Transfer your 800 number to a Canadian phone company
It’s pretty simple to transfer your toll free number to whatever phone company you want whether they’re in the US or Canada. Ask them for an 800 transfer form, the technical name is a Responsible Organization Change Form (you’re ultimately just changing the organization responsible for the toll free number, right?). It may be abbreviated as Resporg Form or Resporg Change Form, or some places may call it an LOA (short for Letter of Authorization, or agency).
All you need to do is fill their form out and fax it back to them with your Toll Free Birth Certificate™ (from page 2 of the toll free manual which we email you after activation). That’ll give them the information so they know where to send the calls and who to bill for it and then they’ll forward the request to us to release it. Most Canadian carriers generally take about a week or two to process them, although it’s not unusual for representatives to tell you it takes quite a bit longer just to give themselves plenty of extra time.
After it’s entered into their system, they’ll forward the request to us when they’re ready for us to release it to them. You don’t need to fax or send it to us because we can’t release it until the carrier requests it because unless they’re ready and it’s connected to your account, it won’t be set up and could be at risk of being given to someone else. If you have a question as to whether it’s been released the easiest way to check is just to drop us an email. That way we can check it and if necessary forward your request into the carrier if necessary. We make it a priority to release numbers much faster and more efficiently than anyone else.
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Ivette says:
April 14, 2008 at 11:18 pm
Love, love, love your site! I have a question that I have not found an answer for, yet many of your past clients seem to be informed on. I already have a 1-800 number with a very inexpensive US carrier that I would like to port to to a cheap Canadian carrier, My current carrier will not transfer calls to Canada, and my business is now on Canadian soil. So, cheap as the US carrier is (under $5.00 a month), it doesn’t serve me at all.
Ideally, I would like to have my 1-800 forwarded to a Skype Canada account with an answering system all in the name of economy. Do I have to have a Canadian carrier at all in order to port my number and forward the calls to Skype? And if I do…who is the least expensive Canadian company of them all?
Any light you can shed on this would be GREATLY appreciated.
Be well,
Ivette
Bill Quimby (197 comments.) says:
April 14, 2008 at 11:46 pm
Ivette,
Thanks for the nice comments. This is an easy question. Yes, you can certainly point a toll free number to any local number including a Skype number.
You can also use a US company to do it, although many regular carriers will require a US address, so you may have to use one of the enhanced voicemail services. They don’t really care where you’re located or require SSN’s. All you need is a credit card for some of them.
Using a Skype or vonage type number through your computer is one way to get international forwarding anywhere in the world with a good internet connection.
Bill
Ivette says:
April 15, 2008 at 5:49 pm
Thank for the quick reply. So how do businesses get the 1-800 number to show up with the skype flags next to them on html? That’s the last piece of my puzzle. LOL
Ivette
Bill Quimby (197 comments.) says:
April 16, 2008 at 1:05 am
I’m not that familiar with Skype but there must be some notification process or some profile or registration. If you find an answer to that let us know.
Bill