Port in limbo

[weaseltraps]

Day 12 and still no working phone. But, I can now log into OLAM. There has been zero communication so I don't know if I am supposed to attempt to change my plan to the Beyond Talk option (curently it's on PAYGO + $10 blackberry) or wait for them to fix it. The phone number is right in OLAM but the BB won't perform an update profile. It looks as if the number is still not associated with the phone's ESN in activation or inventory on VM's side.

There is no payment information from my original "activation" when I gave VM my credit card information and there are no adjustments posted (i.e. the $60 and $10 supposed "credits" that were promised over the course of the 6-7 calls and 3 online trouble tickets I've open over the last 2 weeks).

I've placed the originally ~$38 charge VM took on day one into dispute. I'm not paying for service I am not receiving. Hopefully AmEx will light a fire under VM seeing as how customer service, facebook, and a fcc complaint have not provided any resolution to nearly 2 weeks of port limbo.

[chew1138]

Day 2 update: They "have my number" and just need to set-up my account again. The CSR said both "today" and "within 24 hours".

We'll see.

I've been checking my phone number for the last few days and have gotten a "number is not available" message. Just called and it went to voicemail. I then checked my VM account online and it shows my Touch with my phone number.

I didn't get any notification from VM, but my port obviously went through. I re-activated my Touch and was able to call out to my office phone, it showed the ported number.

Three days total, I feel lucky.

[pitflyer]

My sister ported from AT&T to Virgin Mobile in the same time frame as me for PagePlus to Virgin Mobile (about 3-4 hours). She asked me first and didn't make the same mistakes I did (activating online). They told her 72 hours too .. so some people have really long times porting, but it can be pretty short too.

[queenanbp]

It took VM 10 days to successfully port me and my wife's number over from T-mobile. When they finally got us over they put us on a pay per minute plan instead of a beyond talk plan and for some reason they can not get the system to switch our Rumor Touch's to the right plan. That was 4 days ago! So it's been 14 days and it's still not right!

I knew paying 25 dollars a month I shouldn't expect great service but I had no idea that Virgin Mobile was this incompetent!

[daleebd]

The person I spoke with yesterday says they just really don't know when they will get everything working. But they are working on it (as we can tell from the new Troubleshooting menu when you call).

We tricked the system to let me online, and VM credited me some money so that when the system debits me for going online (it insisted I had to top up so we put credit in the account to make it look as if I had), I don't have to "pay" because I have Beyond Talk. But the system must "sort of" believe I switched, because instead of showing charges for each call and text, those are showing as minutes used and the texts aren't being changed.

They said they are having many issues, issues with the Sprint/VM connections, etc. The last advisor said I should not close my account and open a new one (a thought we had to reset it all) because it might not work and then I lose all the work we've already done. I sure don't want to lose my place in any queue.

My plan is to call once a day to check on the status of investigations (there are 4 currently open on my phone). If I need to use my phone to go online I will. If they debit me to the point that I can't get online, I'll call and have them credit back so we can start all over.

They REALLY ought not to have rolled out the new phones and plans until everything was tested and they knew this would work. Sprint was making their play for our business, which worked, but the level of unreadiness and cluelessness is disturbing.

VM was fine for us in the past, but mostly we did not have issues anyway.

And it should not matter what you are paying - you are a customer, and they specifically created this plan and made these phones available to woo us - now they have to provide what they promised.

[pattyrn]

I heard sprint activations crashed as they rolled out the evo 4g as well.

[dwkct]

Here's what really annoys me about this... I had two lines with Tmobile prepaid. I bought two Rumor Touches and started the process within a few days of each other.
With one, I activated it and then started the port. Big mistake.
The other one I started the port first - that one is fine now, just took a couple of weeks total.

So I'm still waiting on the one I activated first. I call in about every day, I have open investigations, etc. For a short time I had a $60 credit on the account, but couldn't switch plans. Then I guess whomever is working on the investigation reset the acct, and the $60 is gone.

So it's not like they can't do this port, they just can't get the steps in the right order. I don't see why they can't activate it like the other one, THEN drop the credit back on. I'm going to have to dispute the original charges on my credit card, at least then I won't be out anything other than the phone. Which, by the way, is coming up on the Best Buy return deadline, and I can't even use it yet.

On the one that's working, hey, it's not bad. Overall decent data speed, clear calling. Coverage is kinda meh, but not horrible.

This wouldn't be so bad if the IVR at VM wasn't so irritating. Bad music on a short loop. It echos though my head when I try to fall asleep and then comes back in my nightmares.

[tethys180]

Weekend update: after receiving a sales call on an otherwise disabled phone on Saturday (!?!?!), my account was finally activated by having me physically buy top-up cards to pay for my Beyond Talk plan. Apparently they continue to be unable to use a credit card with my account - not even for a single "top-up" - and this is after the HQ investigation was completed "successfully". Once I paid using top-up cards from CVS, they were able to activate the BT plan on my phone. Their hope is that once the system recognizes that the BT plan is attached to my phone, it will let them enter a credit card for future payments. But they don't want to do this until I'm due to pay my next month of service (I guess they're hoping they'll have more of the issues worked out by then).

I hope that works, because I'm not going to stick around if I have to purchase cards every month to pay for my service. They also didn't want to address the free month of service at this time, because they seem to be really afraid of making any changes to my account right now. Their lack of confidence in their system continues to be troubling, and I'm sure I haven't seen the last of my VM problems. But, after two weeks of daily calls to customer service and rerouting calls through my landline and friends' cells, I'm elated to have my phone working again.

[weaseltraps]

@dwkct - we are in identical situations. I'm on day 15. I made the mistake of activating online (assuming there would be a port in option like every other online activation client I've ever experienced). I expected an option to Port and after I clicked next on one of the cryptic screens before I knew it the phone was provisioned with a new phone number. I called in immediately and they disabled that number (even though it still shows up on the blackberry).

Since then I have had zero communication from VM other than when I call into support. They do not call me back no matter how many times I call them. OLAM shows the port in phone number but it somehow is not associated with the device. I cannot update the profile from the device side. I have called many time and also put the original charge in dispute. No resolution for me is in sight. I'm hoping it being a Monday somebody picks up on all my rants on facebook and gets my phone working.

[dwkct]

@weaseltraps - that's exactly the problem. Nobody at VM takes ownership of an issue and sees it through. However, I struck gold today! I called in to porting support, and the csr said "oh - let me activate that for you... " I watched on OLAM as the $35 went back on the acct and then it switched to Beyond Talk. I don't have my free month at this point, but I didn't want anything to screw it up.

So there's one guy who has a clue. Great. I wouldn't count on anybody just going out and fixing your acct without you having to call them...

[weaseltraps]

I am up and running too. I got en email that apologized for the situation then saying everything is fine now and that I had a month of service. Of course, my phone still did not work so I had to call in. An hour and 20 minutes later and a trip into the phone's service menu to manual edit the phone number and my phone works.

I can't imagine that this could not have been done on day 2-15 if someone just took the time to help and as you said "take ownership" of the issue/customer.

Anyways, we'll see how things go from here on out. I have to check my OLAM account. I'm not sure that my payment information is even there (it wasn't yesterday). Best of luck to others still waiting.

[avatarofbelle]

My 2nd number finally started working last Friday. I'm happy with the service considering the price I paid. I wish I didn't have to call in so often to get everything fixed but everything is set now and I hope there aren't any problems in the future.

[queenanbp]

18 days and still VM is unable to switch my 2 Rumor Touch phones to a beyond talk plan. I sent an email to Virgin Mobile and Sprint in a desperate hope that they can resolve my issue before I give up and return these phones to Best Buy. I am worn out trying to get this to work. I have dealt with a dozen live advisors and multiple supervisors and have just come to the conclusion that Virgin Mobile is totally and utterly incompetent.

[warmup]

How long should I wait?

It has been 24 DAYS since I called VM CS to port in my number from T-Mobile prepaid. Today they told me it should work by tomorrow as they told me many many times. I'll wait till tomorrow. If it still doesn't work, I will return my LG Rumor Touch to Bestbuy. I don't want to spend my money on a phone that doesn't work as a real phone forever.

[hawkgirl73]

I'm so glad I stumbled upon this thread. I'm switching from T-Mobile to Virgin Mobile and I had thought about porting over my number to my VM phone. But I'm just going to get a new number. No way am I going through the hassle of having to wait 10 days or more for my phone to work.