Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, and Vodafone Idea (Vi) had made their prepaid plans with SMS benefits quite expensive. Users had to pay a substantial amount of money to buy a prepaid plan with SMS benefits just to be able to port out. But the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has changed that now. Telecom operators can no longer stop users from porting out with low-end prepaid plans. While the users still can’t send SMS with the low-end prepaid plans, they can now send port out SMS at least. Prepaid plans that do not offer SMS benefits will still allow users to send port out SMS to 1900.
Reliance Jio Had Complained to TRAI for Expensive SMS Plan from Vi
After the tariff hikes kicked in, Vodafone Idea made its minimum SMS bundled prepaid plan cost Rs 179 for the users. At the same time, Jio and Airtel offered their minimum SMS plans for Rs 155 and Rs 128.
Looking at this, Jio had complained to TRAI last week that Vi’s plans are restricting low-end plan users from porting out to other networks. Thanks to that complaint, all users will now be able to send port out to SMS to 1900 even if they are using a prepaid plan that doesn’t offer SMS benefits.
How to Port Out?
Start with sending an SMS to 1900 texting ‘PORT’ followed by a space and the 10 digits mobile number you have. You will then receive a port out code. Then choose the operator you want to port out to — go to its retail store, fill out a porting form and mention the valid port out code. Submit all the necessary documents, make payments if necessary, and complete the KYC process. This is all that a user needs to do for porting out and it is a good thing that TRAI has amended the rules and now allowing all users to send port out SMS at least.
