Last month we finally “cut the cord” and rid our house of both cable television and home phone service. We still wanted to have a “home” number to give out to business and acquaintances, however, so we set up a Google Voice number and set it to ring the phones of both my wife and myself. This worked OK, but we still had an issue of not knowing if a call coming in was meant for our cell number or the “home” Google Voice number. It led to some issues, but we finally hacked out a simple solution.

First, we set the Google Voice number to present the GV number itself as it's caller ID. We had originally set it to display the ID of the caller, but this is what led to the confusion of know knowing what number we were being called from and had to go.

Next, my wife and I erased the “home” number on both our contacts. This way, when the call came it we wouldn't be overwhelmed with information of “who” might be calling.

Finally, we created a new contact, set to the organization <last name>'s Home – and set our Google Voice number as the only number in that contact. I also set the GV number to ring with a unique ringtone, so I don't even have to look to know a call is coming from that number.

Now whenever a call comes in to our “home” number we can know at a glance, or by sound in my case, and know the call isn't meant to get us “on the run.” This is helpful when I'm at a meeting, away on vacation, or simply out doing errands when I know my wife is at home. If both my wife and I are out, the call goes to voicemail – just like a normal home number. When we get a bit more comfortable with the features of Google Voice, we'll sit down and work out how to transfer calls and other fun toys the system gives us. As an added bonus, political robo-calls and telemarketers tend to give up when they hit the Google Voice ID prompt.

It's different than having a traditional home phone number, but it is workable.

Posted with Blogsy