Two Accounts - One Email

[iamchris]

Hi all, firstly I know that it shouldn't be possible to have created an account with an email address that was already in use, but the Public mobile setup let me do it at the time.

I have been a customer for I think a year and a half.  My wife switched to Public almost a month before I did, but when going through the setup of my account I had the unfortunate idea to try and use the same email for both of us.  And the system let me do it at the time and I set up autopay and all was well until I needed to change credit cards.  Now I'm realizing that the only account that can be accessed on the Public website is my wife's.

In the last two months I have tried several things hoping to get back onto auto pay since purchasing vouchers every month is very inconvenient.

1. Call 611 and setup autopay -> it just doesn't seem to start using the card.

2. Change the email address for my wife's account -> now two email addresses can log into her account and still not mine.

3. Buy a new Public sim card and create a new account -> the website won't transfer my phone number to the new sim.

4. Visit a Public Mobile mall kiosk -> person at kiosk thought one of the above might work, but eventually felt that my best bet is to switch to another network to keep my phone number and then switch back later.

So I'm hear on the forums to ask if switching away is really my only option at this point.

Cheers & thanks,

[computergeek541]

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@wingin wrote:

Are you talking about setting up the gmail account with the anything+xxx@gmail.com?

And we will still need separate account in PM?

---

Yes, that's what people are talking about. A seperate e-mail address is linked to the same account at G-Mail.  You still need to have a sepearate Pubilc Mobile self serve account for each phone number.

[wingin]

Are you talking about setting up the gmail account with the anything+xxx@gmail.com?

And we will still need separate account in PM?

[gblackma]

You are welcome @iamchris .Glad that we could help you. Have a great week.

[iamchris]

Hi geopublic, I'm afraid I can confirm that the email was entered correctly.  I have account creation confirmation emails for both phone numbers.

Moderators were able to fix everthing though.  Thank you very much for your help!

Cheers!

[kb_mv]

"That's a good idea  👍 ..... I know Telus allows alias email addresses(or at least they used to, about 2 yrs. ago)."

Gmail has this feature.

When you get to the stage of providing a second email address, if you have a gmail account try this:

after your email address and before the @ add + and then anything else you like, say the last 4 digits of the phone number associated with it or the first initial of the person using the phone. All emails for all the accounts will go to the original account (email without the +...)

My son has 3 accounts on his one email doing this. 

An example is;

anthing@gmail.com

anything+me@gmail.com

anything+1@gmail.com

etc etc etc

These will all go to the "anything" account but they are different for the account signups.

[gscratch]

I have 3 lines with PM at this point - and had the same issue with multiple emails / accounts.  I needed a single email account to access all 3 phone accounts (My wife, and two children) who are on my billing.  Since I'm paying the bills, I need the account access.

If you have or are using google mail - there is a built in solution.  Using a "+" in your email allows you to have multiple unique emails that all go to the same google mailbox.

yourmail+kid1@gmail.com is the same 'inbox' at gmail as yourmail@gmail.com

You can 'filter' in the inbox at gmail on the to: field if needed to split them up.

Perhaps that would work for you!

[CannonFodder]

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@geopublic wrote:

@iamchris  I suspect the only reason that the system allowed you to use the email was there was probably a typo when you entered it.

To verify ask the moderator to check the email for the account. If you want to use the same email for both accounts check to see if your email provider allows you to use an email alias and ask the moderator to change the email to the alias.

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That's a good idea  👍 ..... I know Telus allows alias email addresses(or at least they used to, about 2 yrs. ago).

[geopublic]

@iamchris  I suspect the only reason that the system allowed you to use the email was there was probably a typo when you entered it.

To verify ask the moderator to check the email for the account. If you want to use the same email for both accounts check to see if your email provider allows you to use an email alias and ask the moderator to change the email to the alias.

Hope this helps!

[CannonFodder]

@iamchris  Yeah, it APPEARS as though a Mod is the only solution to this particular dilemna. A little more info, which I paraphrased from someone else's info, to contact a Mod:

To contact a Moderator, click on the question mark icon in the bottom, right corner of the screen, and follow the prompts.

1.) Click on Chat with Simon, and on the line, "Ask me something", type "moderator"

2.) Click on "account specific question", and then click on "no, I want a human"

3.) When you see an answer "submit a ticket Click me!", do the obvious.

Once you've submitted a ticket, occasionally check on your private message envelope icon, near the top of the screen, and when there's a number showing, you've received a reply.

[iamchris]

Thanks gail709, CannonFodder & gblackma! I didn't know about the moderators method of submitting a ticket.  I had tried previously to use the chatbot to get a person and was unsuccessful.  Hopefully they can help me out.

[iamchris]

Thanks kselmak, this is the response I get from the system.

The phone number entered is invalid or you may have created your profile already. If you've forgotten your password, please click here.

But the forgotten password page just resets the password for my wife's account.  I can tell because it always asks her security question and not mine.

[kselmak]

@iamchris 

Can you try registering your original number with the original email

https://selfserve.publicmobile.ca/self-registration/ 

If you activated the 3rd sim with that email change to something temporary just to have it available

Let me know what happens

[gblackma]

@iamchris , Unfortunately I would say yes, that is the only way to keep your number. Port it out and then back into the new account. But have you tried contacting the moderators here? They may have another solution.

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@iamchris wrote:

Hi all, firstly I know that it shouldn't be possible to have created an account with an email address that was already in use, but the Public mobile setup let me do it at the time.

I have been a customer for I think a year and a half.  My wife switched to Public almost a month before I did, but when going through the setup of my account I had the unfortunate idea to try and use the same email for both of us.  And the system let me do it at the time and I set up autopay and all was well until I needed to change credit cards.  Now I'm realizing that the only account that can be accessed on the Public website is my wife's.

In the last two months I have tried several things hoping to get back onto auto pay since purchasing vouchers every month is very inconvenient.

1. Call 611 and setup autopay -> it just doesn't seem to start using the card.

2. Change the email address for my wife's account -> now two email addresses can log into her account and still not mine.

3. Buy a new Public sim card and create a new account -> the website won't transfer my phone number to the new sim.

4. Visit a Public Mobile mall kiosk -> person at kiosk thought one of the above might work, but eventually felt that my best bet is to switch to another network to keep my phone number and then switch back later.

So I'm hear on the forums to ask if switching away is really my only option at this point.

Cheers & thanks,

---

[CannonFodder]

@iamchris  I would THINK that someone on the Moderator team could sort that out.... hopefully. Click on the question mark icon, in the bottom, right of the screen, and follow the prompts to send a ticket, explaining the situation. Let us know how it goes.... good luck!

Ninja'd again! Just don't type quick enough, I guess....

[gail709 · Accepted solution]

Before you do anything drastic, why don't you contact the moderator and ask them to separate the two accounts.  You can reach them by clicking on the question mark at the bottom of the page and typing Moderator, specific account question.  Good Luck.