From “hi” to a working phone plan, with nobody on the other end.
An Australian challenger mobile brand wanted big-telco onboarding without big-telco overheads. Now a new customer goes from first message to a live eSIM in one conversation, at any hour.
What it was. What it is now.
- Staff checked every new customer’s ID
- Payments were chased by hand
- Every order was re-keyed into the carrier’s system
- Onboarding stopped when the team went home
- ID checked in the chat, from a phone
- Payment taken in the conversation
- The carrier updated in real time, at every step
- A live eSIM at 2am, with nobody on shift
Joining a mobile network is one of the most tedious sign-ups there is: pick a plan, choose a number or bring your old one, prove who you are, pay, then wait for a SIM. Every step is a chance to give up. For an operator without a call centre, every step also meant a person.
JUST Mobile’s CTO, Brian Keayes, had an idea: what if a new customer could do all of it in one conversation, on their phone, and walk away with a working eSIM? He brought the idea to Levelfeed. We turned it into the product.
The conversation was easy. The carrier wasn’t.
A real phone service on the Telstra network only exists once Octane, the carrier’s wholesale platform, has issued the number and the SIM. That platform was built long before chat, with documentation that often didn’t match how it behaved. Every question the assistant asks had to become a correct instruction to the carrier.
It took months of testing and back-and-forth. Then, on 18 April 2024, the email arrived:
“GREAT NEWS!!! … Finally got a QR code from Octane to activate the new E SIM plan.”
Brian Keayes, CTO, JUST Mobile, the day the first eSIM went through end to end
The first customer had gone from conversation to working eSIM without a single human step. Everything after that was scale.
What we found first
We mapped the journey from a customer’s first question to a working service, and every task the team did behind it.
| What we found | What it cost | What changed |
|---|---|---|
| Every sign-up step needed a person: ID check, payment, number choice, activation | Est. 20–30 minutes of staff time per customer, and nothing happened after hours | Automated: the whole journey, first message to active eSIM, 24/7 |
| Every order re-keyed into the carrier’s wholesale system | Slow activations, and typing errors that broke services | Automated: each step written straight to the carrier, in real time |
| Bringing a number from another carrier meant manual checks and calls | Porting delays, customers stuck between networks | Automated: porting verified with a one-time code in the chat |
| Rejected carrier orders found late, often when the customer complained | Lost customers, avoidable tickets | Automated: every order tracked, the team alerted the moment one is rejected |
| Four brands would each need their own sign-up process | Another build and another team for every brand | Automated: one system running all four |
| Billing disputes and cancellations | Need a human conversation | Kept human, by design |
Estimates are the working figures we used to rank the list, not numbers reported by the client.
One conversation, four systems behind it
For customers, and for the business
- One guided conversation instead of forms, a store visit and a phone queue
- Keep their old number or pick a new one, confirm their ID, pay, and get the eSIM straight away
- On the website, WhatsApp or Messenger, in their own language, at any hour
- Upgrades and plan changes later, in the same chat
- Onboarding runs 24/7 with no activation team
- Four brands on one system, so a new brand doesn’t mean a new sign-up process
- Every order tracked to completion; the team alerted if the carrier rejects one
- Demoed by the sales team at an industry conference in July 2025, as part of the product
Six steps, one conversation
- Start a chatThe customer picks a plan.
- Choose a numberNew, or bring their own, verified with a one-time code.
- Confirm identityUpload a passport, licence or proof-of-age card in the chat.
- PayIn the conversation.
- Get the eSIMA secure QR code, plus a confirmation email with the order details.
- Behind every stepThe system instructs the carrier in real time.
Timeline: November 2023 → live since 2024, still running · Founder-led: from the client’s idea to the product.
Onboarding that still runs on forms, queues and hand-offs?
Thirty minutes with the founder. You’ll leave knowing where the hours go, and whether an audit makes sense.