Dear fellow geeks,

Last year I decided to take on a cheap vodafone plan, to allow me to have a data plan so I could browse the web on my N95.

This was all working fine, though after the release of the "$1 a day", the data plan had become somewhat redundant.

I decided to call vodafone to ask them to transfer me back over to prepay. I was told this could be done the same day with a potential downtime of about 10 minutes. I agreed to these conditions and was looking forward to saving some money.

The next day though, I was unable to send text messages, odd, I thought. So tried to ring Customer Service. I found out that for every number I dialed, I now get a message saying: "You are not a valid Vodafone customer". Text messages fail to send. When I try to log on to the vodafone website, it states: "Sorry, balance not available". If I click anything it says "service unavailable".

The odd thing though, is that I can receive text messages and calls fine, I can also use 3g without problems.
The phone will not find wireless signals any more, even though I am often very close to a router.

I have called Vodafone numerous times off other phones. I have also gone into a store to get help, all to no avail.
Every single time I ask for support I get told that it "should be working tomorrow morning, try restarting your phone".

This is getting very frustrating, this phone has become my life and connection to everything these days. Many people are expecting me to return their calls or messages, and I cannot explain to them why this isn't possible.

What I would like to know is:

1. Can anyone think of a solution to the problem?
2. Does anyone know of an alternative service I could use (temporarily)? I was thinking of using SIP, but it looks very confusing and requires WiFi. Maybe I could use it to send text messages?
3. Could or should Vodafone provide compensation?

I would greatly appreciate any suggestions, as I am out of ideas.

Thanks a lot in advance.

Scott