Telephone number recovery (porting disaster)

[miken2]

Good evening,

I recently moved from NowTV to OneStream (including change to voip) and the move went well except OneStream, in carrying out the 'active line' transfer, failed to port the telephone number contrary to our agreement.

OneStream, after 10 days, say they cannot port the number because NowTV need to release it by me getting a PAC code (although didn't know that was a non-mobile thing.)

When I talk to NowTV they say the number has been unallocated  on the transfer and 'returned to the Openreach pool.' Which doesn't seem quite right but a lot seem to mix BT and Openreach!

Nonetheless, looking at this link https://www.ofcom.org.uk/phones-and-broadband/phone-numbers/numbering-data I think the number (01625 57xxxx) is 'allocated' to BT.  

So I really just want to, please:

  a) make sure my understanding of situation is correct / plausible as told; and
  b) most importantly what can I do to 'recover the number'?

Any help gratefully received. Mike

[Keith_Beddoe]

@miken2 

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

As the number belongs to BT, its not going to be possible to get it back, even if you ever became a BT customer.

NowTV did not own the number, so it was not possible for them to port it out to OneStream, contrary to what you have been told.

[miken2]

Thanks Keith,

Not the news I wanted but useful to know (although would have been even better to know before transfer of service!)

Just out of interest when NowTV took on the service from AOL they managed to retain the telephone number.  So it looks like it should have been possible somehow, do you happen to know exactly what the process should have been?

Thanks for the welcome,
Mike

[Keith_Beddoe]

Things are more complex now, with the closure of the PSTN network, as all BT numbers would have originated on that, and assigned to specific exchanges in groups.

With the move to BT Digital Voice, its fairly straightforward for BT to move their customers from PSTN to DV, as there is a robotic process to do that, although sometimes there are issues routing incoming calls from other providers, and they have to be investigated manually.

Once a number becomes inactive, then the routing info is deleted after about 30 days, and its not possible to get it back.

[iniltous]

Your choice of your new provider is the subject of quite a few comments on an community forum concerning money saving in an expert way , and TBH ,they are not positive comments, so hopefully your experience will be better than those , both your old and new provider show their relative ignorance using obviously incorrect terms , but the basic tenant is correct , between them they have lost your phone number and it’s now effectively unretrievable .

[miken2]

Thanks Keith.  Not the solace I craved but I appreciate your expertise and time to answer.  Mike

[miken2]

Thanks Liltous, I appreciate your feedback and information. To be frank, they're not meeting their guaranteed minimum rate either so, all in all, it's turned into a bit of a disaster. Ho hum. 

But thanks,
Mike