[VoiceOps] TF number ported out/re-assigned without authorization

[Peter Beckman]

You're not alone.

We've had numbers ported out without authorization or even the correct
information before, and we get billed for it for months until someone
notices.

We've also put numbers into production that our carrier provided, only to
find out they should not have been in their inventory at all.

We went as far as sending test calls or SMS messages to each number in our
inventory about once every 2 weeks, and generate a report of numbers that
have failed the test (we didn't receive the inbound call or text). This has
helped us detect issues earlier, but not prevent them.

We have implemented Port Out Webhooks with Bandwidth and that has prevented
several incorrect Port Outs.

Mistakes happen, but Thinq seems to have royally messed up here. There is
no requirement for carriers to regularly validate that they are still the
CLEC/ILEC/RespOrg carrier of record for a number, and honestly there is no
proactive notification sometimes either, so they simply might not know. But
most carriers assume that if it is in their system, it is probably still
there and theirs. This just isn't the case in a small number of situations,
and these situations really suck.

Beckman

On Tue, 14 Mar 2023, Carlos Alvarez via VoiceOps wrote:

> This is a huge problem, so while I’m waiting for thinQ to tell me what they
> can do, I thought I’d check with my other resources.  They gave us a small
> block of TF numbers some time back, and we assigned them to one customer.
> We tested them in March of 2022.  One of them was not put into use as it
> was for a pre-planned project this year; the customer needed to physically
> publish the number on posters, via letters, and by email.  Now it’s time to
> start the project, and we find out that the number has been given to
> Telnyx.  We were told by thinQ that it was part of a bad inventory load,
> but that can’t be possible since it did work.  And we also have working
> numbers from the same batch (for now…that’s worrisome too).
>
> Currently the number goes to a fax tone, and we don’t know who owns it.  I
> have not tried sending a fax.  I’m not sure how I’d start that conversation.
>
> This seems like a massive failing on thinQ’s part.  The end user is a
> regional government authority that has spread the number far and wide.  In
> fact if you google the number, you get the government agency’s info.  What
> can we force them to do?  The project was to go live on Monday.
>

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Peter Beckman                                                  Internet Guy
beckman at angryox.com                                https://www.angryox.com/
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