How to Keep Your U.S. Phone Number While Cheaply Making Unlimited Calls and Texts to the U.S. While Living in Thailand (or elsewhere :)
by Joshua Berry
*This is kind of a pain in the butt. But if you’re a cheapskate (like me) and you have want to keep your phone and your old phone number (like me), then it’s worth it.
**This works only for U.S. Phone numbers.
***Unlock your phone before leaving the country. Otherwise you can’t get a Thai data plan.
****Make sure your cell phone provider’s contract with you is fulfilled. If not – cancellation may cost you fees…but you’re moving out of the country anyway, so I’m sure you’ve thought of that.
*****This works great with both wifi and data, but understand that it will chomp through your data if you use it outside of wifi zones. And speaking of data…
******Get a Thai data plan afterwards (TRUE, DTAC, AIS). These are cheap, and it’s obviously good to have internet and a Thai phone number in addition to your U.S. phone number. This means you now have two phone numbers on the same phone!!!!! Read on…
#1. Port Your Number to Google Voice
Damage - $20.00
Porting your number to Google Voice will effectively save your phone number so that you can have it when you return to the United States, without forcing you to have an international cell phone plan while you are away. When you return to the U.S. you can easily port your cell phone number out of Google Voice and back into a cellular plan.
To port your number, type in “Google Voice” in … GOOGLE … and go to the main page. It’s easiest if you already have a Google account so, make sure you are signed in with YOUR google account (and not anybody else’s! – You may need to create a google account if you do not have one already), and click “Settings” on the right hand side (looks like a bolt). Under “Phones” click “Get a Google Voice Number” and then “I Want to Use My Mobile Number.” Follow the steps in place to port your number to Google Voice.
Number porting takes about three days and when it has completed you will receive a confirmation email. At this time your contract with your previous cell phone carrier will be cancelled and you should not be charged unless you are canceling before your contract is up (make sure you double check when your contract ends!). You will not need to contact your carrier, Google Voice will cancel for you.
You’ll want to let people know that you may not be able to make/receive calls or texts for the next couple of days. Unfortunately this part is a bit of a pain in the rear end.
WARNING: DO THIS FIRST STEP IN THE UNITED STATES. I didn’t and it literally took me an entire day to figure out how to make it happen. You can sign up for Google Voice in the United States ONLY. This is not advertised – so I didn’t know. And I wasted an entire beautiful day in Thailand smashing my head against my computer as a result (“WHY won’t this work??? WHYYYYY?????!!!! AGHHHHHHH!!!!!!”). The whole registry process can only be done from a device in the United States. I couldn’t get it to work from Thailand so I eventually just wondered what would happen if I asked my dad to check it out in the states. I was able to get it to work by having him log in as me in the states and sign up as me while we were communicating over the phone. I gave him my card number to pay the 20 bucks and after I was signed up … THEN I could finally log in. You CAN do it this way, I just extremely recommend doing it in the States first.
Now, because Google Voice is not a service provider (merely a way of forwarding calls), you will need to set up a service that will work alongside Google Voice. This is where Skype comes in.
#2. Buy a Skype Phone Number
Damage - $5.40/month – usually charged all at once for a year – you can usually get a discount if you purchase a subscription – next step – at the same time.
First of all, you should understand that Skype has a free service (where you can make calls/video calls from one computer to another computer over the internet) but this means you can only call someone else when that person is online. Skype also has other paid services that offer more options – like being able to call landlines and mobile phones from Skype. Buying a Skype phone number has been very handy for me personally, because I have a ton of bills back in the states and it makes calling brick and mortar companies / banks / etc. possible whereas simply calling through Skype’s free service renders this impossible.
So now you’ll need to purchase a skype phone number. This will be a completely different phone number than your own that will only be used for forwarding purposes. Nobody will need to know this number. You can purchase a number with any area code for any area that you’d like. The reason you have to get this number is so that when someone calls your actual phone number, Google Voice will forward the call to this number and you will actually receive the calls via Skype. This is a little bit confusing, I know, but just think of Google Voice as a way of directing the phone calls, and Skype as a way of making and receiving them.
#3. Buy a Skype Subscription.
Damage - $2.40/month for 120 minutes of talk time, or more for additional talk time – $8.04/month for unlimited talk time.
You will need to purchase a Skype subscription so that you can call any mobile or landline in the United States. This is not to be confused with the free Skype service (only for computer to computer calls). If you do not purchase the subscription you will not be able to call mobiles and landlines, you will only be able to call others who are currently online on Skype on their computer.
#4. Add Skype Phone Number to Google Voice.
Go into your google voice account and click “Settings” (right hand corner, looks like a bolt). Under “Phones,” click “Add Another Phone” and type in the phone number that you purchased from Skype. Now when someone calls the U.S. phone number that you ported into Google Voice, it will work like this:
a. Mort calls your original phone number.
b. Call is forwarded by Google Voice to your Skype # (without Mort’s knowledge).
c. Skype app rings on your phone.
d. Call is answered (if call is not answered you will receive an email from Google Voice saying that you had a missed call from Mort, and if he leaves a voicemail it will be transcribed).
#5. Set caller I.D. on Your Skype Phone Number.
This means that you’re making it so that when you call a phone from Skype, it will show up as your original U.S. phone number rather than the Skype number that you’re actually calling from (It’s a swell trick!). To set your caller ID on Skype sign into your Skype account on your computer. Under “Manage Features” click on “Caller ID.” Where it says “Display this number when I call mobiles and landlines from Skype,” make sure the green box is checked and then click “Edit.” Then type in your original U.S. phone number so that when you call a phone number from Skype, it will look like your original number is calling.
#6. Download Skype & Google Voice Apps on Your Phone
Having the apps on your phone will allow you to make calls and text from your smart phone while abroad when you have wifi.
Use Skype App: to make and receive phone calls (via wi-fi)
Use Google Voice App: to send and receive texts and read/listen to voicemails via wi-fi. If you have an iPhone you will still receive iMessages in iMessage, you will only receive texts in Google Voice if they are regular text messages (i.e. NOT from another iPhone). The only thing you’ll need to do to ensure you’ll still receive texts in iMessage is go into Settings – Messages – Send & Receive. Then make sure that you’re original U.S. number (with the 1 in front) is listed as one of the numbers you can be reached at.
That’s it! Now you know how you can inexpensively communicate with the United States and keep your phone number! Yeah! You made it! Pop open a bottle of champagne or something, I don’t know…
Total Damage:
Skype phone number: $5.40/month = $64.80/year
Port # to Google Voice: $20 (one time)
Skype subscription: $2.40/month = $28.80/year
Total averaged out over one year: $9.40/month
(Price may vary but not too much)