mobile phones

[helliebobs]

I know it's a stupid question and I think I already know the answer but need someone to confirm it for me! Do mobile phone numbers get re-used?

[gammaray]

of course they do, otherwise nobody would have a number. My wifes phone has several of the same numbers my phone has - just in a different order!

[mkt]

they must do as a friend phoned me after a drunken night out and got some random person on the other end. this is what happens when drunk....you remember phone numbers and addresses but can't for the life of you remember current ones! so yep someone has definitely got my old number! i'm sure they are probably, um, retired (!) for a little while though.

Nowadays you can take your mobile number with you even when you change networks though so it doesn't need to happen anymore really. No poor soul should ever have one of my drunken friends on the line again. Which can only ever be a good thing! lol

[helliebobs]

Thanks - that's what I meant by the question.

I have a number for a friend I haven't been in touch with for 5 years and wondered if he had changed his number, whether a stranger would answer or if it would just say "This number is no longer connected".

[Buenchico]

A couple of months back, I had a call from a guy who wanted to know who I was and why I'd got his girlfriend's phone which had been stolen many months before. I told him that the number must have been renewed but he refused to believe me and got very aggressive (i.e. "I know where you live, mate. I'm coming round there to sort this out").

I assume that his girlfriend must be the same woman for whom I kept getting calls when I first purchased the phone. Most of these appeared to come from debt collection agencies!

So I'm fairly sure that mobile phone numbers are, indeed, re-used. (So, incidentally, are landline numbers. I know someone who's old number was used by a taxi company many years ago. Unfortunately for her, some people still call that number and refuse to believe that she can't send them a cab!).

Chris

[funkymoped]

a mobile number has eleven didgets. take away the 07 which represents britain. (i think) that would leave us with 999,999,999 potential numbers to use.....

when you concider there are ONLY sixty million people in britan, there shouldnt be a need to re-issue numbers, but it wouldnt suprise me if they did....

[Space]

07 doesn't represent britain.

[funkymoped]

dont say that +44 is the british code.....

i know +44 goes infront of your number when you get a text msg, but that is britains international code.

ALL British mobile numbers begin with 07 not +44