Phone.com has become the latest VoIP provider to offer iNums to its customers. iNums are virtual numbers with their own country code, which is 883. Instead of going to subscribers in specific countries, however, the way calls beginning with 44 go to the U.K., calls to 883 numbers go to VoIP subscribers, regardless of where they are in the world. iNums let callers from around the world reach the subscribers for the cost of a local call. As such, iNums amount to global toll-free numbers.
Phone.com is providing iNums to customers of its "Virtual Office" hosted VoIP service for free. The Virtual Office service offers such features as IVR/auto attendant, call recording, dial-by-name and voice-mail-to-text transcription. Customers can use the iNums as their only incoming numbers, or in addition to their existing numbers.
Voxbone launched iNums commercially in November 2008, following a two-year preparation effort that included persuading the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) to approve the new country code. While currently callers in most places have to call local access numbers before dialing 883 numbers, Voxbone is working to convince carriers around the world to route 883 calls directly to the iNum network. Once they do, callers will be able to dial the numbers directly.
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