Keep your Existing Mobile Phone number, Let Google Voice Manage Your VoiceMail
Google on Tuesday plans to enable a subset of Google Voice features, notably voicemail, when using an existing mobile number including your iPhone.
Google Voice is a service that gives you a new phone number to receive incoming calls from your selected phone numbers. e.g. When people call you at your Google Voice number. Your office, home, call phones will ring if you choose to. Voicemails will be transcribed to text and sent to you in your email inbox. While the service is convenience. People might find 2 hurdles:
- Having to use a new phone number
- Outgoing phone using your existing phone will show the number that you are calling from, thus confusion to your friends, family, co-workers, etc..
Today announcement offers just a subset of voicemail feature if you don’t want to use the full fleche Google Voice. You (not yet Google Voice user) can just simply register the service just to manage your mobile phone voicemail.
Google Voice product manager Vincent Paquet says that Tuesday’s announcement isn’t directed at Apple. "It certainly wasn’t the intent," he said. "This feature was available before Google Voice came out so it’s not like we created this to bypass anything. What we’ve come to realize is that a subset of our users will not want to change numbers and we understand that."
More specifically, if you sign up for Google Voice with your existing number, you’ll get:
- Online, searchable voicemail
- Free automated voicemail transcription
- Custom voicemail greetings for different callers
- Email and SMS notifications
- Low-priced international calling
If you decide to also get a new Google number, you’ll get all of the above PLUS:
- One number that reaches you on all your phones
- SMS via email
- Call screening
- Listen In
- Call recording
- Conference calling
- Call blocking
If you already have a Google number, this new feature should also help with the transition to your new number, as you can now forward unanswered calls to your mobile phone to your Google Voice account. This way, people who still call your old number will reach the same voicemail as people who call your Google Voice number.
If you already use Google Voice, you can add Google voicemail to any mobile phone you’ve linked to your account. If you’re not using Google Voice yet, you can request an invitation or ask someone with a Google Voice account to invite you. When you receive the invitation to sign-up, you decide whether you’d like to use Google Voice with your existing number or get a Google number.
[Source Google]
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