The call of Android is pretty hard to ignore. Yet if you already have a phone and a contract to go with it, it might be difficult to actually get your hands on the Android of your dreams. Of course, does it really have to be this way? If you’ve read many of our other guides, you’ll realize that everything is possible with the right solution. The solution is clear: it’s not the fact that you want a new phone, it’s the fact that you need to get out of your old contract.
Maybe your old phone is really good, too — here’s a way that you can help your old phone find a home and still be able to get the phone that you ultimately want. The method is called a change of responsibility, but you shouldn’t beat yourself up if you’ve never heard of the term until now. That’s because it used to be one of those things that were only known to customer service representatives, but now the secret is definitely out: you don’t have to get dinged with that ETF fee if you can find someone to just take over your phone lines.
Thankfully, we all seem to have that one person that’s been dying to get with another company, but they just haven’t taken the time to go out to the kiosk and sign up for service. A change of responsibility does often involve a credit check, but this is one that’s a lot more flexible than the one that might have received at the store anyway.
So, what do they have to do? Well, it really all starts with you: you will need to make sure that you’re giving permission for them to call in about your account to do the change of responsibility in the first place. From there, you will need to also let the company know that you’re giving up all ties to that phone, line, and phone number. You usually can’t take your number with you when you do a COR, but every carrier is different.
After that, the only thing that your person of choice needs to do is make sure that they call in and handle the change of responsibility. They’ll most likely need to go to a different department, but again, this varies based on the carrier you go with.
This leaves you free, after the transfer has taken place, to go with another carrier and get the Android phone that you want. Since you’ll be a new customer, you probably will get a huge list of different offers to choose from. It just depends on what you’re trying to achieve here. If you want to get a bunch of lines for a family plan, then you can definitely do this as well. However, if you’re not trying to go in that direction, you will need to make sure that you just get a single line — it’s cheaper that way in the long run.
Overall, it’s a pretty straightforward process: just do a change of responsibility and you’ll be well on your way to that sweet, sweet Android phone!