Archived from groups: alt.cellular.sprintpcs (
More info?)
momcat1 wrote:
> I'm not too familiar with Sprint's policies and am curious as to
> how they would handle porting an out of area phone number (and also
> from another provider) to an add-a-line on an existing contract.
They can't port the number if it's out of area. WLNP = wireless LOCAL number
portability.
If you're changing markets, however, you can keep your current phone number and
just change your billing address. We did that with both Verizon and Sprint in
2003; until we found a permanent home here, we kept our Ohio phone numbers and
gave the carriers our temporary Cali address.
When we were ready to switch, we had to close the old accounts and open new
ones, but that's not as hard as it sounds. Verizon has a department called E-Z
Move that will move your account from the old billing/market area to the new
one. Sprint has a dedicated department too, though they don't have a snappy
name for it.
In Sprint's case, on my wife's phone, they terminated the old contract and
opened a new one. We were billed a $150 ETF and $36 activation on the next bill
but it was credited right back on the same bill, so we didn't have to pay it.
However, our contract end date was reset (Verizon, correctly, kept the same
contract end date for both of the VZW phones I had at the time).
The solution was to have a CSR place a "high-priority note" on our account
noting that we HADN'T technically extended our contract, that 11/28/03 was
still the proper contract end date, and that if we terminated after that date
we should not be charged an ETF. I checked a few times in subsequent months,
just to make sure the CSRs all knew the note was there, and they all saw it and
honored it.
> wouldn't want to do this and find out afterward that Sprint would
> demand this new line be on a separate contract, because calls were
> being made from another market.
Well, if you're changing market areas, they do have to open a new contract, but
perhaps they can do for you what they did for me? Talk to them. You may want to
talk to a supervisor, since this is not probably something most front-line CSRs
do on a regular basis.
> where certain providers would surcharge you if more than a certain
> amount of your calls came from a market other than the one the contract
> was based out of. Part two of this would be if you had an existing
> contract and you relocated to another market how long would it be
> before they forced you to change numbers to the new market? I'm
> thinking maybe they can't now that we have number porting.
Neither Sprint nor Verizon did this to us, and we had a period of an entire
months where ALL our calls were outside are original home area. We were ok
because we were on-network - both Verizon and Sprint have native coverage here.
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