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[broadstairs]

After trying to find an ISP which would allow me to migrate and take my digital voice phone number with me I ended up signing up with Vodafone with what seems like a good (black friday) deal. However it has not gone smoothly and I'll explain why.

The online sign up seemed to go fine and got all the paper work via email including a url to keep track of my migration. This is where it went wrong. I had said I needed to start on or after 16th December when my contract with BT expired on the 15th, so when it got to the 15th (today) and no sign of any action I thought I'd use their online chat to find out what if anything was happening - bad mistake! I spent 40 minutes with their online chat with a human (after the initial contact with their chatbot) and got absolutely nowhere because I could not pass their security checks. This seems to require a PIN number which I don't have because you cannot sign in to your account until activation! Plus I had no account number or actual activation date because I cannot sign in until activation!

So you see the catch 22 situation  and in the end it was suggested I go to my local Vodafone shop and talk to an actual human. I jumped in the car and drove the 2.5 miles to the shop. Once sitting down with the very helpful guy in the shop it was all sorted withing about 10 minutes. Transpired that the person doing the online sign up failed to give me the account number and PIN which he had created and while I was there I got the actual activation date as well - 20th December which is fine since BT will not disconnect me until then.

So bottom line here is Vodafone need to re-educate their online sales staff to communicate the required information needed to pass their security checks which will allow customers to contact their help line staff and pass security checks 

I'll update again when it all happens - I hope 

Stuart

[kitz]

Not good that you had to go to a Vodafone store to be able to sort it.  Glad that it finally was.   Good luck and I hope all goes well on the 20th.

[broadstairs]

Well it's not going well. I still have no router and nothing from DPD couriers to say its on its way. Yesterday I contacted Vodafone again and they said it was sorted but this morning still nothing. If it were only broadband it would not be so critical but this is also migrating my digital voice phone as well and unless it can be used there is no point in trying the migration tomorrow. I guess I'll have to contact them again today and try to sort something out. I would not be averse to delaying the migration but it is rather annoying that they've had since 24th November to get this set up!

Stuart

[broadstairs]

Well it all went pear shaped today. After about and hour and a half on their online chat it eventually transpired that there was 'a technical issue' with my original order which meant it was going nowhere. Why it took so long and only because I contacted Vodafone that this came to light. The migration was never going to happen on the 20th! Eventually today the guy on the online chat was able to raise a new order with all my original details and this seems to have gone through OK with an activation on the 17th January, yes later than I wanted but at least I should keep both a broadband connection and my phone number! This time I have been contacted by BT to say that someone wants to take over my connection on the 17th January and if this is wrong contact BT. This never happened on the original order.

So after this fiasco I intend to raise a complaint with Vodafone as I have a record of the online chats so can be sure of my facts.

Stuart

[kitz]

   I hope things go well this time.

[broadstairs]

 

Stuart

[broadstairs]

Well it looks like it is all going along the way it should for my move to Vodafone on 17th January now. BT have written to confirm that it is happening and OR have also contacted me to say they will switch me on 17th. Also today I was notified my Vodafone router has been dispatched and should arrive tomorrow (12th Jan).

Stuart

[tiffy]

Have been following your Vodafone migration story with interest as I will be in the same situation in March, initial FTTP 2 year contract with BT ends, I also have digital voice and very much wish to retain my current long standing LL number.

I know I really should pre-migrate my LL number to VOIP, in fact should have done so before migrating from FTTC to FTTP, however having missed that opportunity BT don't make this easy as their digital voice is contracted with the BB, a situation well documented on this forum and others.
There certainly are better "new customer" deals always available and the Vodafone FTTP + digital voice migration route seems the least hassle and cost effective option for me at present.

Find their FTTP BB speed offerings a bit confusing:
(accepting that most ISP's quote estimated UL/DL speeds)
Full Fibre 2, 73/20 Mbps.
More or less same as (theoretically perfect) max FTTP, 80/20 Mbps?

Full Fibre 100, 100/20 Mbps.
As opposed to BT's Full Fibre 100, 150/30 Mbps.

Full Fibre 200, 200/30 Mbps.
No direct BT equivalent.

Wonder which FTTP package you have contracted for?

[broadstairs]

I have signed up for Full Fibre 500 with Vodafone, this was back at the end of November and it was a Black Friday deal so a very good price. I don't need 500mbps but it was significantly cheaper than my existing contract with BT for a 150mbps service. It's a 2 year deal and at the end I will probably drop back to a 150mbps deal when the contract expires.

Stuart

[j0hn]

Have been following your Vodafone migration story with interest as I will be in the same situation in March, initial FTTP 2 year contract with BT ends, I also have digital voice and very much wish to retain my current long standing LL number.

New OFCOM rules that came in in April 2023 should give more flexibility.
Regulated providers need to give 1 month to port out a landline number after it has ceased.

Specific obligations relating to the Porting Process
C7.6 All Regulated Providers shall ensure that:
(a) they provide Number Portability on reasonable terms and conditions to any Switching
Customer who so requests;
(b) they provide Number Portability for a minimum of one month after the date of
termination by the Switching Customer of the contract for the provision of the Relevant
Communications Service(s), unless the Switching Customer expressly agrees otherwise
at the point when they terminate the contract; and
(c) no direct charges are applied to the Switching Customer for the provision of Number
Portability

They should allow customers to drop landline from current bundles and then migrate the number to VOIP without creasing the broadband, or allow you to migrate broadband only away, then port the number to VOIP.

[tiffy]

I have signed up for Full Fibre 500 with Vodafone, this was back at the end of November and it was a Black Friday deal so a very good price. I don't need 500mbps but it was significantly cheaper than my existing contract with BT for a 150mbps service. It's a 2 year deal and at the end I will probably drop back to a 150mbps deal when the contract expires.

Thanks for the additional information Stuart.
Yes, my speed requirements are somewhat similar, 150/30 Mbps is more than adequate, could likely settle for 100/20, will have to see what VF deals are available at the end of March.

Will be interested to hear how you get on with the VF provided router after 17th., I have found the BT SH-2 to be solid and reliable over the close to 2 year contract period.
Having said that, Wi-Fi coverage is not a main factor for me as most of my dwelling is ethernet hard wired and a lot of my Home Assistant wireless devices use Zigbee Wi-Fi to my MQTT broker server.

A very quick browse of the VF customers forum would appear to indicate that although the BB migration/service is generally praised quite a few migrants have had issues with their digital voice migration, of course, as with any forum, only the issues are reported, totally successfull operations less so!
Best of luck for the 17th..

New OFCOM rules that came in in April 2023 should give more flexibility.
Regulated providers need to give 1 month to port out a landline number after it has ceased.

They should allow customers to drop landline from current bundles and then migrate the number to VOIP without creasing the broadband, or allow you to migrate broadband only away, then port the number to VOIP.

Many thanks for the information j0hn.
Wonder if any/how many BT FTTP BB + Digital Voice subscribers have successfully managed to complete LL or BB migrations as per the OFCOM guidelines (rules) to date?

[broadstairs]

Well today's the day and I woke up at 2am (as you do at my age    )and saw the red light on the BT Hub so went and plugged in my Vodafone Hub and it burst into life, connection up and running at 500mbps according to the speed tester. So went back to bed happy so far. The home phone has a dial tone but as yet cannot call my number from mobile so hopefully that will sort itself out in the next few hours.

Stuart

[tiffy]

Well today's the day and I woke up at 2am (as you do at my age    )and saw the red light on the BT Hub so went and plugged in my Vodafone Hub and it burst into life, connection up and running at 500mbps according to the speed tester. So went back to bed happy so far. The home phone has a dial tone but as yet cannot call my number from mobile so hopefully that will sort itself out in the next few hours.

Stuart

Glad the BB migration all went through on time, appears to be fully functional and to contract expectation.
Very interested to see how the digital phone migration gets on, hopefully won't be far behind, that's the difficult bit for ISP's apparently
Did you have any pre-configuration to do with the VF Hub or was it completely plug-n-play?

[broadstairs]

Did you have any pre-configuration to do with the VF Hub or was it completely plug-n-play?

Only my local lan IPs etc, no connection details had to be set as far as that went I just plugged in the router and it connected.

Just one caveat, the online Vodafone account cannot be accessed OK until activation, once that happened I could login this morning OK but prior to activation it will not work! Apparently that's how it works!

Stuart

[tiffy]

Only my local lan IPs etc, no connection details had to be set as far as that went I just plugged in the router and it connected.

Thanks for the information.
When I migrated from FTTC to FTTP close to 2 years ago I found it was easier just to change virtually all of the BT SH-2 configuration settings to that of my trusty XyXEL router, Wi-Fi SSID, PW, LAN IP subnet address etc, I appreciate that this would all be lost with a factory reset, thankfully, have never had any occasion to do so.

Will follow your LL digital phone migration completion with interest, hope it goes well, appreciate any further updates.