The whole thing is done now. From conception to perfect execution, it took me 16 days to switch my out of contract cell phone number from AT&T to TMobile, and then by using AT&T's 30 day money-back guarantee to port my number back to TMobile. All because I wanted to get TMobile's best phone offering, the Samsung SGH-e715. Check out the last two episodes to know what happened earlier in my quest.

My initial plan was to tell AT&T that I am not getting signals in the basement where I live (I don't!). But what really happened was that I actually wasn't getting any signals at my school. And that WAS a problem. So I called up TMobile and made sure I can go back to them, they said yes, and even checked my number to make sure it was portable back to TMobile. So I went to my local mall cellular kiosk where the guy had promised to give me an e715 for $75 (after rebates) if I sign a new contract. Now technically you can do that and get a new number or switch your existing number, pretty much like how I did it with AT&T. But when I gave him the number that I wanted ported to TMobile, he refused. He claimed that once you cancel a number with TMobile, you cannot go back to TMobile within 90 days. "What the fuck!", I said.

I called up TMobile again and then said that wasn't true at all and what I'm trying to do is possible and completely legal. They offered me the same phone for $249.99 (after rebates), which is the price that I didn't wanna pay from the start of this whole ordeal. From this new twist I deducted a conclusion: if you reactivate or switch back to TMobile within 90 days of cancelling service, TMobile doesn't give out a commission to the dealer, since it's considered a recent customer who's simply changing his mind about terminating service.

I went to other local cellphone dealers and both although initially agreed to unltra low prices since I was signing up a new contract, refused later after learning the number I was trying to port originated at TMobile. When I showed then print-outs of correspondence with TMobile about the matter, they said only TMobile can do it themselves so I should contact them directly. Baloony.

I called up Letstalk.com, and the lady after hearing my complete story and getting some help from her supervisor, told me the same bullshit about contacting TMobile directly. So I tried simmobile.com, and ordered online. I called them up the next day and a lady in an Indian voice told me that I had just switched over to AT&T from TMobile... blah blah blah... call TMobile directly. Fucking bitch.

So I was all ready to go to the local TMobile store and buy the damn phone for $249.99 when while sorting through spam in my inbox, I found Wirefly.com. I placed my order and waited. They replied the next day and told me that I needed to give them my old TMobile account number. A bit disappointed fearing the same kind of response, I sent them the account number. The next day I checked my order status and boom, it was "shipped out".

So after all this, I got the phone for $99.99 (after $50 TMobile and $100 Wirefly rebates), AND transferred my number back to TMobile.

I win. Case closed. :)