Keeping an Orange number

I have been topping up my Orange prepaid from Europe for years now at ezetop.com.


You can dial #131# from your Orange phone (provided you have roaming activated) and it will give you your balance and until when it is valid. One day before that date I top up the phone and it will move your valid date into the future. The amount of time it gives you depends on the amount of the top up. Orange sends you a text after the top-up with your new balance and expiry date. One advantage is that when I get back to RD I never have to buy minutes because I have saved up so many. Last time I didn't go back to RD for 2 years and the number still was active and I had about 4500 pesos in calling credit.

creativo said:

Hi jd_mine, thank you for the tips!

I wonder if calling #131# periodically is part of what's holding open your account, or if it doesn't matter.

Unfortunately I neglected to activate roaming before leaving, so I'm thinking maybe I should get one of my friends in RD to visit an Orange store to activate roaming for me.

Hopefully Orange will just obey them if they have all the account details. If not, I could always send my SIM card, have someone put it in their phone just to put in the code to enable roaming, and send it back - a real pain tho!

Won't be forgetting that next time!

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As far as I know here only adding credit you can keep the number no matter if you dont use it. Try to download Mi Orange app so maybe will be more easy to add credit to your line.

Dont waste your time telling your friends to go and tell to activate the roaming in your number, if is under your name they can not do that.

Have had my Orange number since 2011. Have only lived here permanently for 2 years.  As described above, top it off (ezetop) every 89 days and you'll be good to go. 

I wonder if calling #131# periodically is part of what's holding open your account, or if it doesn't matter.

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Nah, that is just to find out when your calling credit expires.

As far as I know here only adding credit you can keep the number no matter if you dont use it. Try to download Mi Orange app so maybe will be more easy to add credit to your line.

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Yes, I do have that app since it makes it a lot easier and reliable to buy internet paqueticos with my existing credit, but as far as I know to actually buy calling credit/recargas they require Dominican credit or debit card. I couldn't get it to work with my non-Dominican cards.

I have had the same RD number since 2007 now, so topping off from abroad definietly works. I don't know if Roaming is activated as a standard with simcards in RD these days or if you still have to manually activate the service first. It's to check though: turn on your phone abroad and see if it connects to a provider. Orange RD will then send you a text message with the rates for the country you're in.

Turn on the phone and see if it is roaming.  I never turned mine on.  In my two last trips through Panama, it was roaming and working fine.  Just came back from the US, and it roamed there too.  Only that I got several messages from Orange about roaming and offering me a data package by dialing #100#(same number as I dial here to buy a package), but dialing that number roaming from the US gave me an invalid number.  I didn't need to use roaming in the US anyway, so I forgot about it and turned it off.

In terms of topping it constantly, that's not really worth it unless you value your DR phone number so much !!  I live in the DR but travel overseas often.  Most times I let the balance expire and before coming back (some times 2-3 months long trips), I either ask my husband to add money to it, or I do it myself once I'm back.

I do believe that 120 days is the max you can keep your phone without a balance not to lose the phone number.   Another way I learned keeping your number may work is having someone call you and leave a message every now and then.  This works for me for my Colombian and Chilean Claro SIM Cards.  I actually call myself and leave a message.  (btw this was a trick that a Colombian Claro rep told me).  Don't know if it works with Orange but it may.  

creativo said:

Hi jd_mine, thank you for the tips!

I wonder if calling #131# periodically is part of what's holding open your account, or if it doesn't matter.

Unfortunately I neglected to activate roaming before leaving, so I'm thinking maybe I should get one of my friends in RD to visit an Orange store to activate roaming for me.

Hopefully Orange will just obey them if they have all the account details. If not, I could always send my SIM card, have someone put it in their phone just to put in the code to enable roaming, and send it back - a real pain tho!

Won't be forgetting that next time!

Click to expand...