XNet mins - how do you know which Network folk are with

kendie

Is there anyway of working out from a phone number which network they are with. It's all well and good when you get inclusive minutes to mobiles on your own network, but how can I tell from a phone number if someone is on the same network as me. I know I could go round and ask my mates ... but just wondered if there was anyway of looking up a number. In the good old days you used to be able to tell from the number ... but them days are long gone. Only asked could just got stung for some calls I made to someone who I thought was on my network but obviously not!

Sorry if this question has been asked - I did try and search but couldn't quite manage to word my search right.

*!*HIBS*!*

Is there anyway of working out from a phone number which network they are with.

The answer is possibly. If the person that you are going to ring has not ported their number to another network, then there are a few sites (can't remember now) which were posted on here to answer a similar question in the past. The start of the mobile phone numbers provided on the sites will only tell you where the numbers were originally allocated to. Now if your friend has moved since networks and taken their "old number" with them, the answer is no, unless you ask them (like you mentioned).

Mobile phone numbers are static (I'm almost certain), so they do not change their network status if somebody has ported their number across, e.g. I port my number from o2 to Orange, my number should be Orange (if mobile number were dynamic), but it will always be recognised as an o2 number, rather than an Orange number even after porting. So if you called me from a landline, the call charges may be for an o2 number rather than an Orange number.

This can be a good and a bad thing. The good thing is that a friend calling me from an o2 number using their own network minutes will be billed as normal (free or cheaper). The bad thing is that say another friend rings me from an Orange number, they may get charged for calling x-net (cross net) to an o2 number, even though I've moved to Orange. (This is what I suspect has happened here). :eek:

So when asking your friend what network they are on now, ask them if they have ported their number across since they were first allocated it.

mobilegossip

The Code Locator on http://www.ukphoneinfo.com/section/home/introduction.shtml
will tell you the origin of the mobile no,but as Hibs points outs it cant tell you if number is ported.

kendie

Thanks guys. Useful information.

dave_dph

*!*HIBS*!* wrote:

Mobile phone numbers are static (I'm almost certain), so they do not change their network status if somebody has ported their number across, e.g. I port my number from o2 to Orange, my number should be Orange (if mobile number were dynamic), but it will always be recognised as an o2 number, rather than an Orange number even after porting. So if you called me from a landline, the call charges may be for an o2 number rather than an Orange number.

This can be a good and a bad thing. The good thing is that a friend calling me from an o2 number using their own network minutes will be billed as normal (free or cheaper). The bad thing is that say another friend rings me from an Orange number, they may get charged for calling x-net (cross net) to an o2 number, even though I've moved to Orange. (This is what I suspect has happened here). :eek:

The mobile networks charge for calls as on-net and off-net. Each network recognises all numbers which are on it's own network including those numbers which have been ported in, calls to these numbers are charged as on-net. Calls to all other mobile numbers are classed as off-net, i.e. x-network.

If I remember correctly it was O2's old PAYG charging system that didn't recognise when O2 numbers had been ported out and therefore still charged calls to those numbers as on-net; their charging system was updated a few years back.