Book Your Zong Number Online – Just a Marketing Catch-Phrase

It’s been old news that Zong has been offering for its upcoming customers to get number of their choice. This post is to review the service that seemed very catchy and a good marketing tactic to grab the attention of customers.

I have seen many hundred persons in queues outside Zong Franchises, trying to Book their Zong Numbers of their choice. These customers normally want to carry their cell numbers of previous operators. Anyone can also Book Zong Number from Zong’s official website as well.

Either you go to Zong Franchise or you try to Book your Zong Number from their website, there are very healthy chances that your desired number is already booked. Lately, I spent more than 25 minutes on their website to Book a Zong number, but I failed to do so. Even Zong’s new series, that is 0312, is also heavily occupied; and you are left with no other option but to purchase a SIM with undesired number.

This scenario is not only for good (golden) numbers, but very ordinary numbers were also taken. I easily had a feeling that this is a fake page that has no link with its backend database and it displays “Your Zong Number is Already Booked” message on every query.

But yesterday, one of my friends was lucky enough to reserve a number of his choice. So that means the service exists. (Or maybe it was linked with database very recently).

Through sources in Zong, I have come to know that they had blocked Gold and Silver numbers (to resale them for good prices, the way every other cellular company did in past), however, they sales’ team has not floated these gold numbers into market yet.

So don’t expect any good number from this service.

Zong Numbers Booked Online can’t be Ported-out to Another Network for 18 Months

This seems something very strange, and against the regulations. Mobile Cellular Policy, MNP Guidelines for Operators and subscribers (given here) have no such point, where operator can restrict its customer to port-out. We have seen operators hindering subscribers to port out, but Zong has dared to mention it explicitly on their website.

Booking Number via SMS

As many of us don’t have internet access. So it was equally beneficial for customers to book a Zong number by just sending an SMS. This was achievable by getting a short code, for example 3130 and making it possible for customers of other operators to send SMS too.

Zong defiantly missed this opportunity. This way they could earn big bucks too, as there were again very bright chances of SMS responses such as “Your Zong number is already been booked, please try with another number” (these short codes generate money for those who own them).

Rest of the process could be kept same as it is on their website, that is, if available, you can book your number by providing CNIC and other information.

For those, who want to try their luck, please follow below process to Book your Zong Number.

How to Book Zong Number Online?

• Go to their website: zong.com.pk
• Enter your desired number
• Click on check availability
• If available then enter your name, CNIC, Contact number and place from where you will collect this SIM and book your new Zong Number; if not available then keep on trying again and again with other numbers, until you get it or you get sick of it.

Check Points

• You will have to purchase a prepaid card of 300 with each SIM.
• You can make a maximum of TEN bookings against the same ID.
• Upon submission of your booking request, a ticket no. will be generated. Please keep a record of this no. as you will be requested to present this along with a copy of your NIC at the time of SIM handover.
• You cannot port-out this number to any operator within 18 months of your first call.