Friends -
We are closing on a park in 30 days. The sellers are keeping their home number, which they had used for the park as well. So I need a new number. I already have one Google Voice number forwarding to my mobile phone, and GV does not appear to allow another to forward to the same number. I know I can pay $17.40/month to get an AT&T number and have it telebranched to Grasshopper, or get a number directly from Grasshopper (or similar virtual PBX service), or I’ve heard of inumbr.com. I’m sure there are other providers.
Please give me your thoughts on what you’d suggest doing in a situation like this where the park does not come with a phone number.
Thank you,
-jl-
We like to use Magic-Jack Plus so long as your not going to forward the number- as they now charge for forwarding. Let me say this though… we are huge on google voice numbers for our parks and every park has a google voice #. We forward the google voice number to the managers cell phone, and then we make the managers cell phone private and blocked. This lets us transfer the number around if we need to, or leave a ‘special’ message if the water is out etc- and shut off the forwarding. We set that up in a email account for the park- and set up forwarding so all of the messages go to us, and our manager. All of our parks now run on the Magic-Jack / Google voice set up. The main park number is the Magic Jack, the ‘managers cell number’ is the google voice.
Another point- we make lots of outgoing calls on google voice using a headset and our computers as well. So you can log into any of your google voice accounts, and make calls. So sitting 1000 miles away- your using the same phone # as your manager sitting in the MHP.
I’ve used a Skype number and it worked well. It’s also easy to view the managers computer screen and help them through things if needed. Hopefully not with the new manager program just released.
Can I get Magic Jack to give me a local number and forward it to Grasshopper.com or similar virtual PBX? I want my callers to be able to ‘Press 1’ and hear directions and hours of operation so that my manager is not bothered so much. Grasshopper even enables callers to ‘Press 6’ and get an application faxed to them. Does Magic Jack to anything like that? And do I need to leave Magic Jack plugged in for it to work and be forwarding calls?
Thank you so much,
-jl-
The magic jack can forward- but they charge for he forwarding service. The new magic jack plus needs a cat 5 cable and to be plugged into a wall to ring- but it will forward calls or send them to voice mail if it is not plugged in.