Neotel’s individual number porting to kick-off in April 2010

The South African telecommunication company, Neotel, will make available individual number porting in April 2010, company officials announced today.

“The porting of numbers in blocks of 10000 or 1000 has been available for some months now. Unfortunately that excluded many businesses, as it is only relevant to very large corporations. In addition, we are already testing 100 block porting, and as of April will be able to do 100 block and individual porting for any customer”, said Angus Hay, Executive Head – Technology at Neotel.

Until now, a number of corporations have ported numbers in blocks of 10000 and 1000 to Neotel.
Hay said that the new portability will provide South Africans with a convenient way of porting their individual fixed line numbers. By using geographic number portability, the clients will keep their existing fixed line when changing service providers.

According to ICASA, ported numbers must be indicated to the consumer by the sound of 3 beeps while a call is being connected, as is currently the industry standard with ported cellular numbers.

Neotel is a South African communications network operator, providing a range of value-added voice and data services for businesses, wholesale network operators and consumers using its IP Next Generation Network, powered by a fibre optic backbone.