Google Voice for Newbies: Why am I calling myself?

In our last post, Carol and I signed up for our Google Voice numbers, and read the Google Voice Getting Started Guide for information. Today, I'd like to share my first experience with the Google Voice website and the "Click to call" feature. After setting up my forwarding phones, I noticed the green arrow Call button at the top left of the homepage. Intuitively, I typed Carol's number into the "Call" box, but I was a bit confused when asked to choose a "phone to ring." I selected the existing option (which was my cell) and clicked Connect.

I wasn't expecting my cell phone to ring, but when it did, I picked up the call. After a few seconds of wondering, "Hold on, why am I calling myself?", Carol answered the line. I explained I was calling from my new Google Voice number, so she saved my new number in her address book. (If you use Gmail, you'll notice that your address book is shared across these products. This means you'll see all your Gmail contacts in Google Voice and any changes to your Google Voice contacts will be reflected in your other Google products.)

After hanging up, I realized I could choose which phone (cell, home, or desk) I wanted to use to connect to Carol. Pretty cool! Google Voice acts like a hub; you decide which phone you want to use each time you place a call, or you can check the "Remember my choice"** box to use the same phone anytime you place an outbound call from the web. When you click connect, Google Voice will ring that phone and dial out to your desired recipient. When I use the click to call feature, my Google number displays on the outbound caller ID. Now that I've done this a few times, it's not so surprising when my own phone rings when I place a call via the website.

A quick read on the different calling options for Google Voice can be found in the Google Voice Help article Google Voice Basics: Making Calls. And you can always post any other questions you may have in the Getting Started category of the Google Voice Help Forum.

Posted by Heather and Carol
Googlers

** The "Remember my choice" feature can be a bit confusing. After experimenting with it, I learned that the number selected is remembered by machine. For example, on my work laptop, I can choose my work phone as "Phone to ring", and select "Remember my choice". This means from now on, when I want to dial out via my work laptop, my work number will be selected to ring by default. If I go home and use my home desktop to dial out, I can select my home number as "Phone to ring", and select "Remember my choice". From now on, my home phone will ring when I dial out of my home desktop, and my work phone will ring if I dial out of my work laptop.