Vodafone wont give me my number back after a year of non use?

baxterfly

I just came back after over a year away. Havent used my old number of 6 years in the year. Went into a vodafone shop and I asked the guy can I have a new simcard with my old number. He asked if I was gone over a year I said yes.

He said hed check. Pressed a few buttons on the keyboard and said, ''Nah its gone''.

Gone where. I mean no one has my number. If you call it, its just like its not in service. Why cant they reassign me my old number like. Has this happened to anyone else

Milkey Bar Kid

If people who tried to call you for the past year got a service message then get a new number

Davy

Its part of the terms if the number isn't used it will be put back into the pot. You could have it back, but they don't offer a service to request a number. I know that some networks offer a period where they hold it for an extra 30 days over the 12 months before its completely gone, but after that im sorry its gone.

easyeason3

baxterfly wrote: »

I just came back after over a year away. Havent used my old number of 6 years in the year. Went into a vodafone shop and I asked the guy can I have a new simcard with my old number. He asked if I was gone over a year I said yes.

He said hed check. Pressed a few buttons on the keyboard and said, ''Nah its gone''.

Gone where. I mean no one has my number. If you call it, its just like its not in service. Why cant they reassign me my old number like. Has this happened to anyone else

He was being lazy. If he rang Vodafone they would have re issued it so he could have then processed the sim change.
If a sim card hasn't been used in a year it effectively becomes dead but it is possible to get it back.
Ring 1850 20 87 87 & explain it to them what happened, get them to re issue the number & then go into another shop & get the sim card.

rainbowtrout

well from my experience of working in O2 if a number was not in use for a year then it was freed up and made available for use again. It's possible that it has been reassigned to a prepaid phone, that phone pack may be sitting on the shelf of a shop somewhere in the country or it could be used by a company for a text service.

helimachoptor

A year after the last top up on the account the number is essentially gone, it remains "on the books" so to speak for another 6 months but these are Government regulations and all of the numbers in this instance must be recycled so you will not be getting that number back.

As said above depending on when it was deactivated it could well be in a shop somewhere, or most likely it's waiting to be assigned to a sim card that will sent to a shop.

chrislad

Technically, it was never your number. Vodafone just let you use it

helimachoptor

chrislad wrote: »

Technically, it was never your number. Vodafone just let you use it

Actually the government let you use it, mobile phone numbers are considered a natural resource and they are controlled by the Government.

ardmacha

Moral of the story, if you are away and want to keep the number then bung in €10 topup over the Internet each year to keep your number going, on Voda you can then transfer this credit to another prepaid user.

Ron DMC

helimachoptor wrote: »

Actually the government let you use it, mobile phone numbers are considered a natural resource and they are controlled by the Government.

Surely you mean national resource? They're hardly natural.

helimachoptor

Ronny Mitchell wrote: »

Surely you mean national resource? They're hardly natural.

Indeed i do

120_Minutes

moral of the story, its the op's fault

Blue_Wolf

easyeason3 wrote: »

He was being lazy. If he rang Vodafone they would have re issued it so he could have then processed the sim change.
If a sim card hasn't been used in a year it effectively becomes dead but it is possible to get it back.
Ring 1850 20 87 87 & explain it to them what happened, get them to re issue the number & then go into another shop & get the sim card.

Lazy?
The number can be in a sim pack any where in the country as we speak, just because you ring it and theres no service doesnt mean its available. Sure available for someone to buy over the counter.