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Call forwarding

Keep your business number. Forward calls to your AI receptionist.

Customers keep dialing the number on your website, listings, and printed materials. Your phone provider forwards the calls, and InsertChat answers them.

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Call forwarding lets your existing business number send calls to InsertChat’s AI receptionist, so customers keep dialing the number they already know. In the US and Canada, you choose when calls forward, dial your provider’s code or change a portal setting, and InsertChat places a verification call to confirm that calls arrive.

How forwarding to InsertChat works

01

Enter your business number

In your assistant’s phone settings, choose Forward my existing number, enter it, and check compatibility. Confirm the provider you pay for phone service.

02

Forward to your routing number

Choose when calls forward, then follow your provider’s steps to send them to the private routing number InsertChat creates. Never publish that number.

03

Verify with a test call

InsertChat places a verification call. For unanswered-or-busy forwarding, let it ring without answering so your provider’s rule can forward it.

Forwarding steps by provider

Verizon call forwarding

Verizon Wireless, Verizon Business Digital Voice, Verizon One Talk

See the Verizon steps

Which calls should forward?

Forward all calls when the AI receptionist should answer every call. Forward unanswered or busy calls when your team picks up first and the assistant catches the rest. Forward after hours when your provider supports a schedule. InsertChat’s own call routing can also ring a team member’s mobile or direct line before the assistant answers.

Another provider

Available for numbers in the United States and Canada.

Forward all calls

  1. Ask your phone provider to forward all calls to your private routing number.
  2. Keep caller ID passthrough enabled when offered.

Forward unanswered or busy calls

  1. Ask your provider to forward unanswered and busy calls to your private routing number.
  2. Disable carrier voicemail or make its ring timeout longer than the forwarding timeout.

Forward calls after hours

  1. Create an after-hours routing rule that forwards to your private routing number.
  2. Keep the existing daytime route unchanged.

Turn forwarding off

Source: Another provider documentation, reviewed .

Call forwarding: common questions

Costs, providers, and removal

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The first active line is included with your InsertChat plan; additional lines are $10 per month plus voice minutes. Your phone provider may also count forwarded calls against your plan, so check your plan with them.

Choose Another provider during setup. Ask your provider to forward all calls, or unanswered and busy calls, to your private routing number, keep caller ID passthrough on when offered, and make carrier voicemail ring longer than the forwarding timeout.

Not at the moment. Keeping your number by forwarding works for US and Canadian numbers. Elsewhere, use a local or toll-free InsertChat number where one is available. Number porting is not offered.

Remove every forwarding rule that points to your private routing number using your provider’s removal steps, then run the removal check in InsertChat. The routing line is released when the test call no longer forwards.

Facts last reviewed .

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