kdfederer wrote:To keep an account active, it must have money in the account. Without money, the account closes and you lose your phone number. If you want to keep the same number, you will need to keep the account active, at least on a minimal level.
The way to keep the account active without having to put money into it every month is to switch to the $2/day plan which only gets charged if you use the phone. You can switch back to a monthly plan when you come back to the states.