Don’t Queue for Petrol, Get Audio Conferencing!

Posted on March 29, 2012 by Dan

In this day and age having no petrol and petrol strikes is still an extremely worrying circumstance for many people, especially for business travel. However you shouldn’t have to worry about these events if you looked into alternatives for your business. Audio conferencing is a great solution for this as it’s been available for years and is an excellent solution for companies looking to save on travel costs, help reduce carbon footprint and you never have to worry about running out of petrol!

Audio Conferencing might have been mentioned to you previously, but let’s look at the facts to why it is recommended, compared to you having to travel to meeting:

  • - Available 365 days of the year, in the event of short notice you don’t have to queue at a petrol station, you can just pick up the phone.
  • - Free to set up, unlike travelling to a meeting and stopping in a hotel.
  • - No Monthly Costs, unlike new tyres and servicing to your car.
  • - All you pay for is the call itself which would work out more cost effective than petrol!

There are no hidden costs, it’s a great service that allows you more time to do what you need to instead of travelling to and from meetings. All you need to do is send over your details via this form and we’ll send you a Pin number back, easy.

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0800 Number to Mobile

Posted on January 20, 2012 by Dan

0800 Numbers to mobile phones.

Having a 0800 number gives any kind of company legitimacy. Therefore if you advertise a 0800 number your company (however small) will be made to look larger than it actually is.

A common trend that we have noticed is smaller one man bands taking a 0800 number and pointing it to a mobile phone. This makes the small business look larger than what they are and much more professional. I mean who do you know that calls a tradesman with a mobile phone number in their advert?

Having a 0800 number pointing to a mobile phone also means that you can take your calls wherever you are. You could be on site doing a quote and still take the call that you would normally have missed. You never know that missed call could be the next big deal!

If you are a smaller business and want to have a 0800 number going to your mobile then you can either click on the above link or contact us to discuss how this works. Setting up a number is easy, quick and will not cost a fortune. One of the best elements to this service is that the 0800 number to mobile is on a 30 day rolling agreement.

Please, don’t waste money advertising your company with a mobile number put a 0800 number in the ad and answer the call on the move!

One final point – if you don’t want an 0800 number and think that a landline number would work better as it makes you look local, then talk to us about our UK landline numbers to mobile.

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The Olympics Phone Number 0845 2012 2012

Posted on November 21, 2011 by Dan

The Olympics will be here sooner than you think! Next month it’s Christmas, then New Year and before you know it the Olympic torch will be running the length of the country!

You may have already seen the BT adverts with their Olympic number which is 0800 2012 2012? Have a look at the advert here if you are interested – BT Advert

These phone numbers are very rare and there is only one number in each number range (i.e 0800, 0845, 0333). We are proud to announce that we have secured the below phone number which is now for sale:-

0845 2012 2012

This 0845 number is perfect for next summers global event and is ready for any business to connect.

We are selling this number for a one off fee of £2000 + a monthly rental of £5 and calls received to the number are free (if we point the number to a UK land line).

Please contact us if you are interested in buying this Olympic phone number for your business.

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Finding UK local numbers

Posted on November 7, 2011 by Dan

We are constantly looking to improve on our site features and help our customers have a more fluid method in finding what they want and order easily. Some of the features in the past have been our simple main menu on the front page and our live chat, these have helped users of our site navigate easily and get all their questions asked efficiently.

Search for a UK local number easily

We have just updated our search function on the UK Virtual Number page. This search has been developed to improve our users interaction, giving them the ability to simply type in either the STD Code (e.g 0161) or the area name (e.g Manch or Manchester) and having the search function display all possible results for that phrase.

This has made finding a UK local number extremely easy, considering we offer over 400 UK numbers available for purchase. So check out the search function and see how easy it really is.

UK local number

Local Number search making life easy!

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Verizon Business give notice to some resellers

Posted on November 4, 2011 by Dan

Sometimes we feel like a dog sitting at the table waiting for scraps to be thrown off onto the floor. If you think about this, dog’s make a good living off these scraps and sometimes the scraps can be big chunks of meat!

Yesterday we learnt that Verizon were having a spring clean (in Autumn) of some of their lower spending accounts. The letter states that they are streamlining their wholesale channel and they are giving 3 months notice to some of their customers. We only know about this because one of their customers has requested to move all of their International Toll Free numbers from them to us.

If you are effected by this account clear out and need to keep your toll free numbers in service please call us on 08453 666 555 and speak to Craig or Rav. We will be able to migrate or port your numbers so that they remain in service.

Don’t panic 3 months is enough time to get your numbers moved across.

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Dialling local phone numbers in the future

Posted on September 8, 2011 by Dan

Ofcom today anounced that certain STD codes will have to dial the full phone number even if they are in the same STD. Bournemouth will be the 1st location where you will have to diall the full number (Bournemouth STD code is 01202).

So if you are currently in Bournemouth and dial 556677 for Bournemouth Taxis you will have to dial 01202 556677. Brighton will be the 1st to introduce this change with Brighton and Hove, Aberdeen, Milton Keynes, Cambridge and Bradford by also joining during 2016.

Imagine how long it would take you to phone someone in the future if you still had an old rotary phone!

Another impact of the change is that suppliers of UK Phone Numbers like us will have an additional cost of 10p per number per year to swallow for numbers that we have in stock. This change will discourage telcos from holding stock of thousands of numbers that are not connected.

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Phone scam alert

Posted on June 30, 2011 by Dan

We have been alerted to a phone scam currently going around that we thought we would pass on to our followers to warn others about. Simply link Our URL from the address bar or re-tweet our Twitter/Facebook post. The more people that know about this the less likely it is to work.

What is the scam?

It involves getting a call from BT customer service’s (it isn’t them) asking for a demand in payment of your bill. Now this is initially quite a common scam, but it takes a twist in the fact that the caller is willing to provide proof of their BT credentials by ‘apparently’ disconnecting your phone.

The caller will ask you to try dialling out after you hang up your phone to them and tell you that you will not be able to as they will disconnect you. You try dialling out and are unable to, and after trying you will get a call back. The caller will call back telling you that you are re-connected and you should now pay your bill promptly. The scam is all about getting your card details and not the money.

How can they disconnect me?

What is in fact happening is the caller is not hanging up when you hang up. They will instead mute their call and stay on the line listening to you attempting to dial out, which of course you cannot do as you have reconnected back to the original call that is now muted.

This works by the fact that the caller has to hang up their call to terminate your existing call with them, if they don’t hang up you just end up reconnecting back to them. You are then not able to dial out, resulting in what appears to be a disconnected line, if you have been told that’s what it is.

We have had several reports of this, all with BT’s name being used as the caller. However there is no reason why they won’t use another carriers name.

Double check

Please note that if the caller gives you an 0800 number to call back, then double check that number on-line via the carriers website and dial the number from their website instead. Get names and ask them to give you your details instead of you giving them any details.

BE careful out there!

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What are 0845 numbers

Posted on June 22, 2011 by Dan

We get asked this question every day of the week! So rather than repeating ourselves we thought we would write an article that would explain exactly what are 0845 numbers?

0845 is an incoming only phone number (also known in the industry as an ‘inbound’ number). Being inbound establishes that you would not be able to make outbound calls from your 0845 number at all, however you can inform your landline provider that you have an 0845 number and ask them to present the number as your dialled number (CLI Presentation – the number you are calling from).

0845 number benefits

Most UK companies use 0845 numbers for two very specific reasons:-

  1. They want to disguise their geographic location. 0845 is not based in any location in the UK (that is why they are called Non Geographic). So when someone calls the 0845 number they will not know where they are calling. This is a positive because some companies operate on a national basis and don’t want to appear local (if on the other hand you want to appear local, you should look at our virtual UK landline numbers).
  2. They want to keep their number forever. An 0845 number is routable to any phone number worldwide. So for example if you are a company based in London and you move to Glasgow (i know its a big move – but we’re just saying!) you can take the number with you. We have had examples where a company has moved to France and they have taken their 0845 number with them with no problems at all.

There are other reasons why companies buy 0845 numbers but these are the main two.

What is the cost to call an 0845 Number? Another daily question!

The cost to call 0845 numbers has reduced significantly over the years. If you are on a BT call plan you will generally find that the cost to call a 0845 is free (up to a certain amount of minutes per month). If you are not on a plan then the cost to call is about 3.5p per minute at all times. However, one of the negative points about 0845 numbers is the cost to call them from a mobile. Depending on your mobile provider it can cost between 5p and 25p per minute to call.

An important point

One final point that we think is important is that 0845 numbers are not guaranteed to be dial-able from overseas. So, if you are a company that have international customers please be careful about using an 0845 number. You may want to look at an alternative number range.

What are 0845 numbers through City Numbers?

We currently provide over 20,000 0845 numbers to companies across the UK and they are highly popular with our customers. If you are interested in purchasing an 0845 number or would like to know about the costs please feel free to click on the last link in this sentence.

Hope you like this article? If you do please re-tweet, +1 or ‘like’ in Facebook for us.

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City Numbers +1 and ‘Like’ Us

Posted on June 7, 2011 by Dan

We have recently deployed the Facebook ‘Like’ button and the NEW Google +1 button across our site. This gives you the ability to recommend us to your friends and contacts or approve a service that worked for you.

+1 and Like available throughout City Numbers

Google +1
Easy to use, you need to have a Google profile. Clicking the button will explain everything you need to know and if you have a Google account already you will be prompted to login. If you don’t have one, then simply register in that same window and come back and +1 our page.

Facebook Like
Simply click the Like button and login to your Facebook account. If you are already logged in then you it will provide you with a Comment box to say what you like and post onto your personal wall.

The Blog
Our Blog section already has these options available to you, so you can use those as you normally would, we have also implemented the Google +1 to theses posts, so feel free to use the +1 there as well.

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Cheap calls to India reduced to 1p a minute

Posted on May 23, 2011 by Dan

We are happy to announce that our cheap calls to India package has been made even cheaper. We have slashed our prices to call India landlines and India mobiles to just 1p per minute.

Using our cheap international call service is easy.  Just follow the easy 1-2-3 steps below:-

  • 1 – Dial 0844 720 2400 (this is charged at 1p per minute by your landline provider – calls from mobiles may be higher).
  • 2 – Wait for the voice to prompt you to dial the India Landline or India Mobile number then dial.
  • 3 – Connect to your friends and family in India and speak to them for just 1p per minute.

We have also slashed other countries to 1p per minute which we will blog about shortly.

We hope you enjoy our cheap calls to India service.

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