What to do with Airtel Sim Balance?
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Upon mailing them, I received this response.
How to utilise the balance if it cannot be used to recharge a number.
& if it is the case, why are they still allowing us to to recharge talktime balance.
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Last updated by: mahidada
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It's a common since. Get it replaced at an Airtel store. 3 years back I had been charged 3x Rs 25.
Maybe TRAI is no longer bothering with such user complaints anymore? After using up the balance in my last Airtel no. in July I had emailed TRAI regarding the same in case of my Vi nos. but never received any response from Vi. Anyway I will try again in Jan/Feb.
I think it's possible via USSD
Which is the lowest pack that can be done from main balance, and what code do i use?
As I had expected Airtel stopped responding. No response at all to many emails since 14th August. I guess I need to contact DoT again soon. Airtel is just horrible. 14 months since they completely blocked off main balance usage with the exception of the crappy 99 pack.
For the 2nd time in as many months Airtel obliged. This time I got Rs 99 pack activated.
from last 4 months 99 got deactivated automatically for me without any complaints
finally now balance is 0 and will move to jio in couple of months
Can v recharge through main balance now ?
It went pretty smoothly much to my surprise. The desired pack was activated within a few hours of sending the email.
Lest I be (unfairly) accused of lying/boasting again I have attached a screenshot of the email from Airtel where the sender’s email address can be clearly seen. If this still doesn’t suffice as proof then I don’t really give a damn.
Even more surprisingly speeds indoors have actually improved to the point it’s comfortably usable though still sub-par by 4G standards nevermind 4G+.
So what is the procedure now to recharge through main balance?
Sending an email to airtel customer care will suffice ?
@mahidada I will have some news for you in the coming couple of weeks. Airtel has already agreed that they will activate the desired pack from main balance from their end. But since I had already recharged with Rs 99 pack which is expiring on the 26th I will wait until then before contacting them.
What is the current status?
I got below response but it didn’t work in my case.
Please be informed that you can recharge any other Airtel prepaid number using main account balance via USSD and earn 4% commission without any registration. To use the same, you can dial 141<B Party Mobile No>*<MRP>#. Further, we suggest you to recharge only with all Bundle plans (RC 149 and above ).
Current status is Airtel has blocked off every avenue of using main balance. Not even Carrier Billing in Play Store is available anymore. Airtel is “Open to questions” barring those that involve allowing the user to utillize his/her own balance. Since freaking June/July of last year! It’s the only operator to do so. I email Apellate authority at the beginning of every month and they respond with the same copy-paste response.
Received SMS in an Airtel no. that had last been used back in May 2021: “Your no. xyz hasn’t been used in over 120 days. Please recharge by 15th April to prevent discontinuation of services.”
Only 55 balance. So no Rs 20 deduction but straight away deactivation?
I have current plan running.
Tomorrow it is expiring. So, tried to recharge from balance with *567*99#
But giving error
Invalid (empty) response
This recharge also stopped?
In my case it never worked. “Not eligible” bullshit all the time. Most exploitative operator of all time.
P.S. Someone had mentioned to try it during the 3 days OG grace period post the default 28 days validity expiry.
No longer seeing the option to pay via Airtel main balance in Play Store. Only Vi billing option is being shown.
Ironically Airtel keeps sending messages mentioning coverage boost in my locality whereas it has degraded by quite a bit at least in my place of residence. Previously at least I could get excellent speeds if the device was placed near a window which enjoyed line of sight to the nearest tower. But now short of band lock no other way to get good speeds other than going outdoors.
Also sometimes the previously disable flash messages, again start coming up.
567 doesn’t work even though i have active plan
To make matters worse Airtel is now the worst operator in my locality at least as far as indoor coverage over B40/B1/B3 is concerned. Good speeds only over B8. Still slower than Vi. LTE-CA is as unstable as ever. If recharge for others makes a comeback I will recharge my aunt's no. with an annual pack which will use up close to half the total balance. Airtel has got absolutely nothing going for it. All my devices are rooted but only 1 supports B8 otherwise the situation will have been even more dire.
*141*Mobile Number*Amount# is supposed to work atleast as per the official response from USSD but it’s not working on 99 plan. Have anyone tried this to recharge?
It was working when you try with other numbers, that service they stopped now
If you have working plan in your phone then *567*99# works as per above convo
Google is investing billions of dollars in airtel… tag them continuously on twitter… until they get fed up of it and ask airtel about it … 😄
*567*99# didn’t work for me. I tried a bunch of different codes but to no avail. Emailed Apellate authority. Not willing to spend a single additional paisa on Airtel nos.
Edit: Received the same response as the OP.
he already activated plan but having 99rs still intact
use carrier billing
without plan you cant 😄
Fellas, the 19 rs recharge which used to provide a 2-day validity seems to be recalled by airtel. What's the minimum one now? I just need 1 day validity that's all for one incoming text. Kolkata circle.
anyone able to recharge with balance ? my number is with incoming / and sms cut. trying to recharge,
called cc, they said first do 99 as normal and once i have validity, do the ussd code recharge.
is this how it work ?
Airtel keeps coming up with such lovely “innovations”. Can’t help but admire the upper management folks.
P.S. Email and confirm that OG validity is necessary for activating packs via USSD. Otherwise consider the Rs 99 as a forced donation to Airtel’s kitty.
@mahidada I recently activated 99 plan with *567*99# on number which was out of service since 3 months. So it works but circle specific only. It didn’t worked for me few days and gave error Invalid Request but tried everyday and one day it got done. Circle: Punjab. If you dont have balance it throws error you have insufficient balance to complete this transaction. Recharge and try again. So maybe they will allow in ur circle also.
Airtel = Welcome to the world of anti-consumerism. Airtel is a leech since its inception and due to its anti-conumer policies they made Idea and Vodafone also suffer since 2006-2016. COAI was association of all GSM operators but only Airtel had the biggest hold and its head Ranjan Matthews became puppet of Airtel only.
Thanks to Jio which came as a boon for Indian telecom users else after 4G auctions, we would be getting 1GB for 450 for 4G. Airtel, Idea and Voda take them lightly and thought they wont be able to place Infrastructure and eventually fail but they did hard work and defaeted them badly. A businessmen like Mittal thinks only about itself while a good businessmen thinks about consumers also and his own pocket too.
Nope, Recharges would overlap
i had recharged 3 years back… still 3k balance left… not my primary sim
few months back by mistake did a rc of 5k from mobikwik.. still around 2.9k bal left in my account.. i am recharging my family mems.. once this bal over i will port immediately to jio.. airtel customer care is worst.no way to recharge our own number.
recharging other number is working fine?
If yes, what’s the process and which plans are available?
yesterday i read somewhere comment regarding acitvation of some pack from main balance did u tried it ?
Nothing to do but wait. Airtel always aims to inflict as much pain as possible before stepping back. IMHO there couldn’t possibly be a worse operator ever anywhere in the world.
You could use up balance in purchasing apps/subs in Play Store.
How?
My airtel sim registration failed with
1500 around talk time balance