A common Question that's always asked about GoogleVoice.
How? What? Where?
(Need to make a video when I have some time and patience explaining all the steps.)
But just read the post and I'm sure you'll be able understand. And of course if you can any Questions post away and I'm sure someone will answer or I will try to answer myself.
I'm traveling to Israel and I want to be able to make and receive phone calls, just like I would be able to do in america.( For all practical purposes I'm going to use Israel as my destination vs any other foreign country which would be the same steps.)
And that's all possible with Google Voice which is actually free!
The only thing you would pay for is a sim card in the country your going to visit, and I will explain why you should get a sim card from the country your visiting VS using your american carrier which has data in many other countries.
It's pretty straight forward once you get the hang of it and go through the steps once.
Reason why I would recommend to get a sim card from the country your visiting vs using your own;
Your data, the reception and quality of phone calls is two different levels, when your going to use your american carrier which will be roaming on Israeli networks, the Internet does not work well.
And especially for a google voice account when making calls if you don't have good service the calls will be quite choppy, I've tried it myself on T-mobile, Sprint, Verizon. All of those services are great but not when traveling abroad to Israel and relying on it to use for Google Voice.
I reccommend you set up your Google Voice account before you leave your home country.
The steps are as follows,
1- You need to make sure you have these three apps downloaded, yes three of them, which im not sure why, but if you want it to work properly and be able to make phone calls you should download all three.
(One) app called "Google Voice"
(Second) app called "Hangouts"
(Third) app called "Hangouts Dialer".
2- Now after downloading all three apps go into the google voice app and create a google voice number which you like, now in order for you to have downloaded the google apps it has to be you already have a Gmail account connected to the google play store which would mean in the google voice setting there would be at least one Gmail acount there to connect a GV number to.
And the reason why I'm mentioning this I will explain a bit later, as another option to make calls will require a 2nd Gmail account "without" a GV number.(Continue reading..)
3- "Settings in the phone". You will find this all in the "hangout app" on your device.
This is a very important step, if there's one small setting not correct then the whole google voice will not work properly or not ring at all.
a) There's an option "Notifications" make sure everything is allowed in the settings of the phone and app settings.
b) Next option will show your Google Voice number, make sure you have enabled the incoming calls option, (when I say enabled it should be marked in the green showing its on.)
Make sure messages is enabled as well.
And then a bunch of other options like GV sms and and voicemail, you can set them however you like and custamize the notification sounds.
c)Now on the "Google Voice" App there will be an option which says devices and numbers, that's where your number will ring when someone calls, whether it being a desktop or your phone or phones.
As well make sure the settings "making and receiving calls" is set to prefer wifi and mobile data Vs use carrier Only.
Then there's an option call forwarding, that will enable you to select which devices should ring and which not.
And you can set the option whether to hear callers name before or not, myslef I don't like people knowing it's GV so I diabled that, and email alerts and all the other little stuff you can play around and set to your hearts desire.
4- So You have your american number which we will label for all practical purposes 917-987-6543, Now you would go into the call settings or depending on the phone carrier will depend what options you have to set up call forwarding.
Now with "Tmobile" you can simply go into the phone icon and then go into the settings and set up call forwarding to the GV number you set up. Meaning if your google voice number would be 347-852-3698 then that number you would enter into the call forwarding options of your phone.
Each carrier being different your best option would be to google how to set up call forwarding for sprint, verizon, At&t.. or simply make a phone call to the carrier and have them manually set it up.
Now I'm telling you to do this while your still in the US and not once you leave. To elabverate I've been able to change the call forwarding on my T-mobile phone no problem on my own, but for a sprint plan it required me to call the carrier to have them manually set it up to forward to my GV number as I was not able to set it up as I was in a different country.
So to make life more simple just set this up before hand and all your calls will come into the google voice app which will ring just like your regular phone would. While your in the airport you can set this up, or randomly try to set call forwarding to the gv number to see if it works and you'll be familiar with this the next time you need to set this up.
5- Now You have your google voice phone ringing when someone tried to call your american phone and you can act as if your still in america.
But how can you make a call without the need to use my GV number which noone regonizes?
Also quite simple.
Number one you will need a 2nd Gmail account connected to your Google voice account, now like meantioned before "Do Not connect a Google Voice phone number" just create an account.
Now once your in the Google voice setting click on the Gmail account which has no Google Voice Number connected to it, and there should be an option to enable outbound caller ID, if you don't find it in the GV settings then go into the hangouts app and look In the settings there which should have an option for enableing Outbound caller ID.
Once enabled you will be able to make outgoing phone calls from that 2nd gmail account while using your american number, and you don't have to worry that your making a call abroad with your american phone number, you won't be charged anything as long as it's coming from the GV app and not from the actual phone.(Same idea as Wifi calling with T-mobile.)
6- Some people like forwarding the Gv number to their own cell phone and the texts coming into the gv number to their own, that's really easy to set up but not really helpful in this situation.
And of course if you actually learnt something and got your Google Voice rolling because of this post feel free to hit the like button.