Comments on: Forwarding to a Cell Phone

Question: Forwarding to a Cell Phone

scarlet — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 16:31:32 -0800

What is the best way to get a phone number with a specific area code, and have calls to that number forwarded to an existing cell phone?

To avoid carrying around a second phone, I'd prefer to stay away from prepaid cell plans. I do currently have a Cingular plan, and since I am pretty sure I can forward my calls to it for free, I'd like to take advantage of that. So, what's the best way to get a phone number with a specific area code, and have it forwarded to my current cellular number?

By: ranglin

ranglin — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 16:37:26 -0800

I'm not that familiar with the American phone system, but I would have thought that most VoIP companies would offer this service to you.

The number you are looking for is called a DID (Direct In Dial) number and you would just organise to have it permanantly diverted to your cell phone. It may cost you a bit for the diversion though.

By: ranglin

ranglin — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 16:41:02 -0800

Sorry, VoIP = Voice Over IP (i.e. Vonage), which is a service that allows you to make phone calls over the Internet.

By: JohnnyGunn

JohnnyGunn — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 16:49:58 -0800

Grand Central. Not sure if this is what you are looking for, but it does allow you to pick a number in almost any area code and forward it to multiple numbers.

By: Armitage Shanks

Armitage Shanks — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 16:52:41 -0800

Yup, Vonage will let you choose an area code, and also let you forward all the calls to another number.

By: spaceman_spiff

spaceman_spiff — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 17:16:44 -0800

Gizmo Project can do this for pretty cheap (2 cents a minute in the US, I think?)

By: Good Brain

Good Brain — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 17:27:07 -0800

Grand Central, which JohnnyGunn mentioned, will let you do this for free, and you can actually have it ring multiple phones simultaneously (if, for example, you wanted it to ring to your landline and cell).

A potential downside is that your voicemail ends up on Grandcentral, not your cellphone provider, but grandcentral will automatically e-mail it to you and/or send you an SMS.

By: scarlet

scarlet — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 18:04:38 -0800

Thanks for the great advice. I checked out GrandCentral, and it seems like that'll work fine (and free? awesome!). It looks like they're in beta, but I won't be using this for any mission-critical phone calls anyway. Thanks again all.