Mobile number portability....

Heavy congestion, high call rates or low network; there could be many reasons to dislike your existing service provider, but you could not since you wanted to retain the old number.

The good news is that the much awaited Mobile Number Portability is now a reality. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh launched on Jan 20 nationwide mobile number portability (MNP), a move that will allow users to switch operators without losing their phone numbers.

By the time you read this, you might have already received a note from your service provider expressing their commitment to you as a superior/premium customer, but if you still like to switch then, here are the steps/guidelines you would be asked to abide.

Mobile number portability, by definition and function means a customers can move/port to another telecom service provider, while retaining his/her ten digit phone number. Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has specified few guidelines for the portability in order to safeguard the consumer from getting deceived by their respective Mobile Number Portability Service Provider (MNPSP).

According to this, the portability request will be registered after the MNPSP receives an SMS from the customer, and the process starts with a reply to the sender informing the Unique Porting Code (UPC). UPC is a confirmation code consisting of 8 characters of which the first two shall be alphabets that denote the operator's code and service area code that have been specified by the authority.

'This code allocated to a subscriber shall be valid for a period of 15 days from the date of request or such time till the number is ported out, ” reported TRAI guideline. It would be catered to all service areas except Jammu & Kashmir, Assam and North East licensed areas where the validity period is of 30 days

MNPSP needs to retain the UPC number for verification of the request, as they are expected to maintain a database.

Customers also need to visit the respective outlet / showroom fill the Mobile Number Porting (MNP) form providing details like-current mobile number, current operator name and UPC code along with their documents (generation of UPC before/after the form filling depends on the respective operator).

Since, the recipient operator incurs a cost for the per port transaction charge which is payable to the MNPSP for processing the porting request, the respective operators are allowed by TRAI to charge a minimal amount (depending on the service provider) to the customer for the new connection (SIM card). This is a non-refundable amount.

After getting the data and verification, the customers receive porting date and time. 

The No Service Period 

Here comes the no service period. It is the period of time between the disconnection of the mobile telephone service to the porting subscriber by the donor operator and the activation of mobile telephone service, onporting, by the recipient operator. In a few cases, like Airtel, this period stays from 12am (midnight) to 5 am. After which, they can change the SIM and start using the services of the new operator. Any customer wanting to cancel the request for MNP should apply within 24 hours of the first request for UPC.

Before requesting for the move, the customers have to ensure that they have no dues remaining with the donor operator, and that the number is not expired one (though SIM card claim to give life-time validity).

Now, the real question is whether you should take the plunge and switch loyalties or not, but i have already switched over from Vodafone to Airtel.... :-) :-)