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It's actually a terrible system though. It relies on the original issuer of the number maintaining essentially a "proxy" to your new provider. So if I transferr

It's actually a terrible system though. It relies on the original issuer of the number maintaining essentially a "proxy" to your new provider. So if I transferred from o2 -> EE, and o2 had network issues, it's possible (and has happened to me personally) that I am affected even though I have left o2. I think also calls are actually physically routed through the original network. Lots of weird things can happen like texts from certain networks never arriving. I had to get a new number when I discovered my NZ family could receive my texts but their replies never arrived at my end. For more info, see https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/07/20/uk_number_porting_creaks_as_arcane_system_shows_its_age/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/07/20/uk_number_porting_c...

ZeWaren 7y ago
I've been switching back and forth between two providers for the last 5 years, and I've always wondered now that I'm back to my first provider if calls/texts to me go directly to A, or go A->B->A->B->A.
- amaccuish 7y ago
  Should just go straight to A. The way the numbers work is that the prefixes are assigned to various operators. When you transfer, the "owning" operator forwards calls on to the target operator. If you returned presumably the forwarding is removed. (From [0]): "One of the very few countries not to use ACQ/CDB is the UK, where once a number has been ported, calls to that number are still routed via the donor network. This is also known as "indirect routing" and is highly inefficient as it is wasteful of transmission and switching capacity." And "Because of its donor dependent nature, indirect routing also means that if the donor network develops a fault or goes out of business, the customers who have ported numbers out of that network will lose incoming calls to their numbers." [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_number_portability https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_number_portability

ZeWaren 7y ago

I've been switching back and forth between two providers for the last 5 years, and I've always wondered now that I'm back to my first provider if calls/texts to me go directly to A, or go A->B->A->B->A.

amaccuish 7y ago
Should just go straight to A. The way the numbers work is that the prefixes are assigned to various operators. When you transfer, the "owning" operator forwards calls on to the target operator. If you returned presumably the forwarding is removed. (From [0]): "One of the very few countries not to use ACQ/CDB is the UK, where once a number has been ported, calls to that number are still routed via the donor network. This is also known as "indirect routing" and is highly inefficient as it is wasteful of transmission and switching capacity." And "Because of its donor dependent nature, indirect routing also means that if the donor network develops a fault or goes out of business, the customers who have ported numbers out of that network will lose incoming calls to their numbers." [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_number_portability https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_number_portability