[smgit]

I have an Indian colleague whose dad was in some kind of coma for few months after an accident. He had a real crazy time keeping the house running. His dad's number was attached to all kinds of bills - electricity, gas, milk, water, internet, cable, newspapers etc. Most of the services would send a verification sms to his dad's phone for any kind of interaction. No one knew the password. And it turned into a major nightmare. It wasn't just a question of paying the bills. Lot of these services had to be shutdown or have settings changed temporarily. And each one had a different set of documents/processes required to prove he was a relative.

[sieve]

The only place where the phone number really matters in India is when dealing with banks, AADHAR and the phone company.

Phone/Gas/Electricity/Internet/Cable etc bills can be paid through any of the hundred-odd mobile wallet apps. Other than some exceptional cases, none of them require access to the linked phone number.

[lmz]

Remove the SIM card and pop it into some other phone? Unless the SIM has a PIN lock, but I guess you could go to the telco for help with that.

At least SMS is easy to divert that way. Think about the services that verify over Whatsapp or Telegram. Good luck finding someone who cares there.

[smgit]

He was in a different location initially. He eventually got access to the sim. So every process requiring sms verification became a roadblock.