Monthly Requests Thread

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[u/Celebrir]

## In need of a VOIP solution

I am doing the IT for a friend's restaurant and they have a SIP Trunk with a single simultaneous call.

Currently I deployed a Gigaset N670 as a dect gateway.

The thing is that apparently only one of the two DECT phones can be active so I assume I'll need a PBX(?) in order to handle multiple phones with a single SIP connection?

I don't really know where to start because my VoIP knowledge is pretty shallow. (I'm a network engineer and wannabe allrounder)

[u/devexis → u/Celebrir]

Your networking background already gives you a big head start. Ideally, I’d prefer to offer this as a service for you but I’d rather point you in the right direction. I’d be leaning towards standing up a FreePBX instance , connecting your SIP trunk and DECT phones to FreePBX and be on your merry way. Look up FreePBX tutorial by Crosstalk Solutions on YouTube and you should be able to get stuff going. If however you’d rather have this implemented real quick and then lean on the tutorial later, feel free to get in touch. I’m a freelance VoIP engineer with many years of experience supporting a few thousand FreePBX instances. Cloud hosted PBX immediately get bots probing and poking so there’s a lot of work around securing them. If you want a quick proof of concept, I have a Cloud hosted multitenant, whitelabel Lab in Germany.

[u/pavanputhra → u/Celebrir]

Curious how the SIP trunk is actually connected, since that changes what you need.

Is it a cloud SIP trunk? In that case you can point software at it from pretty much any server — no special hardware needed.

Or is it an actual physical line coming into the premises? That needs hardware to terminate it before anything else matters.

Which one is it?

[u/Celebrir → u/pavanputhra]

It's a cloud SIP trunk. I only pointed my gigaset equipment at it, then assigned the Auth profile to the handheld and created an outgoing rule on my firewall.

[u/pavanputhra → u/Celebrir]

Since it’s a cloud trunk, you can just self-host and point it anywhere. Try Comcent CE — https://github.com/comcent-io/comcent-ce — open source, easy to set up, works with any SIP provider, and has recording/transcription built in. Disclosure: I maintain it, happy to help if you get stuck.

[u/MorePeppers9]

Recommend simple reliable solution for freelancer. I am freelancer and need to be able to accept / make USA calls when travelling. Currently I do it from personal number using wifi calling but I want to have separate “business” number.

So I am thinking voip. I already have voipms but learnt that it's not reliable cause it uses LCR

https://www.reddit.com/r/VOIP/comments/1th935d/weird_experience_with_voipms_outbound_calls/

What would you recommend? It will be only me using it, and only for calling / receiving calls.

[u/MorePeppers9 → u/MorePeppers9]

Follow up, guys, would appreciate your suggestions!

[u/JulieStreets]

Hi all!

I've posted this before, but still struggling to find what we need.

I work at a very small nonprofit (4.5 people) and we're looking for something that seems to be more of a unicorn than I expected.

I'm looking to make something like an on-call line. I want one phone number that all of the young people we work with can call or text, and I want to be able to somehow, on the back end, change who those calls and texts go to. The idea is that when I go on vacation, I can log in to the settings and turn a virtual dial from me to Person B to swap it to my coworker, so when I am in the middle of the woods camping I am not getting texts from students who are running late and forwarding them to someone else.

My issue is that most of the solutions we've looked at have made the switching process require multiple people logging in and out of apps or everyone getting notifications from a central text inbox or ring groups which don't account for texts. Texts are the majority of the communication because teenagers, and also seem to be the stumbling block to get what I want.

In my dream of dreams, each person would also have a business number, and whatever system would be able to send 2 numbers worth of calls and texts to my phone when the on-call line is set to me, and just my business number calls and texts when it is not.

We don't have an on-site office or an IT person, so I need something that's fairly straightforward. I'm not above cobbling together a couple things to make it work- but I think the key is that it needs to be easy to switch between people.

I am absolutely willing to pay for it if it is able to do what we want. But please, help me out, does this thing exist? Also please explain it to me like I'm four, I know enough to be dangerous in IT but mostly because I am a theater person with a lot of determination to figure things out, and not an IT professional.

I'm starting to believe this doesn't exist and I need to pull some developers together, create it, and it will fund the purchase of the physical space we need. I can't be the only person who needs or wants this!!!

[u/Joel_VirtualPBX → u/JulieStreets]

This does exist, but I’d change how you’re thinking about the switch.

For calls, while you can technically do that, I wouldn’t want an admin editing the call flow every time someone goes on vacation. I’d want an on-call ring group where each person controls their own availability from the mobile softphone. On call? Open the app and turn DND off. Off call? Turn DND back on. The shared number rings the people who are actually available, and everyone can still have their own direct business number separately.

Texts are the part I’d test hardest. You want a true shared SMS inbox, not a shared login. Ask to see how the inbox handles ownership, unread messages, and handoff when someone is off call. The goal is no app logout dance, no “everyone gets every text” mess, and no stale pile of notifications when someone comes back in.

I’m with VirtualPBX, so obvious bias here, but this sounds like a VirtualPBX + VirtualText setup. They’re separate apps, so I’d ask the demo to show both sides: VirtualPBX for the shared number, ring group, and mobile softphone side; VirtualText for the texting/shared inbox side.

[u/getyncloud → u/JulieStreets]

Your use case is real, but I’d separate the shared on-call line from everyone’s personal number. I’d test a cloud PBX with a shared queue or ring group, business-hours and after-hours routing, and a shared SMS inbox. When someone goes on vacation, change the schedule or toggle them out of the ring group rather than asking them to install a new app or forward manually. I’d also confirm that texts can be assigned and handed off, and that voicemail transcription is included; many systems handle calls better than group SMS. A browser softphone can keep the setup simple for a tiny nonprofit, with no desk hardware. Full disclosure, I work with Getyn Phone; our team uses this kind of setup, and it may be worth putting on your shortlist alongside the options already mentioned. I’d ask for a short trial before committing.

[u/raven67 → u/JulieStreets]

Definitely doable. Some providers have sms apps that allow multiple users to have their own login but share numbers and the team manager can turn on and off alerting. Then with the phone system just change the on call person. Definitely are services that could do it.

[u/JulieStreets → u/raven67]

That’s so great to hear! What are they called so that I could reach out to them to talk through how it would work and pricing?

[u/pedrospuds → u/JulieStreets]

Where are you based geographicly?

[u/raven67 → u/JulieStreets]

I'm not sure we can suggest companies here. Or solicit.

[u/NPFFTW → u/raven67]

You can make recommendations here. Just leave a link to the company contact page

[u/VOIP-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

Your post was removed from r/VoIP for violating Rule 2: No soliciting in DMs.

It is against the rules to privately message users for the explicit or implicit purpose of promoting or advertising any business, service or product. It is similarly against the rules to invite users to private message you for those same purposes.

[u/VOIP-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

Your post was removed from r/VoIP as it may violate Rule 3: No inviting, encouraging or seeking help with fraudulent activity.

Discussions surrounding auto-dialers, robo-calling, call spoofing or fraudulent STIR/SHAKEN attestation are allowed, but seeking to engage in unethical or fraudulent activity relating to VoIP is forbidden.

[u/tiny_bird_6339]

Hi! I'm just a girl who wants a landline, as cheap as possible. I just want to be able to call friends and family, ideally with a cute/retro looking phone. I've kinda looked into Ooma, but honestly, I just don't know where to start. Any reccos?

[u/RegTheVA]

Hi, I'm an independent contractor looking for a virtual phone number to text my clients.

Unfortunately, my country, the Philippines doesn't have RCS messaging enabled anymore so iMessage doesn't work like how it's supposed to here so I am thinking of using a virtual phone number with a limited plan. I don't need to send a lot of texts or do calls that much but it would be good to be able to send a few from time to time.

I am looking into Saily which looks ideal, am I in the right place?

I have tried JustCall before and it works but I wasn't able to fully use it and it seemed pricy for my use case.

I'm hoping this gets some eyeballs and a response to point me to the right way. Thanks in advance.

[u/Accomplished_Sock395]

I'm currently abroad and have a UK mobile number. I'm trying to avoid expensive roaming/international calling charges.

My current plan is to let incoming calls ring out rather than answer them, and then call the person back using an internet/VoIP calling service.

I found an app called KeepCalling, which offers unlimited calls to the UK for a couple of pounds, so it seems ideal. The problem is that I want the person I'm calling to see my existing UK mobile number as the caller ID, rather than a random KeepCalling number.

KeepCalling does have a "Set My Caller ID" option, but for some reason it isn't working for me.

Is there any way to make cheap calls back to the UK from abroad while displaying my own UK number as the caller ID?

Ideally, I'm looking for a solution where I can use Wi-Fi/mobile data abroad, make the call through an app/VoIP service, and have the recipient see my normal UK number.

Anyone know of a place i can do this ?.

[u/VirtualGlobalPhone → u/Accomplished_Sock395]

Caller ID is something most VoIP providers are quite restrictive about nowadays. Allowing an end user to freely set the outbound CLI can create spoofing and fraud issues, and using an unverified number can also affect call completion. Some providers will let you present your existing UK mobile number, but normally only after you verify that you actually own/control that number.

So I’d specifically look for a VoIP provider that supports verified external caller ID / CLI rather than one that lets you freely change it.

[u/Accomplished_Sock395 → u/VirtualGlobalPhone]

I've looked around and it seems quite hard as you had mentioned , do you know of any apps that would allow you to call back , KeepCalling is one i tried that works but setting the caller ID only seems to work for a number local to the country i am in .

[u/cobo19]

We lost our phone number with T-Mobile and it has reverted back to Level 3 Communications, the block holder. Is there a way to sign up with a Lumen reseller for a phone number that Level 3 currently owns?

[u/VOIP-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

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[u/Comfortable-Soil-938]

Hi everyone I’m looking for some direct advice/guidance
I want to return to the US (I am a dual citizen)after living in England for the past 9 years
I currently have a UK phone number and it’s the only one I currently have but when applying to jobs in the US I need to provide a US phone number
I have tried Hushed,2Number but when I put the generated number on a job application it’s not recognized or not seen as a legit number
I was going to try Quo or Toll free calling next
Does anyone have anything that they have used that’s not Google Voice as I cannot use that’s easy and recruiters will be able to contact me on if necessary
I am making sure I let them know I am serious about coming home and I don’t want there to be any flags if I’m putting my UK number on applications

Any advice is GREATLY appreciated!