I’ve been going through the process of moving my landline phone numbers to Google Voice and wanted to share my experience with others who might want to do the same thing. Technically I am moving from Vonage (having ported there from a wired landline a year ago) but the process is the same regardless of whether on Vonage or an actual landline (as both are treated the same from a porting perspective).
A Note For Those Moving From a Cell Phone to Google Voice: Congratulations – it’s very easy. You can port directly from a mobile phone to Google Voice without the workaround discussed here.
Why Move to Google Voice?
Google Voice allows you to take a telephone number, ring multiple phones when someone calls it (such as multiple cell phones, or a cell phone and an office line, or, like in my case, a cell phone and a Skype number), forward texts to multiple devices, and keeps a history of voicemails both on its website and emailed to addresses of your choice.
In our case, we had a home landline that received virtually zero calls due to friends and family calling our cell phones. The problem we had was that the number had been mine for over a decade and it was still the number on file with our banks, credit cards, emergency contacts, etc, so disconnecting it could have a number of issues.
In a second instance, I had a home-office land line that I have used for my business for over 10 years. This number is used in many places, but I only used the phone attached to it on rare occasion – I was already forwarding calls after 2 rings to my cell phone. Paying $50+ per month for this line no longer made sense, but I didn’t want to lose the number.
The Problem: Google Voice only allows number porting from mobile numbers (as of this writing).
The Solution: A temporary cell phone!
As of a few years ago, you are now able to port a landline number to a cell phone carrier. This means that you can transfer your landline number to a cell phone, and then transfer your cell phone number to Google Voice.
The key is to do so as inexpensively as possible – you don’t want to get into some sort of contract on a phone if you are going to transfer it away.
AT&T has a line of prepaid phones called “GoPhone”. With these you purchase blocks of prepaid currency (the minimum being $15) which goes towards calls at $0.10 per minute. Looking on their site, I found a refurbished F160 GoPhone for only $15.99 with no contract. Better yet, AT&T allows number porting to GoPhones.
Step 1: I set up a Google Voice account with a temporary phone number. This allowed me to set the account to forward as I like, set up my voicemail, etc.
Step 2: Purchased AT&T GoPhone for $15.99. AT&T assigned a temporary number to the phone.
Step 3: After receiving the phone, I activated it and called the AT&T porting center at (888) 898-7685 and arranged for my landline number to port to the GoPhone. Because this was coming from a landline, the process took about 3 business days to transfer.
Step 4: I purchased $15 in usage for the GoPhone. This is the minimum allowed, but it’s needed for the number to transfer. To help make sure I didn’t miss any calls, I set the cell phone to forward calls to my temporary Google Voice number (which in turn directed them to my cell phone and other numbers).
Step 5: I checked the http://www.wireless.att.com/lnp site until it showed the date and time my number port would be confirmed. That date and time is only for when your existing carrier has agreed to allow you to port the number – it does not mean the number will automatically work on your temporary phone at that time.
Step 6: Right after the port confirmation date and time, I again called the AT&T porting center at (888) 898-7685 to have them finish the port. Within about 10 minutes my landline number now worked on my temporary cell phone. While you have someone from AT&T on the phone – ask them for the account number for your GoPhone. You can only get this from someone at AT&T and it will be needed to port the number from the GoPhone to Google Voice!
Step 7: Immediately following the landline number now ringing to the cell phone, I went to my Google Voice account, to Settings, and started the process of porting my number from the cell phone to Google Voice. This took 24 hours and has a one-time cost of $20.
At that point, my old land line number was working on Google Voice!
All told, I had $41 in cost ($16 for the phone, $15 for the usage, and $20 for the Google port) and going forward with Google Voice I would save $35 per month on my land line! The total process from beginning to end took 4 business days from when the GoPhone arrived to my home to when the number was active on Google Voice.
What about a second number?
I already had the GoPhone in hand, and I wanted to port my other number (my home office line) to Voice. The biggest hurdle with this one was that I needed a new, unused SIM card. I went to the nearest AT&T store and asked a guy who worked there for a SIM card for a GoPhone, and I told him I would activate it at home. He handed me one at no charge, and when I got home I went to https://www.wireless.att.com/GoPhoneWeb/goPhoneLanding.do?method=activatePayGo, entered the number from the SIM card, and put it into the GoPhone. From here the process was exactly the same as before. 4 days later and my home office number was ported, saving over $50 per month!
Obviously, your mileage may very, but all in all it proved a great way to keep my legacy numbers for no ongoing cost.
Update 11/1/2011: A few days after the migration of my second number from Vonage to Google Voice, I received word from a few of my contacts that they were getting a “this number has been disconnected” or “this number is not in service” message when they called from Qwest or certain VOIP providers. After much digging, it looks like there is a not-uncommon issue of Vonage failing to delete the number fully from their systems after cancellation, causing odd routing issues. I ended up posting to this thread on Vonage’s forum, and I was contacted by someone saying it would be deleted within 24-72 hours. So here’s hoping!
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Did you ever get this resolved? I’m still having similar issues with my number, although Vitelity (number owned by XO) rather than Vonage.
It did. Once they removed my number from their systems everything worked fine again.
Hmm, everyone forwards me to Google Voice to handle the problem… and it is next to impossible to get anyone at GV to research a problem. Frustrating.
Are you aware of any good resources that explain phone number routing works across cell/traditional/voip services? I keep getting conflicting information about who needs to fix the problem… and I’ve dealt with this for multiple SMS and Voice routing issues over the past eight or nine months.
What I learned was that it had nothing to do with GV and was entirely on the end of my old VOIP provider. People at Vonage didn’t believe me either until I found proof of similar issues online, and only then was I able to request (via a forum posting that one of their support people monitored no less) that they completely delete my records.
thanks for sharing. I began looking into this in Dec 2011 but had just prepaid for a year of voip via my discount service provider. Now I’m up for renewal again in mid Oct and am considering moving it again. if I can get the whole transfer for what you paid, plus another $50-60 for a google chat enabled voip router and my hard lined phones remain in business with no ongoing bill — at least until GV changes their terms.
Hello Jason.. I have a Sprint mobile account, a land line acct with McCleodUSA, at cheap pay as you go cell acct for emergencies for my wife. My problem started when my business number was given to me by a company called Callwave that was a VOI forwarding service that also provided recorded and stored messages and efax’s. 3 weeks ago they went out of business and a company called Level3 owns my number. I was thinking of adding another cell phone to my account just for me business number to port, and getting a Dock-n-Talk that coverst line line phones into cellphones but still use your hand held receivers that my wife likes(Sprint rents one for $20) less than the $50 I pay now for land line, however when i do make biz calls I prefer to talk on my land line phones for clarity and convience, same for me wife. I looked into Google Voice and was told that I would get a number GV supplied and not a ported number.. you have proven this wrong.. MY VOI 317-708-4858 number is critical to get back in my hands..critical, and it’s crazy paying for a land line anymore especially if I get another cellphone to have my business number .. do you think I could pull off the tactics you did to get my business number ported to Sprint or another cell company and then just use Google Voice? Is it professional when some one calls? etc.
What did you do about your outgoing callerID? Presumably it does not show as your GV number when you call from your old land line…
Bill: I haven’t tried the GV enabled router but I’ve heard of them. Seems a little like an abuse of their service, although within their current terms I guess. I prefer paying a reasonable price for my actual landline (in fact I’d happily pay for GV if it would result in active support).
You might be able to accomplish what you’re talking about though. I don’t see why not.
I do notice a little additional lag when I have multiple forwarding (e.g. cell to GV to VoIP line), but for direct GV->Cell or GV->VoIP it works fine and is professional.
joeblow: I use VoIP service to originate my calls, which allows me to specify my caller ID. I don’t know how you’d solve this with a traditional landline, I don’t think you could.
Tried the AT&T go phone with $25 plan. Set up to forward to Google Voice. Great service. Here is the problem. AT&T charges 3 minutes (or $.30) for the call or a text to be forwarded. They round up on minutes. A lot of the calls are marketing type but because it is forwarded the minutes accumulate with a minimum charge of 2 minutes. If you don’t forward and go to voicemail… and never really talk much on the phone… you might stay within the $25 a month plan. I brought my own phone and paid the $15 for a SIM card. When the minutes ran out after 3 weeks the phone disconnected mid call, then since I had texts forwarded… all the texts from AT&T were being charged to me! It was and is a mess. In order to port over to Google Voice, you still have to have a cell phone carrier. I looked at other inexpensive plans, Metro PC offers a $25 unlimited minutes and text plan if you buy their phone BUT it does not include call forwarding. I am now researching Parking Garage that will port in my number and forward to my other phone but SMS and MMS can not be processed even with email or by forwarding to my google voice number. Interesting and frustrating all rolled up in one difficult commerce driven world. I need two phone numbers. Qwest/Century Link land line was my first porting… well they can not put through all carriers! Yep. Even with a land line your callers will receive a never ending ring without message or notification. After a year of trying to figure this out with Century Link, I had to provide two numbers of calls I new were made and never received… they researched and since they were not affiliated with Century link the problem must be on the other end but no way to no… in order words… out of luck using a land line for inexpensive call gathering. To date, I have not found a solution. Any suggestions for services besides park my phone and parking garage?
No offense, but your math is off. It cost you $50.99 (15.99 + 15 + 20) to port your number.