Upgrade vs new account on orange

[Guest cyrilthefish]

I've had an original SPV, then later an e100 (i was one of the lucky ones that got an free upgrade from orange care when they ran out of SPV's :P ) on the same contract for almost 2 years now and i want a C500...

Right, thing is every time i've upgraded a phone i end up paying a LOT more for the handset than if i cancelled and started a new account (why do phone companies try to drive customers away like this?). I'm guessing the same thing is going to happen when i try to upgrade this time, so i was wondering if i could do this:

1. get one of the pre-order deals mentioned on coolsmartphone.com (£25 PM, free C500 handset)

2. Transfer my phone number from current orange contract to the new one (can this be done?)

3. cancel old contract

would this work or not? :?:

[Guest squall]

my advice would be to phone orange when the c500 is launched and ask for retentions, they are in a position to give pretty sweet deals if you rub them up the right way.

[Guest chucky.egg]

Yeah, they *CAN* do, but they don't always care that much!

I don't bother with upgrades any more.

I bought a "gold" number on ebay, signed a new contract with O, got a free E200 (which I flogged on eBay for twice what I paid for the number) and now get more minutes and SMS for less money. I made a tidy profit and save £40+ each month on my bill.

Each year I'll give my current network (O or Voda) one chance to keep my business, and port it to the other network if they don't care enough.

Don't fanny around with them, and tell them why you're moving (cos Voda want new customers more than O want to keep current customers).

[Guest mcwarre]

You can't port your number to another contract on the same network. Porting means exactly that transfer to another provider (PAYG or PM). One way is to port your current number to another network PAYG the port it immediately back to O on the new contract. Quite a bit of hassle tho'

[Guest Lingerhosen]

See if this previous discussion helps...

http://www.modaco.com/viewtopic.php?t=1097...9725&highlight=

:wink:

[Guest MorphFx]

I'm with Orange and I always do this...

I have two orange mobiles, one pay as you go, and the other on contract.

When the contract is up (after 12 months) and I want a new phone, I end the contract by converting it to Pay-as-u Go (Orange will do this for free) and I then get a new contract and phone and transfer my other Pay-as-u-go number to the new Orange contract.

This way I always keep the same two numbers! I've been doing this for years!

(Sounds like one of those cheesey tips you get in women magazines dun it :P )

[Guest mcwarre]

Are you saying that O will let you port from an O contract to an O PAYG???

[Guest Honest John]

Are you saying that O will let you port from an O contract to an O PAYG???

I rang O today. Apparently - and remember this was from an O customer services rep so treat it wil caution - if you have number "A" and take out a contract on number "B", you can convert "A" to Pay as you go, but you have to stay on PAYG for 3 months, then you can transfer "A" number to the "B" contract.

[Guest ndmorgan]

Dowhat I do every year.

If you are a high tariff user - say over £75 a month.

Towards the end of your contratct - Find a deal on roughly the same tariff and offering a free phone with similar spec.

Phone Orange customer services and say that your contracts running out and you require your PAC code (Portability access code)

You'll immediately get transferred to a sales guy who will be quite willing to give you or reduce the price considerably on a new phone.

When you ask for your PAC code they check to see your usage and if it's a high usage they want to keep your business so they'll offer you a good deal.

You may get asked what other offers you've seen and will try to match it or beat it thats why you have to research the best deals out there.

I've done this for three years, the only phone I got charged for was my spv100@ £50 but I did get a £50 voucher towards my next bill, so really it cost me zip.

:P

[Guest cyrilthefish]

hmmm... my current bill averages around £33-35 at the moment (i spend 3 times as much on GPRS than i do on calls/SMS combined! :P ) but i haven't

upgraded for allmost 2 years...

Is that going to be too low to risk asking for the PAC code do you think?

[Guest kurtfhouse]

After 2 years you must be entitled to a free upgrade......surely!

Why wait 2 years though? :shock: I have only ever waited the whole year once, can never wait to upgrade, something much better always comes along 6 months after I buy a phone :P

[Guest kurtfhouse]

After 2 years you must be entitled to a free upgrade......surely!

Why wait 2 years though? :shock: I have only ever waited the whole year once, can never wait to upgrade, something much better always comes along 6 months after I buy a phone :P

[Guest cyrilthefish]

well... it's sort of a long reason, and should really have upgraded a year ago and sold the new phone on ebay :P

years contract expired december 2003, what with christmas and everything, i thought i'd hold off the upgrade a bit.

then i was looking forward to the E200, but ended up being put off by reports of the really bad battery life (i mean i struggle with the ~30 hour battery life my E100 has, i couldn't go any lower)

i then thought i'd hold off for either the MPx or MPx220 (i didn't want to upgrade then, as it'd mean i'd have to wait a few months after they were released for the extra 12months contract to finnish so i could get one)

and just recently, the C500 appeared from nowhere and has everything i currently want (well, except WiFi) in a smartphone (faster CPU and more RAM (thats what really annoys me about the E100 now), better battery, bluetooth, smaller size and newer OS)

The real reason i haven't been bored and wanted a new phone really is because of the constant stream of new software available for smartphone. Like a PC, there is allways some new Game/App/Tweak/Homescreen to fiddle with to keep me interested.

Apart from my Siemens SL45 (the smartphone of it's time, especially when used with a 128MB MMC card. I kept that phone for 14months while i waited for the first SPV to be released) i've got bored of a phone within 6 months and eagerly awaited the day i could upgrade...

If i could just upgrade the CPU/RAM of my E100 i'd be just as happy. The E100 hardware is now becoming old enough to not run certain software (ie. doom type games *barely* work and need a reboot to work usually, video needs really carefull encoding to play properly, and pocketmusic needs a 200mhz CPU to enable bass-boost on OGG files :D)