When I retired a few weeks ago, I turned in my company cell phone. I decided to check out my old cell number a few days ago. Not to my surprise, AT&T had already reissued the number. I feel sorry for the lady it was issued to. I had several hundred contacts plus there are 1000+ business cards out there with that number on them. I called the number a couple times but it goes to an answering machine. I left a message that she should request another number or expect to get a lot of calls for me.
Many companies I dealt with don't even know that I'm gone.
Oh well, This is the second time this has happened. The previous time, it was my fault. I swapped carriers and somehow during the process I messed up and couldn't keep my old number. Verizon reissued the number within a couple weeks to some poor dude down in New Orleans. One of my vendors told me he had called the old number and the guy was pretty upset. I then called my old number and it went straight to an answering machine. I did leave a message that he should request a different number since the one he has was a business number.