ISO telephony ideas

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pdxdvr

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Dec 10, 2011
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I think I'm overthinking my phone situation and would love any feedback.

I'm from the US, but live ~11 months of the year in Mexico. Not all of my clients know this because they've never asked and it doesn't matter. I have a personal number with AT&T on a plan that includes voice in Mexico. My lady friend is on this plan with me. I have a business number with Google Voice that forwards to my Skype number for incoming calls. I'll have need to add at least two more numbers in two different states in the US this year.

Ideally, here's what I'd like to be able to do:
  • Ditch AT&T, port my numbers out
  • Be able to receive calls to all of my numbers on my iPhone regardless of if I'm in Mexico, the US, Belize, wherever. I can figure out the local SIM card issues, I don't need help with that part. So I either need a service that will forward to these numbers or has an app that allows for direct dial/answer.
  • Be able to respond to calls/texts to these numbers directly from my iPhone
  • Be able to make outgoing calls/texts from my iPhone with the ability to select which number I'm calling from

As I said at the top, I think I've been going too complex with this.

I looked into Twilio but the whole calling out from certain numbers requires app programming skills I don't have. I tried their open source OpenVBX but the iOS app doesn't support having a non-US number. I tried PhoneUnite (a Twilio partner) but they ended up just being a pain in the ass and despite being on their cheapo plan all of a sudden my card was getting charged for close to $100 in the first day of just getting everything set up.

Yes, I'm mostly just wanting to be a cheap bastard. Right now I'm paying ~$1200 per year for service I use less than a month. That's a fair amount of hookers and blow in Mexico. And I pay about 200 pesos (~US$15) every six weeks for my iPhone down here.

So, any ideas on how to accomplish this for significantly less than the ~$100/month I'm wasting now?
 


Why do you need app programming skills? Just make Twilio prompt for a number to dial. Don't use Twilio partners, Twilio's easy to use and 99% of the partners charge a total rip off of a markup with basically no benefit. It shouldn't take much time at all to get it set up. I'm a Twilio user, have used it for pretty critical things (automation in regard to payments) and I'm definitely a fan (other than the one niggle when they froze my account for a few hours because I was using the same number to report errors to my phone, and it got into a loop, but that's understandable, they lifted it as soon as I contacted them.
 
-joe- said:
Just make Twilio prompt for a number to dial.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure what you mean by this, there's a way to make outgoing calls while on the go using Twilio that allows me to select my caller ID number without using an app?
 
Sounds like you need a PBX with SIP capability. Problem is VOIP over 3G is crappy at best. You'd need constant Wifi or 4g to do it effectively and reliably.
 
cheshire said:
Sounds like you need a PBX with SIP capability. Problem is VOIP over 3G is crappy at best. You'd need constant Wifi or 4g to do it effectively and reliably.
Click to expand...

The wifi isn't a problem. Any recommendation on a PBX with SIP capability?
 
Dealing with a similar thing for a client.
Looking at grasshopper to use a 800 number that then forwards the phone call to Europe. Everything is cool but they want a 500$ deposit to set this up.
Will keep checking back in.
My situation seems easier than the OP's will keep checking in.
Thanks for the advice given so far.
 
pdxdvr said:
I'm not sure what you mean by this, there's a way to make outgoing calls while on the go using Twilio that allows me to select my caller ID number without using an app?
Click to expand...
Say you have 3 Twilio numbers, 123, 456, 789.

You want to make a call from 456. Upon dialling it, you hear a message saying 'please press 1 to speak to pdxdvr'. But you want to make a call, so instead you dial a predefined code. After that code is entered correctly, Twilio then asks you to dial in the number you wish to call. You dial the number in, and Twilio then calls that number.

Would that not work?
 
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