GEO Number for use to receive calls on VOIP

Johnboy1951

I have been asked by a friend about this service, so decided to ask here if anyone had used them

http://www.flynumber.com/virtual-phone-number/ireland

Seems a reasonable price for a local number ....... but is there a catch?

Mr. G

It would appear they are based outside Ireland, most likely in the US. You would be calling through the US back home which may add latency and call quality issues. The chances are high that they are being resold several times before they reach the consumer.

Goldfish do it for €3 which is just a bit extra but for the sake of good support and dealing with an Irish company I would pay that few cents extra.

Just my 2c

Johnboy1951

Mr. G wrote: »

It would appear they are based outside Ireland, most likely in the US. You would be calling through the US back home which may add latency and call quality issues. The chances are high that they are being resold several times before they reach the consumer.

Goldfish do it for €3 which is just a bit extra but for the sake of good support and dealing with an Irish company I would pay that few cents extra.

Just my 2c

Thanks ..... much as I thought myself ....... but my friend is not in Ireland (nor Irish) ...... presently living in Sweden so the same concerns would apply ....... latency etc ...

I think he will go for it, at least on a trial basis as he has not found any reasonable alternative it seems.

Maybe I should look around ......

Johnboy1951

On thinking about this I wonder if the factor of latency or call quality is pertinent at all ......

The caller calls a landline number and that is directed to the selected VOIP account ......... all the communication data should flow only through the account provider and not through the relay (landline number) provider ........ and thus there would be no/little impact regardless the location of the number provider.

Would this not be so?

Mr. G

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Thanks ..... much as I thought myself ....... but my friend is not in Ireland (nor Irish) ...... presently living in Sweden so the same concerns would apply ....... latency etc ...

I think he will go for it, at least on a trial basis as he has not found any reasonable alternative it seems.

Maybe I should look around ......

Just so you know, it is against Comreg regulations to allocate a Geographic number outside that MNA. Therefore, someone in Sweeden isn't permitted to use an Irish Geographic number.

Convention 11.2.1.7 of the ComReg Document 08/02, 2008 (“the Numbering Conventions”) states that:
“A geographic number may only be allocated to an entity whose address, as registered with ComReg or its network operator, is within the designated geographic numbering area for that number. This means that, for PSTN purposes, calls to the number concerned must be fully terminated to the end-user within that geographic area unless they clearly exit the fixed network PSTN within the area (i.e. logical termination on a gateway to some other network).”

Decision No.3 of ComReg Document 04/103, 2004 states that:
“(..) Irish geographic numbers shall not be allocated to end-users or termination nodes located outside the MNA [Minimum Numbering Area].”

http://www.comreg.ie/_fileupload/File/312_Case_Summary%5B1%5D.pdf

As a solution, one can use a non-Geographic number, such as an 076 number.

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

On thinking about this I wonder if the factor of latency or call quality is pertinent at all ......

The caller calls a landline number and that is directed to the selected VOIP account ......... all the communication data should flow only through the account provider and not through the relay (landline number) provider ........ and thus there would be no/little impact regardless the location of the number provider.

Would this not be so?

Well not really.

If you make a call to a friend who is with the same VoIP provider (e.g. Blueface), the call goes through 1 datacentre. The amount of "hops" the call makes is less than to another provider.

If you make a call to a friend from the PSTN with a provider outside Ireland, the call is put through the Irish PSTN, connected with the wholesale carrier (e.g. Cable & Wireless) in a data centre, transferred to another reseller, and possibly another. The call is then terminated with the end user. There is a lot more hops. The likelihood is that the provider is reselling numbers from another reseller (this also adds to tracing down issues should they arise).

Then you have to take into account the hops between the provider's servers and the end user.

Maybe I'm being biased, but personally if I wanted a phone service that was reliable and did not have latency issues I would choose an Irish provider.

Hope this helps.

Johnboy1951

Mr. G wrote: »

Just so you know, it is against Comreg regulations to allocate a Geographic number outside that MNA. Therefore, someone in Sweeden isn't permitted to use an Irish Geographic number.



As a solution, one can use a non-Geographic number, such as an 076 number.



Well not really.

If you make a call to a friend who is with the same VoIP provider (e.g. Blueface), the call goes through 1 datacentre. The amount of "hops" the call makes is less than to another provider.

If you make a call to a friend from the PSTN with a provider outside Ireland, the call is put through the Irish PSTN, connected with the wholesale carrier (e.g. Cable & Wireless) in a data centre, transferred to another reseller, and possibly another. The call is then terminated with the end user. There is a lot more hops. The likelihood is that the provider is reselling numbers from another reseller (this also adds to tracing down issues should they arise).

Then you have to take into account the hops between the provider's servers and the end user.

Maybe I'm being biased, but personally if I wanted a phone service that was reliable and did not have latency issues I would choose an Irish provider.

Hope this helps.

Sorry if I failed to make this clear ......... he is getting the number only from one provider and using another provider's service for the calls.

So, he uses one of the Betamax providers for the calls, but if someone rings his new landline number that call is passed to the Betamax provider for the connection.

That is why I wondered about the data flow ........ it is unlikely to go through Flynumber is it not?

Thanks for the comments

Mr. G

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Sorry if I failed to make this clear ......... he is getting the number only from one provider and using another provider's service for the calls.

So, he uses one of the Betamax providers for the calls, but if someone rings his new landline number that call is passed to the Betamax provider for the connection.

That is why I wondered about the data flow ........ it is unlikely to go through Flynumber is it not?

Thanks for the comments

No prob.


If you're forwarding the number to a SIP URL, then the call will go through Flynumber and then to the Betamax reseller. There will probably be a slight delay in this case regardless of whom you go with. If it's a Betamax provider, the delay would be slightly longer I'd say

Johnboy1951

Mr. G wrote: »

No prob.


If you're forwarding the number to a SIP URL, then the call will go through Flynumber and then to the Betamax reseller. There will probably be a slight delay in this case regardless of whom you go with. If it's a Betamax provider, the delay would be slightly longer I'd say

I see ...... I thought Flynumber would just 'hand off' the connection to the SIP provider and take no more part in the data flow.
I envisaged a slight delay in initial connection but no extra deal (other than caused by the routing by the SIP provider) caused by Flynumber.

Thanks for the clarification.

Johnboy1951

An update to this ..... my friend is resident in Sweden and got a Swedish number from flynumber.

He reports excellent results with calls in to his 'number' and is using a headset and Linphone to receive (and make) the VOIP calls.

He is a happy chappy at the moment.