Heeeeeeelp! who wants to help me unravel my 3 mobile mess?!

[nannymags]

Will try to keep this brief and succinct.
Been with 3 for years. Had a contract that expired so I thought in November 2019 that i upgraded to an iPhone , £39 contract. Turns out i took out a new contract instead of upgrading. Ring customer service and speak to eleventy million lovely robots who pass me from department to department.
as per their advice, Ive moved the old contract to pay as you go, and all I want to do is keep that number and move it to the new contract.
Any ideas welcome. I am having no joy with customer services and am logged out of the online account as the contract cancelled!

Oh I don’t have it in my at the moment to fight that hard over 20 odd pounds. I’m still working full time, panicking about the lockdown etc

Do you have bad credit because of this?

I just want the balance cleared! I will be complaining to 3

I would try to contact them on social media, and also have a chat to somewhere like citizens advice.

I’m rubbish at social media but will have a go, but on my research last night everybody who I saw complaining on Twitter etc got the “bot” reply of sorry you feel this way please contact 333

Ask 3 for the PAC code. Then pop and get another SIM from any netword onPAYG. You port the number over to that which takes 24 hours. Then ask for a PAC code from that payg provider and bring the nunber back to the new account you have taken which will cancel down the number on the new account

Then just wait for the debt collection letter and pay it- is it already on your credit rating?
Tbh I never checked my credit rating back then but now my credit score is excellent.

If I pay the debt collectors immediately and in full will it affect my credit rating ? Xxx

I have no idea- sign up to clear score and check? Thames water put a dent on my account I didn’t owe (didn’t get to debt collectors) and I had them remove it (a “correction”) and write me a letter that it was an error on their side.
I’m confused though, did they ever chase you for the debt?

Thank you all for brilliant advice. I’ve been on to customer services and managed to get hold of a human being who “seems”to know what they’re talking about. So far, the outstanding bill has been written off and I shouldn’t hear from the debt collection agency. They’ve also reimbursed £50 for the bills on the old account .
And should be sending a new SIM card which hopefully should fix the lines.
My head was frazzled! I was on the phone for nearly three hours!

Pick up a pay as you go SIM from any other network. Get a pac code from three and port your number onto the pay as you go SIM. Then get the pac from the pay as you go and transfer the number back to the new number taken with three. Takes 24 hours for each port in