🔄 Number porting: switch providers without losing your number

Number porting is the right to switch providers without losing your number. Your company keeps the numbers your customers already know, while improving service or cost.

How the process works

• Choose the new provider and confirm your numbers are portable.
• Provide the documentation and an authorization.
• Coordinate the port date to minimize any interruption.
• The number goes live on the new service, with your IP telephony or UCaaS plan.

What to keep in mind

Plan the port during low-activity hours, keep the previous service until confirmed, and check that all lines (main numbers and trunks) are included.

At TelHarbor we guide you through the whole process so the transition is smooth.

What can and cannot be ported

The general rule is that the number is yours, not the carrier's. Even so, a few details are worth checking before you promise your team a date:

• Active fixed and mobile numbers: port without trouble if the account is current.
• Full DID ranges: if you hold a block of numbers, the whole block usually ports, not individual numbers out of it.
• Already-cancelled numbers: once released, a number goes back to the carrier and is usually lost. Never cancel before porting.
• Numbers with debt or in dispute: rejected until the situation is settled with the current carrier.

How not to lose service on cut-over day

Every company has the same reasonable fear: "what if we have no phones the day we switch". A simple sequence avoids it:

1. Stand up the new service first with temporary numbers and test it properly: inbound, outbound, menus, queues and recording.
2. Forward traffic from the old number to the new service, so your team is already working there before the port.
3. Port during a low-traffic window, typically overnight.
4. Remove the forward and the ported number lands directly.

Done that way, the real interruption is measured in minutes and happens when almost nobody is calling.

Documents usually required

• A copy of a recent invoice from the current carrier.
• The company's registration document or tax ID.
• ID of the legal representative and a signed letter of authorisation.
• The exact list of numbers to be ported.

The detail that causes most delays: account-holder data must match exactly what the current carrier has on file, down to how the company name is spelled. A minor difference is enough for a rejection.

Common mistakes

• Cancelling the old service before porting. The expensive, irreversible one.
• Porting before testing the new service with real traffic.
• Forgetting secondary numbers: the fax line, the branch number, the one on an old sign.
• Not telling the team: people should know calls arrive somewhere else that day.
• Not updating where the number appears: website, Google listing, email signatures, invoices and printed material.