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N9MD
Too busy to chat
Premium Member
join:2005-10-08
Boca Raton, FL

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1 recommendation

N9MD to ConstantineM

Premium Member

to ConstantineM

VoIP Uses

said by ConstantineM:

...Did you port your dear old numbers to VoIP, and got new numbers for the actual devices? Don't you get any calls on the actual mobile phone numbers to which you forward all your calls? Or do you subscribe for no voice, and merely use SIP on the mobiles?

Background
My wife and I have homes in NJ and FL ... so we want to give our friends and family in both places local numbers to dial.
My wife and I each have regular ATT cell phones (no SIP, no fancy stuff) ... with Northern NJ DIDs ... but we never give out those numbers ... except to our kids and grandchildren.

Home Phones
Our NJ home phone has a DID from Voip.ms which is set to ring on our 2-line cordless phones system (base station plus 5 satellites and built-in answering machine). This DID can be redirected (forwarded) at will to one of our cell phones when we are travelling.
Line 2 on our NJ telephone setup is registered to one of the "lesser" providers for redundancy.
Our FL home phone has a DID from VOIPo which is set to ring on our 2-line cordless phones system (base station plus 3 satellites and built-in answering machine). This DID can be redirected (forwarded) at will to one of our cell phones when we are travelling.
Line 2 on our FL telephone setup is registered to another "lesser" provider for redundancy.
Each of the incoming VoIP home phone DIDs (NJ & FL) have failover to my wife's ATT cell phone number. Thus, even if we are away from one home and cannot reset that home's router or ATA, calls to that home's VoIP DID will ring (failover) to her cell phone.

Cell Phones
My wife has two additional DIDs permanently forwarded to her ATT cell phone ... a FL DID from CC and a NJ DID from Voip.ms.
I have a FL DID from VOIPo and a NJ DID also from VOIPo ... permanently forwarded to my ATT cell phone.

Faxes
My wife's incoming faxes arrive directly in her email (with fax attachment) using a CallCentric DID dedicated to fax.
My own incoming faxes arrive directly in my email (with fax attachment) using a VOIPo DID dedicated to fax.

Other Uses
We have a separate Voip.ms DID specifically for use with DISA for outgoing calls from our cell phones. This is useful when either one of us wants to make an "anonymous" call from our cell phone ... without the potential for the called party to either learn our "real" number or to thwart our efforts through No-CallerID denials. To make a call, we dial this Voip.ms DID ... their system recognizes either of our cell phone numbers ... we enter the number we we want to call and our PIN ... the call connects with the called party seeing an Atlanta GA CallerID. [If anyone calls back the Atlanta number they are redirected/forwarded to one of the many "strange" voice responses I've been collecting over the years.]
Employing VoIP DIDs rather than publishing PSTN or cell phone numbers permits the use of selective and/or general Black Listing (Call Blocking) as I mentioned in my earlier post.

PSTN vs VoIP Expense
Were I to have a Verizon landline in NJ and an ATT landline in FL, my expenses ... including intra- and inter-LATA and long distance calling plus CallerID and CallForwarding, with none of the other VoIP features offerings, and adding in fees and surcharges and taxes ... would be over $1,000 annually.
My VOIPo numbers are on a pre-paid annual plan while I have PAYG accounts with all of the other providers. The per minute usage, fixed fees, E911 fee for NJ (already included in FL's account) ... with no extra costs from CallCentric, VoIP.ms and VOIPo ... average $334 per year.

Final Comments
I realize how convoluted, complex and downright goofy all of this may sound. However, my setup offers a great degree of flexibility and functionality ... it is very easy to tinker with should my needs change ... and it yields not too shabby cost savings.
I apologise for the length of this post (and the earlier one) ... but I hope I've provided readers with various ideas, uses, options and incentives for using VoIP ... and a reason for having more than just one VoIP DID/account.