Hack62.Give Your Mobile Phone an International Dial-In Number


Hack 62. Give Your Mobile Phone an International Dial-In Number

Use SkypeIn and call forwarding to give your mobile phone one or more international dial-in telephone numbers.

Works with: Windows version of Skype.

Giving your mobile phone one or more international dial-in numbers has a number of advantages, not the least of which is a reduced call rate for callers who are in the same country as your dial-in number, and the fact that you can have an international presence at a distance.

This hack uses three Skype services: SkypeIn, SkypeOut, and call forwarding. By giving a Skype account one or more SkypeIn numbers, you can use Skype call forwarding and SkypeOut to automatically forward to your mobile phone all calls that come in to these dial-in numbers (see Figure 6-4).

Figure 6-4. Routing calls to your mobile phone through Skype effectively gives your mobile phone multiple dial-in phone numbers


To give your mobile phone one or more international dial-in numbers, follow these steps:

  1. Set up a Skype account just for this purposesay, my_mobile.

  2. Sign up my_mobile for SkypeIn and SkypeOut. Choose your SkypeIn number for the country of your choice; for example, +442075551212 would be a phone number for London. SkypeIn is available for many countries, and even regions of those countries; see http://www.skype.com/ for a complete list.

  3. Set up my_mobile so that incoming calls to your international SkypeIn number are automatically forwarded to your mobile phone (select Skype Tools Options … Call Forwarding & Voicemail). For this exercise, well assume your mobile phone number is +12035551212 (see Figure 6-5).

  4. Log off of my_mobile. Call forwarding for this hack works best when the my_mobile Skype account is logged off.

Figure 6-5. Setting up call forwarding to your mobile phone


Now, any calls to your international SkypeIn number will be forwarded to your mobile file automatically.

Unfortunately, all of this is not free, and you must decide for yourself whether the benefits of having an international dial-in number for your mobile phone outweigh the costs (see Table 6-3).

Table 6-3. Cost of adding an international dial-in number to your mobile phone (an example)

Cost component

Cost

Number of minutes of talk time per year

1,200

Per-minute SkypeOut-to-mobile call rate

$0.03

Cost of SkypeOut calls to mobile

$36

SkypeIn annual subscription ( 30 per year)

$37.50

Total annual cost

$73.50


6.4.1. See Also

  • "Make Cheap Long-Distance or International Calls from Your Mobile Phone" [Hack #60]




Skype Hacks
Skype Hacks: Tips & Tools for Cheap, Fun, Innovative Phone Service
ISBN: 0596101899
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2005
Pages: 168

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