If you are unfamiliar with telephone number porting, this article can give you some general background.
What You Should Prepare
When placing a porting request, in addition to the phone numbers to be ported, you need to provide us with the details of the relevant account(s). You should be able to obtain these from your recent phone bill or by contacting your current provider.
For each account please prepare the following:
- CSR (customer service record) which lists all your current numbers. If you can’t get your CSR immediately we will obtain it on your behalf once we receive the porting request.
- Account number and customer number.
- First name, last name, and email of the person responsible for managing the phone number account.
- Full Address including city, state, and zip code.
- Account PIN: This is a short number that protects your account from unauthorized porting and is usually provided with your initial registration. If you forgot your PIN see if it's available by logging into your account with your current provider. Otherwise, contact your current provider and request it.
- A copy of your recent phone bill. This allows us to compare and confirm the details you provided.
Removing PIC Freeze
PIC freeze (Preferred Carrier Freeze) is a security measure, in addition to the account PIN, to prevent unauthorized switching of service. If you have a PIC freeze in place you need to ask your current provider to remove it. If you don't, the process will be delayed and no FOC date (Firm Order Commitment – the actual porting date) will be provided. If we encounter a PIC freeze trying to process a porting request, we will contact you to ask you to remove it.
If any of the account details are incorrect or if a PIC freeze is encountered, the porting request may be delayed or even rejected. Our support team will assist you in sorting things out and correcting any details.
While each provider may have a slightly different procedure, the following steps are generally what you should expect before and during a porting process:
- Make sure you don’t have any past-due bills or pending orders with your current provider as these may delay porting.
- Submit your porting request, LOA, and recent phone bill from the Phone Numbers page of the Admin Center, as explained here. The LOA gives us the legal authority to port your numbers to Telebroad.
The details on the LOA must match the records of your current provider and your CSR.
If you prefer not to fill the LOA online, you can contact our support team to assist you with your porting request. - We will review the LOA and email you an acknowledgment of receiving it or return it to you to fix any errors if we spot them.
We will initiate the porting process and work with your existing provider until the request is approved and a porting date is set. We will then give you an FOC notice – Firm Order Commitment with a list of the numbers to be ported, which you should review carefully. - It is possible to cancel a port request at this point for a fee that depends on the number of days remaining to the port date.
- If approval and porting date were not provided it is an indication of a possible rejection and you should receive an email explaining the reason for the rejection and what is needed to be corrected. On rare occasions, you may be notified by your existing carrier that porting cannot be carried out because of rate or geographical restrictions.
- After successfully porting and setting up your numbers please make some calling tests to make sure the numbers are working properly.
- Then, and only then you should contact your existing provider and ask them to terminate your service (if you do so before this point you may risk losing your numbers!)
Your Telebroad representative will assist you with any issues or questions that may arise during each of these steps. Here is how you can contact us.