Do the current Google Voice applications for the iPhone and Android smartphones use up your wireless minutes? Yes, they certainly do, and there are only a few ways to get around that, all of which are complicated for the average consumer. While there are several applications that will allow you to use Google Voice on your smartphone, whether you're calling out, or receiving a call, your wireless minutes are being used.
Google Voice is a call back service, not a VoIP service. This means, when you call out, your application is calling a Google number via your voice plan and using your minutes. You could put the number Google uses to call their server in your "Faves" list, but rumors are, the number used to call out can change, and frequently does. Likewise, if you have Google Voice set up to forward to your cell phone, it will use your wireless minutes for the incoming call. The only money saving advantage of using Google Voice on your cell phone is if you'd like to make an international call, where you can utilize Google's low cost rates to place those calls, and Google does have some good international rates.
Many Google Voice users will set up their account to call their cell phone, allowing them to give out their Google Voice number instead of their cell number. Doing this allows the user to take advantage of the many features Google Voice offers, such as call screening, voice mail to email with text transcription (which still needs a bit of work), and simultaneous ringing of several different phones. Again, when using this service in this way, you are using your wireless voice minutes to receive a call.
So what can you do to make and receive Google Voice calls and NOT use your wireless minutes? Essentially, there is NO way to make outgoing calls for free. For free incoming calls,the best application for the iPhone is the Acrobits Softphone. It has built in Google Voice settings you can use with a free Sipgate One incoming phone number. Here is a video tutorial showing how this works. You'll spend a little bit of time setting everything up, but it's not terribly difficult. This allows for free incoming calls only. You could use Sipgate for the outgoing calls, but they do charge by the minute for an outgoing call.
There are other complicated methods that use SIP applications on your smartphone in conjunction with free online accounts such as Sip Sorcery, PBXes, and others, but these are very complicated processes to put in place for most folks. In the past, one of the more popular ways of interfacing Google voice was to get a Gizmo5 account, as it directly tied in with the service. Unfortunately, Gizmo5 was purchased by Google and no longer accepts new accounts. You can still find Gizmo5 accounts on eBay and this is a very viable option if you're inclined to pursue it. You can get free outgoing calls using a Gizmo5 account, however, each call is limited to 3 minutes.
If you're an Android user, there is no app currently available that will allow you to make and receive free Google Voice calls. Acrobits is beta testing an Android app at the time of this writing, so hopefully, it won't be too much longer. You can still get apps that allow you to use Google Voice and take advantage of the features, but they will use your wireless minutes.
The good news is, AusTex VoIP has a method of using Google Voice so that both incoming and outgoing mobile calls are free, while allowing use of a standard telephone at the house to also make and receive free calls. By utilizing a Seagate Freeagent Dockstar network adapter and a Linksys analog telephone adapter, we are able to make this work so calls from your home or mobile phone are free. Just like any other telephone service, you dial your party's number in a normal manner. No special dialing is required.
The DockStar is a Network Adapter normally used to create a server for accessing external USB hard drives. The external drives are used as file servers and media servers in many cases. We've taken this adapter, and modified it so that it will boot from a USB flash drive. That flash drive has a Debian Linux operating system, Asterisk telephony software, and a Python script call Pygooglevoice installed on it. All these work together to interface with your home and mobile phones and allow seamless incoming and outgoing Google Voice calls for free.
Because your phones (mobile and home) are set up as extensions on this system, calling between them is as simple as dialing a three digit number. This process does not use Google Voice. They are direct calls using the internet or 3G data. No wireless voice minutes are ever used with this system, whether for outoing, or incoming calling.
Although, very little set up is required on the customer side, this system does require a Google Voice account telephone number that can be assigned to the server. If you are already using one for you cellphone, or to make calls from your computer, this will work fine. It can easily be set up to work with this package. You will also need a free Sipgate One incoming telephone number to use as a callback number and a SIP application such as Acrobits Softphone for your mobile phone.
Outside of that, AusTex VoIP works with you by phone to set it up so that when you receive it, you simply plug in the Dockstar and Linksys to your local network with broadband internet access, power it up, and start making phone calls. Once past the initial set up, there is no other maintenance required. Just set it and forget it. You'll find the implementation time well worth it when you can reduce or eliminate your landline bill, and greatly reduce your wireless minute plan. Give us a call at (512) 600-0990 or Toll Free at (855) 4AusTex (428-7849) to get started.
