USA Call Forwarding to Guatemala

A few people have ask how I forward calls from my normal business number in the USA to a foreign country. Basically this is a three step process.

Step One: Google Voice (one time fee of $20)

The first step is to sell your telephone number to Google Voice. When you first sign up for Google Voice you are assigned a telephone number owned by Google. I later took my official business number of 720-421-7777 and sold it to Google. After that I went to my carrier in the USA (which is T-Mobile), and got a new mobile number. After both were functioning, I went into the Google configuration and forwarded all my calls from the Google Voice number to my new T-mobile number. Later I changed this number to forward to a Skype telephone number which is part of step number two. When I’m in the USA, I just forward my Google Voice number to my local mobile number.

Step Two: Skype Telephone Number with Forwarding 

Next I created a Skype account and paid for two additional upgrades. The first is for a Skype telephone number with some minutes on it. I use this number and account for my international calls from my remote country to telephones (mobile or land line) in the USA. I put $10 in my account and I’ve used about $8 of that over the last four months. It is very cheap! Next, I pay an additional fee for international call forwarding service. I set this up to forward to whatever local number I have while traveling.

Step Three: Buy a local SIM card for my GSM Phone (about $10)

Within a day or two of arriving in a foreign country, I buy a SIM card for my GSM phone. In the USA we typically have two kinds of phone. The most popular is the CDMA. GSM is popular in both Europe and Latin America. The big carriers in the USA with GSM are limited pretty much to T-mobile and AT&T. I have two mobile phones from T-Mobile, one is a cheap flip top type and the other is a low level Android phone, both of which are GSM based. So, all you have to do is make sure you get them unlocked by your carrier before leaving the USA. T-Mobile was very willing to unlock the phones because I had completed my contract and told them I would be traveling internationally. Once unlocked, you can just go to a kiosk or small mobile phone store in most airports of shopping malls of a foreign country and pay about $10 for a SIM card with about 100 minutes on it. You most likely need to recharge the card with minutes each month. You’ll get a new telephone number in your foreign country.

Putting it all together

So, to put it all together you’ll configure your Google Voice account (the USA number you want people to call) to forward to your Skype telephone number. Google Voice won’t forward outside the USA, so that’s why it takes the extra step. If you don’t care about keeping your own number, you can just use the Skype telephone number and skip this step. Next, configure your Skype number to forward to the number on your GSM phone in your foreign country. It is a bit strange to make so many jumps, but it works fantastic as I’m able to receive calls while walking around in Germany or Guatemala. If you miss a call, Google Voice will send you an email and attempt to transcribe the message so you don’t have to listen to it, or you can login to your Google Voice account online and play the message. If you are in the states, you can even have it transcribe messages and send them to you as SMS text messages (a very cool feature). Some day I hope Google Voice will allow international call forwarding, but for now this is a complex but nifty solution to receive calls while traveling without changing your local USA business number!