# BRD-090 — A sole-proprietor brand cannot move between providers

> Sole-proprietor brands cannot be migrated from one CSP to another.

- **Rule ID:** BRD-090
- **Layer:** Brand (`BRAND`)
- **Checks:** `brand migration request`
- **Severity:** MEDIUM — Usually survives review, but lowers your trust score or invites manual review.
- **When it bites:** Gates approval — get this wrong and registration is refused
- **How it is detected:** Deterministic (settled in code from the submitted values)
- **Fix type:** Wait on an external system or a required interval
- **Required by:** TCR
- **Applies:** Applies when the brand is a sole proprietor.
- **Canonical URL:** https://ekas.io/rules/10dlc/brand/brd-090/

## Why this rule exists

Migration carries a brand's verified status across, and on this tier that status is a verification of a person that the receiving CSP did not perform — so the path simply does not exist. Anyone changing provider has to re-register and answer a fresh OTP, which is survivable if it is planned and disruptive if it is discovered during the switch.

## How to fix it

Plan a provider change as a new registration: a new brand, a new campaign, and a fresh verification text to the same handset. Keep the old brand running until the new one is verified, and expect the number reuse to count against the three-registration limit.

## Check this yourself

**If you are changing provider, have you planned this as a fresh registration rather than a transfer?**

1. Confirm there is no migration path for this tier — there is not — and plan a new brand, a new campaign and a fresh OTP to the same handset.
2. Stand the new brand up before retiring the old one, and count the number reuse against the three-registration limit.

*What wrong looks like:* The switch is planned as a migration, the request is refused at the registry mid-move, and there is no transfer to fall back on while the new registration stalls.

## Notes

The migration is refused at the registry, not by us. What the user has to do is sequence the change themselves — stand the new brand up before retiring the old one — because there is no transfer to fall back on if the new registration stalls.