Ok, you guys who have clients that are not local, do you have an 800 number setup? What's the company you recommend? We are leaning towards finding something that we can have them dial an extension and either get me or hubby, depending on what they need.

I did a pocast with a company called Grasshopper. http://grasshopper.com/

Skype is a reasonable way to make long distance calls as well.

Hey There!

I have a 866 number for those clients who aren't local. It's also a number that clients can send faxes to as well.

It's great with call forwarding, setting up extensions, caller ID, and call screening. I pay about $15.00/month for everything. Good luck

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I'm debating on that because we are planning on moving from Ohio to TN in a few months, and I don't want to go through having one phone number when we start up our business (live March 1) and have to go through a number change when we move. If we have an 800 set up, I don't have to worry about it.

True, having a toll free number is a handy thing to have. I don't necessarily have mine advertised all over the place simply because I don't need everyone calling me on it, but I do offer it to prospective clients, clients etc that it would be useful for.

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Originally Posted by hbplifestyle

I did a pocast with a company called Grasshopper. http://grasshopper.com/ Skype is a reasonable way to make long distance calls as well.

Thanks for the tip about Grasshopper. I took a look at their site and this looks like a good cost-efficient alternative.

I have a local and 800 number with RingCentral.
http://www.ringcentral.com/?AFN=GGRC...US&sid=k197094

It only cost me $15.00 a month and I get a lot of services. I get messages via email & text. I get fax and voice service on both lines. I can call out from my cell phone (or any phone) and the caller id of the receiving party will read that of my business phone number. You can set up extensions. Calls can be forwarded to any number (with a code before the number so you know it is your business line). You can set-up a variety of answer rules (workday, evenings, weekends, etc) with separate greetings for each. You can block incoming call from a particular number(s) and you have a choice of what message the blocked caller will hear. You can set-up a digital VoIP line (for a small fee-price depends on the number of monthly minutes you choose).

This service woks well for my business.

Julie

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I use Kall8. It's wonderful for someone in my situation. It only costs me $2 a month to keep the number open, plus 6 or 7 cents a minute to use. That may sound steep, but in a typical month I have NO calls since my clients are all mainly email-based. I just keep the line for potentials and to do quarterly follow-up calls with current clients.

That said, it would definitely work for a business that has bigger phone needs. There are lots of options, nice packages that include multiple outbound messages, menus, and separate extensions if you have more than one person in the business.

But like I said, it's the basics that sold me:

--You can have the same number for phone and fax (for fax, it's sent to me by email as a PDF @ 7 cents per page), so I had no expense in buying a fax machine.
--You can set your toll-free number to forward to any other number, land line or cell, so I have it forward to my home line. That means I also don't pay extra for a second line.
--You can set the ring forwarding to a schedule. My business line never, ever rings before or after hours or on weekends, so I don't have to worry about screening calls during "off" times. It goes directly to VM instead.
--You can make outbound calls from the number, too, so my clients never see my private home number on their caller ID even though that's where I'm calling from.

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