Back in the USA - one phone has gone from my account in the last few days!

[Mark-USA]

OK, I live in the USA. I keep two UK PAYG O2 phones (mine and wife's) for use when there. I'm aware of the 6 month rule and go to lengths to make sure I send a paid txt from one phone to the other and vice versa within this period to make sure I don't lose the balance and we keep our UK numbers active. I often check MyO2 to ensure all is well, which it was, until I logged on today - and my wife's phone number was gone - presumably taking her balance with it.

So, I was in the UK in October, a few weeks ago, and obviously made sure there was paid activity on my wife's line and mine, and I used my personal one extensively. Mine still shows up - hers does not (she wasn't on this trip). I did add some £'s to my line but not hers as she didn't need it. Both lines showed up a week or so ago with a balance when I checked, now just mine shows on the account. Clearly something has happened that I don't know about.

Both phones were powered down at Heathrow (after setting to Airplane mode) just before my return flights so I can't see how there would be any use to drain either balance to zero. The only difference is I added some time to mine but if there's a new rule about having to do this, I'm unaware and I can see my line going off too as I will not be back in the UK in the next 6 months.

Anyone got any clues? Help!!!

[jonsie]

Apparently, I know from my own personal experience, a top up is now required every 6 months too along with chargeable activity

Best option is to call customer service to see if it's possible to reactivate your wife's number

Use Skype to call free or try the social media links

Guide: A Guide to Skype 

Guide: How to find help & contact O2 

[Bambino]

@Mark-USA To add to the advice from @jonsie, sending a text isn't sufficient to keep the account active. You must make at least one chargeable call every six months.

[Oxonian]

@Bambino 

Would a text that is chargeable, ie sent to a number on another network, be sufficient to keep the account active ? 

Asking for a friend ! 

[Mark-USA]

I just called them. The lost lines was reactivated promptly enough. I'm still waiting to get the balance back - if not I guess I'll call tomorrow. 

How to keep the lines active was a bit less consistent. I called twice and got two slightly different stories. Both said I'd need to make a CALL every 3 months (OK, no prob), one said no top-up needed, the other said it was required every 3 months, but, if we did get deactivated to just call and reclaim the numbers.   

Now I'm not sure I got a totally informed customer service opinion as both lines has not been topped up on that frequency (mine was 11 months between, hers has been a year at this point), both were kept alive by txts every 6 months. Top ups are an issue - everything I have financially is registered at a US address which I can't link to my O2 account - a nuisance for sure.

So, the plan is:

(1) Check MyO2 regularly to see if either account gets deactivated - if so, call in and reactivate.

(2) Make a paid call on both lines every 10-11 weeks

(3) Not much I can do if a top up is required to keep both lines alive - I guess I'd have to resign myself to abandoning the numbers and balances potentially.

So we shall see. Hopefully the calls will do the trick. Watch this space..

Thanks for your help folk. If I find out more over time I'll come back and report it here.

Cheers

[jonsie]

Restored credit usually takes 24 hours to be recredited 

As for the different advice given, there seems to be no consistency and I think advisers just work their narrative around each given situation ie. say anything to justify O2's actions

Glad you are reconnected

As for top ups there is a guide and advice on using a third party to purchase vouchers with your own US bank cards

Guide How to Top Up (PAYG) 

[Mark-USA]

I called today as the credit hadn't been returned yet - the gal I spoke to promptly made sure it was. They did say to leave the phone on for a while, then pop the SIM after 5-10 mins and check the balance. I'm not sure if that had anything to do with it, but at least I now have one.

As to the latest variation on the top-up theme, she said I would need to top up every 4 or 5 months (?), not very exact or useful, to keep the phone alive, plus periodic calls, again no exact time period. She suggested I get someone in the UK to send me top-up vouchers (well, send me the codes) and then could call customer service periodically to add them. I'm not totally opposed to the idea but the lack of exactness, plus the inconvenience makes me a bit wary of any of this advice. I don't know what to believe but I think you may be right jonsie - a need to say whatever to close out the call.

Anyway, I'll stick with plan A, above, for the time being and see how that goes.

The next challenge, and why txts worked for me in the past, is that roaming here in Northern California is terrible and I could just about sneak a txt through. I tried a call between my phones today but could not get through - basically my roaming (at home, on T-mobile) varies between 1 bar and 'no signal', not good enough for a voice call. I'm literally going to take a drive to see if I can find a spot with a strong enough signal in a while.

I'm almost at the point of just abandoning O2 and just buying a new SIM at the airport. The rules of the past few years worked fine for me though obviously I'm not exactly making them a lot of money with my usage patterns. Quite frustrating nonetheless as people know our UK numbers.

[Oxonian]

@Mark-USA 

O2 PAYG top-up vouchers have a twelve month validity. Could you not buy a couple when you are in the UK and take them back to the US with you and use these to top up online ? 

As people know your UK numbers, it might be feasible to move them to another UK network provider. If the O2 signal is acceptable in the areas that you frequent, both Sky and Tesco are virtual operators that utilise the O2 network and both have better than average reputations for Customer Service.    

[Mark-USA]

I could - had I known the rules had changed, I would have considered it when I was in the UK last month - but the answers I'm getting from Customer Service are all over the place.

Perhaps you're right about being time to change. I noticed the new 2023 USA roaming thing that you need to have 4G enabled etc. The video showing how to do it doesn't match my iPhones OS so I just updated both (on wifi, data off) - it still doesn't match the video but the gist is my settings seem OK. Generally I always keep cellular data turned off while in the USA as the rates are ridiculous. I made the mistake of turning it on for a few mins, as this was implied, while I went thru this process to check everything was set right for the US and rule out terrible roaming as the sole cause. 

Guess what - that couple of mins of data on appears to have completely sucked up my entire £29 balance.

I will have to call tomorrow to see if I can appeal to their better nature - if not, then it looks like I'm through with O2 as I can't deal with all the fuss, let alone the way my money just got vacuumed up. Sigh..

[Mark-USA]

I take it back - my balance has been restored to £29.82! It seems it disappeared for a while during the iOS update process and subsequent reboot onto the very feeble roaming network took quite a while to communicate the true balance back to home base for MyO2 to report.

So, having my balances back, and ruled out the need to set up the phones properly in the USA, I'm off to seek out somewhere with actual reception, if I can find it, to make a phone call or two. I think this will be, somewhat literally, the next mountain to climb. To be fair, while roaming partner reception is feeble in the area, I do have a house on the edge of a ravine where even my primo Verizon US cell has it's moments. A weak signal in a poor reception bowls may be the big problem now..