HELLO & WELCOME

[alex01]

I'm increasingly needing to forward calls to my mobile from my pbx and was wondering if any forum members could help me to find the cheapest solution in uk for this.

currently I'm paying 14p per minute using my trunk provider, is anyone using a cheaper solution?

I would be grateful for any advise on this matter.

thanks.

[WelshPaul]

The cheapest I have come across is Google Voice at 3.6p per minute and that includes VAT. You need to jump through a couple of hoops in order to setup an account because Google Voice isn't officially available here in the UK.

I setup an account a while ago for testing with an OBi1032 but haven't looked at setting up a trunk with Google Voice, you would need to look into that yourself or maybe Steve could give some advice?

Most UK VoIP providers charge around the 10p mark for calling UK mobiles, Soho66.co.uk charge 8.5p peak and 8p offpeak (plus VAT)? Gradwell charge 9p peak, 8p offpeak and 6p at weekends (plus VAT)

Voip2Go charge 4-6p per minute, not sure exactly what that means though as there isn't a breakdown on mobile call charges: http://www.voip2go.co.uk/call-rates-uk.html

Tel2 charge 5p for calls to UK mobiles and that is inclusive of VAT: https://tel2.co.uk/rates.html

[alex01]

Hi Paul, many thanks for your fast reply.

That sounds a lot better than what i'm currently paying - it would be very interesting to know if there was a way to get an account this side of pond - I'll certainly take a look into it and setting up a trunk. I would of course be interested if Steve or anyone else could share some info on this.

just a note, I'm not really sure what happened but I was in my Gmail contacts where I accidently I clicked a mobile number which fired up a program called hangouts. The call didn't go through because I had no credit but I noticed there was a call charge of 3p per minute. the point is that it would be great if there was a way that I could incorporate this service into my freepbx for forwarding someway.

[WelshPaul]

it would be very interesting to know if there was a way to get an account this side of pond

You need a US IP address, I got one using a VPN. You also need a US telephone number to complete the google voice registration process.... I got one for free using call centric (I think).

There are guides available on the net that talk you through the process.

I will look into setting up google voice as a trunk on FreePBX as I already have a dormant google voice account, it may come of some use to me at some point. Will post back with update...

[gsmlnx]

localphone.com has the following UK prices per minute (VAT included)

United Kingdom
Landlines All Landlines 0.5p
Mobiles All Networks 1.8p

I use them for mobile outgoing calls although the quality is some times variable. YMMV

By the way, all mobile networks means the mainland networks not the Manx or Channel Islands

[alex01]

I purchased some credit with local phone and tested, not to bad; you have to bear in mind that my mobile service is with 3 which has a mind of it's own anyway so I'm used to some degree of problems with call quality. I also like the fact that it's freepbx friendly.

I've tried forwarding via ring group, miscellaneous destination, and follow me but can't forward original CID to mobile, It would be perfect if I could achieve this - has anyone got any ideas?

merry Christmas to all btw

[gsmlnx]

Hi Alex

Sorry, no idea about passing on the original CID. That's one area where the suppliers lock down to stop spammers for very obvious reasons.

[WelshPaul]

I don't think you can...

The call is coming in on one carrier and passed on via a new call on a second carrier, as a result your probably getting the caller ID assigned to the second carrier line.

Usually when call forwarding is set the call comes in and then it's forwarded on by the same carrier, as such the original CLI is passed along.

While Asterisk/Freepbx is probably sending the CLI of the caller as mentioned above almost all carriers don't allow you to modify the CLI.

[alex01]

I was asking too much as usual! thanks for info, I'm in better place as far as forwarding call costs are concerned.