A discussion among Grandfathers

[Korth]

"Public Mobile here..." reminded me that it was time to pay for my phone.  So I rushed out, bought my $100 Payment Voucher, stuffed it into my wallet, and promptly forgot all about it.  Didn't login to my Self-Serve account and top up my balance, lol, oops I must be getting old.  Screenshot taken after depositing my Payment Voucher.  (And yeah I should set up Autopay I know I know.)

Fortunately, the "Reactivate Current Plan" button worked exactly as expected.  I've seen this "Your account has been suspended" stuff before, on a friend's account.  It seems there's no difference between plans vs grandfathered-plans in this respect, ie: once the plan (duration, talk, text, data, discount) parameters have been configured they'll remain indefinitely.

Just posting this because I recall a few threads where people speculated about the consequences of allowing a grandfathered plan to expire.  Rest easy, my grandfathered friends, it seems you won't lose your irreplaceable plan forever just because your payment is a few days late.

I notice an Account Deactivation Date.  And I notice that it's 30 days past the Plan Expiry Date (Jan 5, 2017 on my screenshot), it's definitely not 90 days.  What would have happen to my grandfathered plan, my phone number, and my PM account if it remained unpaid past Jan 5, 2017?

[Korth]

Interesting. Any idea exactly how many days your account was left on Expired/Suspended status?

---

The final 15-20 days of prepaid service on the last billing cycle were "wasted", then the plan didn't automatically renew, not enough account balance.

Then my phone languished in snowy/rainy Chilliwack while I enjoyed the wonders of Eastern Europe for almost 4 months, lol.  Definitely longer than 90 days.  I was genuinely surprised that the account and number (and grandfathered plan!) were instantly resurrected, I'd expected them to be lost forever.

[MoreYummy]

This thread is alive again!

[NDesai]

@KorthInteresting. Any idea exactly how many days your account was left on Expired/Suspended status?

[Korth]

So ... I went on an extended work-vacation to Europe.  Left my phone at home.  Used a "spare" phone provided by my boss (along with an endless pile of locally purchased cheap short-term-service SIMs and their random temporarily-issued phone numbers, lol, things are a little weird in Eastern Europe).

My 90-days used themselves up.  Then 30-days more, and another 30-days, and yet another 30-days.  What a great vacation!

But upon my return, I found a number of increasingly sad messages from PM sitting in my inbox, along with a survey asking me to answer some questions about "why I left PM", lol.

So I ran out and purchased a couple of $40 payment vouchers (because they don't sell $100 increments any more?).  Within seconds of submitting the first voucher code my balance was enough to cover my plan and my phone went nuts, flooding me with a "Welcome back!" and tons of notifications/messages (from PM and from everybody else) before I could submit the second voucher code.  I may have lost some voicemails, apparently they don't store them forever.  But I never even had to click the "Reactivate Current Plan" button - which was quite fortunate since it actually disappeared forever after I clicked something else on the page, haha, I was initially a little dismayed by that detail but it turned out to be self-correcting non-issue.

Ye Olde (long expired, longer discontinued) Grandfather plan remained fully intact, same phone, same SIM, same phone number, everything exactly as it was before, except my (new) 90-day billing cycle (re)started on a different date.  And, of course, I wasn't billed for the period of deactivated service.

Not that I advocate pushing the limits on your grandfathered plans, lol, maybe I just got lucky and nobody else wanted my phone number.  But it's good to learn that there seems to be some leeway before everything goes "poof!".

[canucks4life]

It would be nice to get some official word from PM if suspended accounts will stay active for 90 days or only 30 days especially for those going out of country for extended periods whose payment may of lapsed.

[SD08]

---

@Korth wrote:

Fortunately, the "Reactivate Current Plan" button worked exactly as expected.  I've seen this "Your account has been suspended" stuff before, on a friend's account.  It seems there's no difference between plans vs grandfathered-plans in this respect, ie: once the plan (duration, talk, text, data, discount) parameters have been configured they'll remain indefinitely.

Just posting this because I recall a few threads where people speculated about the consequences of allowing a grandfathered plan to expire.  Rest easy, my grandfathered friends, it seems you won't lose your irreplaceable plan forever just because your payment is a few days late.

---

@Korth

Thanks for the reassuring info.  That's very good to know. 

[outdoorsaddix]

Great to know! Should put a lot of minds at ease. 

[canucks4life · Accepted solution]