There will be a chance in 2020: Why is it so difficult to port your number? !

Number portability is an urgent need

Number portability, as the name suggests, means changing operators without changing your number. There are three major operators in China, China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom, and each of them has its own number range. For example, numbers starting with 130 and 131 are China Unicom numbers; numbers starting with 136 and 138 are China Mobile numbers; and numbers starting with 133 and 153 are China Telecom numbers.

However, in this case, if you choose to use a number from a certain operator, you can only switch to the package service of the original operator without changing the number.

That is to say, if you choose a mobile number at the beginning, it will be impossible to use the new services of China Unicom and China Telecom without changing your number.

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In the past, this was not a big problem. On the one hand, everyone used to make calls and send text messages, and the rates for these services were similar. On the other hand, mobile phone numbers were just mobile phone numbers, and even if you changed your number, you only needed to tell your friends and family.

But now, the problem arises. We are using more and more mobile data, and the mobile data charges of each company are very different. Now more and more Internet packages are appearing, data charges are getting cheaper and cheaper, and there are many free data and unlimited packages, and people have more and more choices.

At the same time, a mobile phone number is no longer just a mobile phone number, but is also bound to a large number of accounts, bank cards, etc. Changing accounts is no longer as easy as before.

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At the same time, the conditions for changing packages have been relaxed recently, and many old users can switch to cheaper and more convenient Internet packages.

The most popular package is Tencent King Card, which charges 1 yuan per day for 1GB of data, plus many mobile apps offer free data, which makes many people want to switch to Tencent King Card. China Unicom users can apply directly, while China Mobile and China Telecom users are eager to apply for number portability.

What are the difficulties in number portability?

In fact, it is not easy to transfer your number to other networks. In fact, it is quite difficult.

First of all, after the number is ported, the software vendor does not know that the number has changed networks and will still send verification codes and other text messages to the port of the original operator, resulting in the inability to receive text messages normally after the network port.

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Another difficult issue is the interests of operators.

In the past, if a person used a number from a certain operator, he or she was basically bound to the service of that operator and would continue to use it. If number portability is allowed, it will have a great impact on the number of users of major operators.

Therefore, the attitude of various companies towards number portability is currently very negative. It is said that it takes more than 30 steps to process number portability.

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Since 2010, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has opened pilot projects for number portability in Tianjin, Jiangxi and other places. However, due to the difficulty in the procedures for number portability and the problems mentioned above arising after the porting, very few users actually switch networks, and the success rate of number portability is less than 40%. Many people fail for inexplicable reasons.

Therefore, operators will not easily give up their own interests, nor will they easily give up their own cake to others. Without strong supervision from regulatory authorities, none of them will open the door to number portability.

Number portability is coming soon

However, according to the efforts of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, number portability will be implemented as soon as possible, just like the previous speed increase and fee reduction and old users changing packages. The above-mentioned problems are the most urgent ones to be solved.

First of all, on the technical level, it is necessary to solve the problem of sending verification SMS after network switching. It should be impossible to unify all operators. If software developers can know which specific operator the user has switched to, this will require a huge project.

Number portability is definitely a good thing for consumers. We can vote with our feet and choose the operator and package we like. At the same time, it also requires operators to continuously improve their services to provide us with better conditions for use.

As for operators, winning consumers' recognition through good services may actually generate more profits than restricting users from switching networks.