[Asterisk-Users] Porting a phone number to a voip provider

[Rich Adamson]

> > > Just an FYI... not all cell numbers are portable.
> > 
> > Do you have any more information on this?  I read somewhere that 
> > sometimes you can port a number to a VoIP provider but not be able to 
> > port it back to the PSTN because not all PSTN providers will take 
> > numbers from VoIP providers.  Is this what you are talking about?
> 
> No. Some cell providers do not have the capability to selectively let
> a telephone number move to another carrier/telco/itsp. They may have
> technical plans to allow/support it, but the hardware/software necessary
> to allow/support is not yet in place. Same is true with some smaller
> telcos.
> 
> I'd also have to "guess" that come cell providers have probably taken a
> stand that says they aren't going to do it, regardless of what the 
> regulatory folks do/say.
> 
> So, the issue with number portability really starts with the company that
> currently provides the cell number to you. (Sometimes they don't like
> to volunter that info for obvious reasons.) If your number is portable,
> then it "should" remain portable regardless of where you move it to, and
> you should be able to move it as many times as you'd like.
> 
> If you move your number to the "xyz" itsp and don't like their service,
> then pick another company and ask "them" to move the number for you. For
> them to move it, however, requires an acknowledgement from the previous
> company in most cases. In some (rather rare) cases, the previous company
> will sometimes drag their feet or refuse to acknowledge the transfer. There
> are regulatory escalation processes to address that problem, but usually
> it takes a considerable amount of time to get it done.
> 
> In some cases, even the larger cell providers play games as they don't want
> to lose their numbers, customers, etc. In other cases, some small itsp's
> don't have a clue how to support portability or even how to accomplish the
> transfer. As you can probably guess, a lot of this has to do with capabilities
> to support SS7 (either directly or through another provider), access to shared
> databases, etc.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that DID numbers from itsp's are frequently
considered non-portable. Most of that is because the itsp's have contracted
with other companies to get those numbers, and the itsp cannot represent
those as portable since they really have no management control over them.

For example, teliax.com offers DID's from a large number of area codes and
exchanges, but they have contracted with others to get access to them. It's
not up to teliax to say whether those are portable or not since they are
not the end office responsible for those numbers. (They might know however.)