Pros and Cons of Changing Your Phone Number

There are several reasons why you would want to change your phone number. It may be to avoid unwanted calls, start a new lifestyle with only a few important people in the circle, or segregate personal and business life. 

Changing your phone number is a big decision from a business perspective but not so much from a personal perspective. However, it comes with both pros and cons depending on various circumstances and viewpoints. 

In this article, we briefly illustrate the pros and cons of changing your phone number and will help you decide whether to change your phone number or adapt to an alternative approach.

Stick till the end to find out whether you should change your phone number or not.

Pros of Changing Phone Numbers

Here are the top reasons to change your phone number:

• To get rid of scams or unwanted calls
• Start a new lifestyle after a breakup
• Manage your personal and professional calls
• To upgrade your phone number features
• To globalize your business contact across the border

Let’s check the benefits of changing cell phone numbers (personal and business) in detail.

1. Avoid Unwanted Calls

Changing your phone number can rescue you from unwanted calls. It becomes easier to avoid people from calling you since they do not know your phone number. 

It provides a clean slate opportunity, especially if you plan a new lifestyle keeping only the important ones in your touch. 

New phone numbers do not guarantee unwanted calls, but surely, you (definitely) can avoid being called by people you do not want to contact. 

Basically, you will be able to control the number of people contacting you (especially personal numbers). If you are cautious and register your number in the DNC (Do Not Call) list, you can avoid spam calls, robocalls, telemarketers, and more. 

Changing your phone number is an opportunity to start fresh, separate your personal life from your work life, limit the number of people reaching you via phone, avoid stressful calls from old jobs and ex-partners after breakups, and more.

2. Higher Visibility with Vanity and Toll-Free Numbers

800response‘s research shows that Vanity 800 Numbers have 75.4% higher recall rates than Numeric Toll-free Numbers. This metric indicates the effectiveness of vanity numbers and their potential for business success. 

Vanity and toll-free numbers especially benefit business communications rather than personal life. Nevertheless, it is important to notify your customers about the changes (new numbers) as soon as possible.

Vanity and Toll-free numbers facilitate businesses to customize their phone numbers to meet their business themes and for the convenience of the customers. 

Customizing phone numbers to be simple and easy to remember is the best way to capture the inquirer’s attention. 

Toll-free numbers and vanity numbers automatically increase inbound call rates and enhance prospect engagement with your brand since the callers do not have to pay for calls. These numbers boost your company’s accessibility and visibility. 

3. Divide Work and private life

It is easy to mix up your personal and public/professional life in a communication sense. People usually do not care to give out their private numbers for business purposes, but the number of inbound calls may skyrocket with time, impacting your personal communication. 

Changing your phone number can help you separate your private life from your professional life. Dividing their respective time and space is the best thing you can do to better your lifestyle. 

You can change your phone number or even purchase a new one for your private use. It helps you segregate your calls and selectively address them depending on the situation. 

It is never a good idea to mix up private and business communications; it has several negative impacts on personal life. We recommend you sort it out before it is too late. 

KrispCall cloud telephony provides customizable virtual phone numbers for business communications across 100+ countries, helping you separate your private and professional communications at every step.  

4. Instant Setup: up and running right away

Purchasing a new number or changing your phone number isn’t a tremendous task, and you do not have to go through tiresome processes.

All you need to do is contact a virtual phone number provider, and they will set you up with everything you need within a few minutes. These solution providers have features that allow you to import your contacts quickly. 

You can get back to business without losing much time. The plus point is you can access the numbers and conduct communications from several devices that synchronize automatically to facilitate a seamless customer experience. 

Changing your phone number has never been so easy and quick. Businesses can leverage this efficiency level to change their phone numbers and get back into business operations right away without hampering the customer experience. 

5. Lower Costs in the long run

Although some may beg to differ on this particular topic and say that changing phone numbers cost more at a personal and business level, we can prove it inaccurate. 

Changing your phone number may need a notable upfront payment, but the calling costs are comparatively cheaper than traditional phone numbers once you get started. Think of it as a long-term investment since you will use the same number for years, saving you a fortune in the long run. 

The latest virtual phone number providers come up with various time-limited features and exhilarating schemes, which you can enjoy for a reasonable price and fair service charges after that. 

Changing your phone number allows you to explore new technological horizons and experience unique features, which isn’t possible without change.

New phone numbers present customers with gifts and treat them with free calling hours, a certain amount of costless text messaging, and more.  

👉 Read More About: How to Get Back a Deactivated Phone Number Easily Without any Hassle

Cons of Changing Phone Numbers

There are many reasons not to change your phone number including, the need to update your circles again with your new number, the need to update online accounts for OTP verification,  the unavailability of an easy-to-remember phone number or area code number, risk of personal & business privacy loss, and no guarantee the phone number network is stable and calling cost cheaper. 

Let’s check out the disadvantages of changing cell phone numbers in detail.

1. Chances of identity theft

You should be aware of what happens to your old number after discarding it. Only, then, you can take the required steps to avoid the consequences of changing your phone number. 

After about 90 days of discarding a phone number, the inactive number gets recycled into the service provider’s directory. Then the phone number providers will give that particular number to a new customer. 

If it falls into the wrong hands – a person with an ill mentality, your identity (previous users’ identity) will be at risk of being compromised.

Legal and financial information have the chance of being stolen and used without your knowledge. This situation may create unwanted problems, including illegal cases and financial losses.

It is always a good idea to change your phone number from every related account as soon as you get a new phone number to avoid the risk of identity theft.

2. Unavoidable unwanted calls

As mentioned in the section above, your phone number providers cannot guarantee to stop unwanted calls. There is a high probability that your new number already belonged to someone in the past, and they must have had a reason to change their phone number.

Many people still have the phone number and try reaching the previous owner; instead, they end up calling you. You can only inform them about the change, which might not be as easy as you think. 

There may be several reasons that will definitely bother you from those unwanted calls for some time. You cannot stop those calls; you can only avoid them as much as possible. Still, getting unwanted calls is a traumatic experience. 

3. Need to update all your online accounts

We touched (a bit) on this matter in the above section on why it is mandatory to update all your online accounts, including legal and financial sectors. 

Updating accounts with new phone numbers will secure them and avoid possible unwanted problems that may arise through identity theft. You should follow up the same process every time you change your phone number. 

These legal and financial activities may take time and some authentication processes, which are sometimes hectic and consumes your productive time. 

Considering all these processes and time loss, changing your phone number might not be a good idea unless extremely necessary.

4. Having to notify everyone of your new numbers

If you want to start a new life without the involvement of people in the past, then changing your phone number is an absolutely good idea. But, if you do not plan to do so, you have a huge task ahead to inform everyone necessary about your new number. 

You should notify friends and family about the changes so that they can reach you when needed. You cannot publicize your phone number on social platforms, but the best you can do is create a private group on any social network and share the information. 

There might be cases where some people do not use social media, in which case, you should manually call them or leave them text messages. This process takes time and may involve some expenses. 

5. Unpredictable network coverage

Changing your phone number to the same service provider may not be a huge problem since you are familiar with their services, charges, and other technical aspects. 

This might not be the case if you plan to change your service provider. You enter a separate realm with some similarities but different features, UI, technical aspects, and more. 

Changes are good but not in every sense. Not all service providers provide the same features and coverage in all areas, and you might not be able to cover up the areas adequately needed for your business. 

6. Unavailable Local Area Codes

When we (purely) talk about business, changing your phone number might not guarantee you the phone number you want. In some business areas where the number of companies exceeds the phone lines, it isn’t easy to get phone numbers with local area codes due to high competition. 

Changing your phone number with a different area code for a business purpose in a different area is not wise. You cannot present yourself as a local business unless you have a local area code. 

The best solution is to explore virtual number providers like KrispCall and see if they have the local number of your choice before discarding the previous phone number. It is absolutely necessary to examine before leaping toward changes. 

7. Submit your new phone number to dontcall.gov

The FCC (Federal Communications Commission) restricts unauthorized callers from calling your phone number without your consent. The FCC saves you from bothersome telemarketers, robocalls, and other parties by blocking them legally. 

You need to manually submit your phone number to dontcall.gov to restrict unauthorized callers from calling your phone number. It doesn’t take much time to submit your phone number, but it might take a while to get processed and the service activated.

8. Communication inconsistency 

Changing your phone number creates some communication inconsistency, at least in the initial stages, which can be resolved later or compromised. 

A simple example of communication history that you cannot retrieve on the new phone number from your previous phone number. You should access those from a different platform, such as backups and records. 

The lack of communication synchronization needs extra effort to connect the dots for seamless end-to-end communication. This problem doesn’t create much fuss on a personal level. Still, there will be a lot of information on a business level that requires handling, which creates inconsistency (at some level) in the organization. 

The above cons also apply to numbers that you verified for social media.

Disadvantage of Changing WhatsApp Numbers

There are several disadvantages of changing WhatsApp number. Firstly, people might not know that you’ve changed your number, which could lead to missed messages and important information. Secondly, it can be time-consuming to notify all of your contacts of the change and also changing your WhatsApp number frequently may negatively impact your credibility and make it difficult for others to trust you or your business.

Below are some of the disadvantages of changing WhatsApp numbers whether you are using WhatsApp for personal or business use.

• Loss of personal and business contacts and potential leads
• Need to inform everyone of the change, group chats, update business cards, email signatures, and other materials with a new number
• Disruption in communication with friends, family, clients, and colleagues
• Potential loss of credibility if clients or colleagues are not aware of the change
• Potential missed business opportunities due to communication issues.
• Risk of privacy breach

Therefore, you should avoid changing your WhatsApp number unless it is absolutely necessary.

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Conclusion: Is changing your phone number necessary?

Although changing your phone number has several pros and cons, it is not ideal to do so unless (absolutely) necessary. 

Changing your phone number provides you with a clean slate to start your new life, avoid unwanted calls, relish new opportunities, and separate private from professional life.

Despite these advantages, there are many disadvantages to changing your phone number, especially on the business/professional levels. 

You should consider a lot of aspects before changing your phone number; else, you are the one to suffer all the consequences. 

We recommend you consider KrispCall, a reliable cloud telephony solution that provides local, mobile, and international virtual phone numbers throughout the globe 🌐 for an inexpensive price with 24/7 customer support while changing your phone number. 

📱 Get a new cloud phone number today!

KrispCall offers you everything you need for your private and business communications. We assure you of compliance, flexibility, and scalability to meet your expectations and go beyond. 

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Arun Chaudhary

Arun is SEO Analyst at KrispCall. He has written in extensively in the field of cloud telephony and call center solutions.