I don’t think she is out of luck. She can set up call forwarding to her loaner from any PC, and then tell Google to send a verification code via an automated voice call (which Google will do, I just checked).
Went through this with an old phone of mine. I wasn’t using the number anymore and it was the kind where you deposit money into an account and re-fill when you need to. The company had charged bs “idle” penalties to the account to the point where the balance went negative and they closed it and released the number… Unfortunately that was the security phone for my Gmail.
Spent a week back and forth with Google. Filled out the same form 3 times with tons of information only I would have access to(I’ve had the account since gmail was new). They didn’t care.
Had to re-open the old phone and luckily my old number was still available.
So yeah, lesson learned. I even have a friend’s number put in there as backup now. Anyways, good luck.
Depending on the cell service provider (Verizon, for instance), there may be a web interface available for text messaging and she might be able to receive the text via it.
Or what magnet posted.
Even if you don’t have the sim card, or even if it’s a CDMA phone, you can still do it.
You just go to the phone company, and they will transfer the number to a new phone. They may charge you a few bucks (like 5) for a new sim card.
I mean, come on folks… how long have we all been getting new phones every few years? And the number doesn’t change every time.
Just go to one of the stores for the cell provider, and have them put the number onto a new phone.
The only case where this wouldn’t work is with something like Pants’ situation, where you didn’t use the number for so long, and didn’t pay for the account, and the provider actually gave that phone number to someone else. But that’s not the case in the OP’s situation, so it should be fairly trivial to get the number transferred to the garbage temporary phone.
Answers: for some reason (I’m not in the town where my daughter is) moving the SIM did not work
Verizon would not forward the number of the phone being prepared to her non-Verizon burner phone for a one week temporary period. Tried with two different Verizon people.
She’s contacted Google with the forms a couple of times, the responses have been automated standard forms that don’t address the problem.
Finding a Verizon web interface for texts is a good idea; we’ll pursue that. Short of that, she’s just going to have to wait a few days until she gets her main phone back from the repair.
Thanks for the feedback.
I don’t know if would actually help, but situations like this are why I pay the 2.00 a month for the increased gmail storage at the lowest level. I at least have a credit card record and I can show I’m that person, and in theory they might actually respond to a customer support request.
Not actionable, but it sounds like the burner phone is on a GSM network, which is why Verizon’s CDMA network SIM doesn’t work on it.
We spent months trying to recover my son’s gmail account. To no avail.
Verizon would not forward the number of the phone being prepared to her non-Verizon burner phone for a one week temporary period. Tried with two different Verizon people.
The temp phone is on a different network?
Gmail recovery should be difficult and not this easy.
Yes, just a cheap phone she got to use while her phone is being repaired (got it from Walmart.) Local Verizon store was completely non-helpful/non-caring.
I think you need to get a cheap phone FROM VERIZON. They won’t be able to just use any phone.
Here’s a verizon motorola E for $30.
I got one for $10 on a black friday promotion as a toy. Aside from the terrible camera and only 8GB of storage, it’s actually a really nice little device. It’s completely usable.
@JeffL did you end up ever getting this resolved? My brother in law is in the same situation.
Sadly he changed the password 12 months ago and apparently forgot it. Chrome’s saved password for his gmail is the old password from 12 months ago? What?
His backup email was for Verizon email that went away back in 2017.
Back up phone number was his work cell that he gave back to the company 6+ months ago.
Security question was never set up.
Google would never help. She eventually guessed the PW but she was about to just start a new account.
Did he happen to print out any recovery codes? Sometimes people forget they did that, but they still have it.
Nope. :)