IP Engineering and Software Development
Contributed by Hudson Barton
The Borderless Communicator
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Skype Makes A Great Home Phone Line
Here's the very best setup for a home phone line; powered by Skype. Ready for prime time!Detailed Instructions:- Get smart phones for the members of your household. My wife and I use iPhones. Then download Skype.
- Establish a new Skype account with an ID: "LastName-Myname.Spousename"; the ID is not important, just a suggestion.
- Go buy an unlimited USA/Canada plan for calling regular numbers (landlines and mobiles). Cost: $30 per year.
- Go buy an online number. They are now available in virtually every local community. Cost: $30 per year
- Forward incoming calls to your cell phone and wife's cell phone (and/or other family members)... after 1 second.
- Log out of the new Skype account so that call forwarding will be activated.
- Don't setup voicemail. Let your cell phones take care of that.
- When you want to make a call, if you don't want to use up your cell minutes, boot up Skype on your smart phone. The callerID will display the online number you purchased. Skype calling works acceptably with iPhone on AT&T's 3G network, but I haven't tested it with Verizon, or on Androd.
So there you have it. A home phone line with a local number and unlimited outbound calling that rings on multiple "extensions" both in your house and when you are on the road, all for a cost of $60 per year. Can't beat it.Leave a Comment
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IP Engineering and Software Development
Comments 2 Comments
Both of my children have INQ handsets operating on THREE-UK. Skype calls to/from these handsets are free, including SkypeOut calls to the pseudo country code +990. Calls to +990 numbers emerge out of the back end of the Skype PSTN gateways as SIP VoIP and are routed to one of my home PBXs, where the caller can use an IVR to call a local extension or make an external SIP call to a PSTN number.
As I have an unlimited plan for outward calling, the incremental cost of making calls is ZERO
How much do I love the INQ/Three/Skype combo? Lots!