This topic

Quarantined landline numbers

Gilly55 — Wed, 29 May 2024 15:26:23 GMT

What does it mean when you are told, by a representative from BT, that your telephone number is in quarantine? Is it possible to reclaim this number?

Re: Quarantined landline numbers

iniltous — Wed, 29 May 2024 15:37:47 GMT

If a phone number was ported to another provider , and then that ‘new’ provider stopped supplying telephony to the customer that requested the port in the first place , the number is returned to the original number range holder …..before that number is made available for allocation again ( by the number ranger holder ) the number is held in quarantine for a while , to minimise the chances of the customer given that number receiving calls for the previous people who had it .

Presumably in your case BT are the number range holder , so when you say is it possible to reclaim it , who do you want to do the reclaiming , if it’s not BT but another provider , you need to ask them , if you want BT to reissue the number to you at the same address BT previously supplied it to , then it’s possible but not guaranteed, and as stated with PSTN closing down it’s less likely to be possible to retrieve it .

Re: Quarantined landline numbers

Keith_Beddoe — Wed, 29 May 2024 15:33:59 GMT

@Gilly55

Welcome to this user forum for BT Residential phone and broadband customers.

It depends on if you owned the number in the past. Also, some exchange based numbers are no longer available, with the pending closure of the PSTN network.