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When I try to port my current phone number to Google Voice I get the following error:

We currently don't support porting from your carrier.

My carrier is US Cellular. Does anyone have a work around? I really want to keep this number as I've had it for almost 20 years.

I would be willing to port my number to say T-Mobile if I could without a contract, and then 30 days later port it to Google Voice.

Has anyone tried this or do you have another work around?

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  • Not sure if this pertains to Google voice in particular, so I'll just make it a comment and not an answer, but there is difference between local numbers and mobile numbers and not all vendors can port between the two. Commented Apr 20, 2011 at 2:14
  • @MaQleod I have contacted US Cellular and they say I can take my number anywhere. All I get from Google is "you carrier isn't supported" even when I emailed support. I am not sure if they are considered an land-line in the context you are referring to Commented Apr 20, 2011 at 14:12
  • It is the accepting carrier that needs the switching equipment that can handle the change-over. The phone company I work for can port out to mobile companies, but we cannot accept mobile numbers for port-ins. It may just be that Google can not accept mobile numbers or that the vendor that Google uses has an issue with US Cellular (I'm not sure what number vendor the two of those use). Porting is tricky and there is a LOT that goes on behind the scenes that most people have no visibility into. Commented Apr 20, 2011 at 14:22
  • @MaQleod I've had success porting my own mobile number over to Google Voice (after which, Sprint, my carrier asked if I had authorized it and I asked them to port it back to Sprint, haha...) Commented Jun 21, 2012 at 2:40
  • @Larry - I see your post is from a while back. Have you since solved this issue? Commented Jun 21, 2012 at 2:40

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I ported my number to a Verizon Prepaid plan (I didn't tell them what my end goal was just that I wanted to change to their prepaid plan), the cheapest one was 200 minutes if I remember correctly. I used my phone for a couple of weeks. Once my minutes were almost used up I ported my number to Google Voice. I can't remember the total cost, I had to pay activation and 200 minutes from Verizon, then the porting fee for Google. But for me it was well worth it.

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