the text from T-mobile around 9AM on 7/22/11 and went right into google to see if they would see the number as portable and it's amazing that there was no lag for them to report it was a number they could port. Lastly remember that when you do the port with google your T-mobile account number that you give them is 1 + "your new T-mobile # (ie. the # you are porting)". T-mobile changes your account number from "1 + original T-mobile #" once the port is complete. Lastly right after you initiate the google port expect an immediate email saying there is an error with the port. You will need to go to google voice and it will bring you to a page where they want you to input your T-mobile prepaid pin #, and then it take ~24hrs to complete. I am going to port our 2nd office #, and I going to try to see if T-mobile with activate the account with that number directly, so it would eliminate a step. I'll post back if that works.
johng
mayhem69:
I have a problem, i need some help and so far no one can give me an answer.
I ported my landline phone # 610-473-xxxx to Tracfone (AT&T) successfully. I am now trying to port the # to GV, but so far no go on the GV end. GV is giving me the "Unfortunately there are no Google Voice setup options available for this mobile phone number at this time. Click on the Back button below to setup Google Voice with a new number." crap.
What can i do to get my # to GV?
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