How to move your Verizon Phone number to google voice

Warnings 

Do this at your own risk - I'm only telling you what worked for me.  I don't know if it will work for you.


FYI:  I have an android phone - an HTC Rezound.

If you have grandfathered service such as unlimited data, a text plan cheaper than $10 which are no longer offered from Verizon you will loose them.   They are associated with your phone number which you are loosing.   They did let me sign up for their current best offers - like 12GB for the price of 6GB.

If you have 4G phone you will have to go to a Verizon card and get a new sim card.  Which for me at least didn't cost anything. 

You may be fined the fee for breaking your contact (over $300 in my case).   I'm hoping this is cancelled now that I've re-connected my account.  (I haven't been charged yet, so I'm not sure what will happen - I've been told if I get charged it should be cancelled because I re-connected.   It's also possible they will pull the whole amount from my checking using auto-bill pay, then credit it back to my account which would be annoying as it will take months and months before I used up that credit).

You will loose your phone insurance if you have it - it is associated with your phone number.  I was told I can't get it back through Verizon.

It will take up to 24 hours to port your number.   In my case it took almost exactly 24 hours and my verizon cell phone turned off and with in minutes I got a notification email from google telling me that the transition was complete.   My ported number then started working on Google immediately for VOICE calls (not SMS/texting).  My verizon phone could no longer make or receive calls.

It took around 3 days before texting worked to the google voice number.   I don't know if I was sent any text messages during that interval.  If I was I've never received them.

I learned switching to google voice as my primary number has some downsides.

• Google doesn't support Picture Messaging to a google voice number at this time.  (Sounds like they have something for Sprint but not Verizon).
• You either have to turn on or off call screening for all callers or particular groups, but not per phone number.  I was hoping to turn off call screening for just my new cell phone number and leave it on everywhere else.  This doesn't seem possible. 

I might recommend making these changes early during the work week so its easier to call support or go into a store rather than on a weekend.    It may turn out that I wish I had done this near the end of a billing cycle.  It's risky to change anything at Verizon during the middle of a billing cycle because for me at least in the past if I change something mid-cycle they are helpful by only charging me for the percentage of the month (old plan) I used.  But what isn't obvious is that same percentage applies to your minutes.  So if you used 90% of your minutes in the first 50% of the month you might see overage charges. 

They may ask you to set up a new line to get your phone working - I don't recommend this as I don't believe it is free.   But I'm not sure.

EXTRA WARNING:  This caused a lot of confusion with in Verizon support staff.  I've been without my phone for a almost a week - some had heard of Google Voice others had not.  I'm hoping telling you about my steps will stream line the change for you.

Read the Google Voice Porting FAQ

https://support.google.com/voice/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1065667&topic=1708418&ctx=topic

Steps which worked for me.

I might recommend making these changes during the week so its easier to call support or go into a store rather than on a weekend.  You may also want to do this near the end of your billing cycle, I'm not sure. See my warning above.

1. Call Verizon and talk to support and tell them what you are trying to do (they may not understand but at least they have record that you called them).   They call it a "port out".
2. Start the google voice porting process which requires your verizon account number, phone number, some PIN (I'm not sure when I set a PIN with verizon), and maybe address and other basic info.
3. 24 hours later that number within an hour my cell phone stopped working and google voice started working using the new number.   Text messaging stopped working for 3 days then it started working again on Google voice.
4. I tried to deal with verizon 2-3 times over the course of 3 days to figure it what to do next.
5. Eventually when I called Verizon I learned I wanted to do a reconnected as normally done by the  "winback" team.   This is the process the use to reconnect after someone leaves for another provider like Sprint but quickly comes back.  
6. They told me to go into the store and tell them I wanted to reconnect as part of a winback process.
7. At the store they gave me a new 4G sim card and phone number - without charge.  I lost grandfathered plans associated with my old number, and phone insurance all associated with my phone number. 
8. My new phone number is working.
9. Wait and see if I get charged for anything....
10. UPDATES BELOW 5/9/2012
11. I got lots of texts from Verizon thanking me for getting a new phone. (I didn't get a new phone.)
12. I logged into the Verizon web page and it asked which number to associate with my online account. I choose my new number.  This stopped a reoccurring error with the "Backup Assistant" Android app from Verizon on my HTC Rezound.  (Note I don't think the app could download my old contacts, but since they were still on the phone - they are just re-uploaded once and I continue life as usual.)

If this process worked (or didn't work) for you tell me in the comments.