Walmart Straight Talk Users/Customers BEWARE!!!

**Ira** · 07-26-2012, 08:51 PM

Similar thing happened to me a couple weeks ago. I have had a contract with AT&T for 7 yrs. Looked on ST's website and for my zip, all they offer is VZW. I can see an AT&T tower about 1.5 miles from my house in a neighboring town. I ended up getting a Proclaim and porting my number couple months ago. Love the phone, but screen is too small for my over 40 eyes. Since I already knew AT&T and VZW had about the same signal strength at my house, I decided to get a BYOD sim and buy a used Samsung Infuse (gsm).

To make a long story short, had to change my account zip to the neighboring town to get AT&T sim, as ST does not offer their service at my home. When I got the sim, I put it in phone and attempted to port my number from my Proclaim to my Infuse and activate it. I could not do it online and webpage told me to call them, which I did. I explained the situation. ST tells me they don't have an agreement with AT&T to use their towers at my home zip. I told them the original number I first ported had been my AT&T number for 7 years and I knew I had service at my home and could even see the tower. They asked the zip for neighboring town where I saw tower and I told them. They confirmed they had an agreement with AT&T in that town, but didn't have agreement with VZW for that town. Since I had ported my number from AT&T to my Proclaim, my number was assigned to my home zip and VZW network. They could not port number to AT&T sim since my home was not in their agreement area. I ended up moving up the ladder 3 tech levels on the phone, but nobody could do anything due to my number being registered to my home zip. I had to get a new number which had the same area code and prefix, but the last 4 numbers are different. Go figure. My son is buying my Proclaim and is keeping my old number so at least if any of my business contacts don't have my new number, he can send them my way. I still think this whole setup is ridiculous.

**urinsane** · 07-26-2012, 09:10 PM

Important to remember that this type of "mainstream" prepaid is still very new. Prepaid started out as basically disposable service here in the US, and the carriers are still acting as such. Similarly, they could get away with poor customer service.

The new plans with data are attracting a HUGE new customer base, and not everything has caught up. It likely never will, at least until the something like the European model has taken over here. There are always going to be tradeoffs when you are paying less than half of postpaid plans.

Until then, you need to be OK with the fact that they can cut you off at any time. "Too much data" etc. If you cannot do so, sticking with postpaid is probably a better option (but that obviously comes with its own issues).

(BTW, not saying any of this is right on the companies part, nor am I defending any of the companies for these practices, but it is just the way things are)

**gate115** · 07-26-2012, 09:46 PM

I'm very sorry xxwild, I hope somehow you get that number back as I know all to well about having a biz number for years and how much it means to keep it.

I'm curious as to what was stated here about the number returning to its origin.

Can any one comment on the validity of that? I mean my biz number is 12 yrs old and has been thru ALL the carriers and some prepaid, so if it were lost it would go back to Sprint where it was issued in 2000?

**mirayge** · 07-26-2012, 10:49 PM

They say in their TOS that the service is not for bussiness numbers.

**oldnoob** · 07-27-2012, 01:16 AM

Don't know if it will help, but there is a post that lists several ST numbers, including the one to the manager resolution team. If ST still has control of that number, they may be the only ones that can help. http://www.howardforums.com/showthread.php?p=14821203

**Antenna** · 07-27-2012, 01:27 AM

Straight Talk is pretty bad about number porting. I've been told to *always* use Google voice with any tracfone service because they are bad

Sent from my HTC Amaze 4G

**Mr.Cell** · 07-27-2012, 02:16 AM

Originally Posted by Ira

Similar thing happened to me a couple weeks ago. I have had a contract with AT&T for 7 yrs. Looked on ST's website and for my zip, all they offer is VZW. I can see an AT&T tower about 1.5 miles from my house in a neighboring town. I ended up getting a Proclaim and porting my number couple months ago. Love the phone, but screen is too small for my over 40 eyes. Since I already knew AT&T and VZW had about the same signal strength at my house, I decided to get a BYOD sim and buy a used Samsung Infuse (gsm).

To make a long story short, had to change my account zip to the neighboring town to get AT&T sim, as ST does not offer their service at my home. When I got the sim, I put it in phone and attempted to port my number from my Proclaim to my Infuse and activate it. I could not do it online and webpage told me to call them, which I did. I explained the situation. ST tells me they don't have an agreement with AT&T to use their towers at my home zip. I told them the original number I first ported had been my AT&T number for 7 years and I knew I had service at my home and could even see the tower. They asked the zip for neighboring town where I saw tower and I told them. They confirmed they had an agreement with AT&T in that town, but didn't have agreement with VZW for that town. Since I had ported my number from AT&T to my Proclaim, my number was assigned to my home zip and VZW network. They could not port number to AT&T sim since my home was not in their agreement area. I ended up moving up the ladder 3 tech levels on the phone, but nobody could do anything due to my number being registered to my home zip. I had to get a new number which had the same area code and prefix, but the last 4 numbers are different. Go figure. My son is buying my Proclaim and is keeping my old number so at least if any of my business contacts don't have my new number, he can send them my way. I still think this whole setup is ridiculous.

I believe you can go to your straight talk account where you have the proclaim and change your address to one for the town that offers AT&T service and then try to do the port.

**xxwildbillxx** · 07-27-2012, 02:30 AM

Originally Posted by alphamale-b

sort of like being in a movie and shouting FIRE to get peoples attention?

Wow how does my thread title (Walmart Straight Talk Users/Customers BEWARE!!!) come across as anything remotely close to "sort of like being in a movie [theater] and shouting FIRE to get peoples attention?" (?) I am not an English major that's for sure (not even close) and I'm okay with that. If it means that much to you, your more than welcome to enlighten me on how you would have written the title for this thread so we can move forward and focus on a possible solution.

**xxwildbillxx** · 07-27-2012, 03:00 AM

Originally Posted by mirayge

They say in their TOS that the service is not for bussiness numbers.

Now you tell me

And yes of course it is my responsibility to read the TOS but is it asking too much to have been warned or have an * posted along side a disclaimer mentioning, "any inactive/dormant phones within your ST account are subject to immediate loss of their original cell phone numbers... double stamp, no erasies, triple stamp, no erasies, touch blue make it true.

**efparri** · 07-27-2012, 07:15 AM

Read Technical Issues at this link to see what happens to inactive numbers which have been transferred to other carriers: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_number_portability

Without this provision, some regional carriers could lose all of their numbers.

**pzwnyc** · 07-27-2012, 07:20 AM

Originally Posted by xxwildbillxx

Now you tell me

And yes of course it is my responsibility to read the TOS but is it asking too much to have been warned or have an * posted along side a disclaimer mentioning, "any inactive/dormant phones within your ST account are subject to immediate loss of their original cell phone numbers... double stamp, no erasies, triple stamp, no erasies, touch blue make it true.

I don't know what kind of a business you're in, but I'm pretty sure you have "fine print" of your own, at the ready, to show customers if necessary. Sort of like the TSA does

Anyways, doesn't your business insurance include disaster recovery and business interruption?

**labjr** · 07-27-2012, 10:18 AM

IMO what needs to happen is this country is congress needs to pass a consumer protection law regarding phone numbers. The consumer should own their phone number and be responsible for porting their own numbers when changing carriers. Sort of like redirecting a web site. This way the phone companies can't lose your number or hold it hostage if you have a dispute.

**johnhere** · 07-27-2012, 10:29 AM

I considered straight talk at one time but they sound like more trouble than it's worth in cases like this.

**efparri** · 07-27-2012, 11:04 AM

Originally Posted by labjr

IMO what needs to happen is this country is congress needs to pass a consumer protection law regarding phone numbers. The consumer should own their phone number and be responsible for porting their own numbers when changing carriers. Sort of like redirecting a web site. This way the phone companies can't lose your number or hold it hostage if you have a dispute.

It is unlikely that a new consumer protection law would undo nearly eighty years of established law. Local number portablity regulations have only been in existence since 1996.

**Mrcricket23** · 07-27-2012, 11:06 AM

So far satisfied user here, I mean is an affordable service I guess in order to keep cost down they can't afford good CS

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