MSE News: Plans to improve mobile phone switching revealed

Not asking for a code means you don't need to contact your existing provider, which may encourage switching.

However, the disadvantage with NOT asking for some sort of code when you want to switch landline or mobile provider is that it means your existing firm can't offer you a special deal to stay.. or price match/beat the offer you want to change too - which many people may prefer instead.

As such, many customers will thus be worse off under the new system as they won't be able to negotiate in the same way..

Regards
Sunil

I think number porting needs to be reformed to make it even faster than the one day that it takes and agree with OFCOM that only one network should be contacted to move. When I changed banks, I didn't tell my old bank I was leaving, just went to my new bank and signed up and they did everything else for me.

More needs to be done however when things go wrong and the number only partially moves across. There are countless posts on the forums here that seem to point to a trend. I'm not aware of what has technically gone wrong at one of the two networks' ends, but people have reportedly received calls on their old network whilst only being able to make outgoing calls on the new network which would be quite hard to work with for some individuals (owing to the fact that two phones need to be carried temporarily, among other things too).

Finally, I agree with the post by molerat that networks need to do more to retain existing customers and to reward loyalty. Competition is not always about being able to move elsewhere.

How true. The road of good intentions is littered with such examples... credit cards, banks (apparently the do-gooders would prefer us all to pay charges so existing charges aren't "hidden"), pensions (at least up until the more recent reforms, which may eventually produce an army of numbsculls who ended up getting conned, taxed or spending too much too soon and then come on forums like this to blame eveyone else for allowing them the freedom to make bad mistakes) and so on.

The problem is also going to be any early termination charges, for those still in contract.

If I'm with Orange and want to move to o2, and ring o2 who then arrange to port my number without me contacting Orange. Suddenly, I get an early termination charge because I got dates mixed up and thought I was out of contract when I wasn't.

Even if you did know you were still in contract, it's difficult to know what the early termination charge is as this information is generally not easy to find at all.