FreedomMobile DID to Fongo and Back plus SMS

[AlexTO]

Hi there!

Need to move to Europe for some time whilst maintaining foothold in Canada.
Don't want to carry 2 phones nor pay outrageous roaming costs for voice and text.

Questions:
Can I port my FreedomMobile DID to Fongo and have it work on the Fongo App on my Phone in Europe ?
When I come back permanently can I port the DID back to Freedom or other mobile provider -OR- if I get a new mobile in Canada can my original number keep working on the Fongo App?
Will the app be able to send and receive SMS (e.g. for 2FA) ?
Will I receive calls from Canada, US worldwide and they will ring on the App ?
Can I make phone calls to Canada for free?
Can the app receive or call Canadian government 8xx numbers and services (e.g. CRA) what DID will it show to them ?

What exactly would I need to purchase and what would be the steps to move forward.
For example, can I do all this in the next 2 weeks whilst still in Canada and my Canadian DID would still work as usual in the app on WiFi before I leave?

TIA!!

--
Alex

[Liptonbrisk]

Can I port my FreedomMobile DID to Fongo

If your number is eligible, then yes: visit https://www.fongo.com/services/fongo-mo ... n=getfongo to check.

and have it work on the Fongo App on my Phone in Europe ?

Fongo Mobile's servers are located in Southern Ontario and use SIP Protocol. Can Fongo Mobile work in Europe? Yes. Will it work well? That depends on pings and jitter from the ISP/cellular data provider used in Europe to Fongo Mobile's servers in Ontario.

From the location in Europe, test pings and jitter (you want little to no variation between pings) to 208.85.216.36.
For jitter, ping, and traceroutes, test to 208.85.216.36


There are smartphone apps, such as Net Analyzer, that allow users to run ping tests to IPs, which may be a better idea to try than winMTR since you'd be using a smartphone.

From a PC, you can use winMTR: https://sourceforge.net/projects/winmtr/. Ping about 200 times to each server.


If you're using a Macintosh, maybe this helps: https://www.reddit.com/r/TagPro/comment ... tr_on_mac/

When using WinMTR, look at the very last hop or line. Look at your average ping and then maximum ping. Although WINMTR doesn't provide a jitter value, you can get an idea of what yours is by subtracting maximum ping from your average. Jitter is the difference between each successive ping. The bigger the difference, the bigger the problem.

Same with ping, which represents lag or delay. The lower your ping and jitter, the better.

You do not want high pings and lots of jitter (you do not want a lot of variation between each ping). If you get horrible results (pings over 200ms), to any server, you probably don’t want to use that server. So you would want to give that server the lowest priority.

What follows below is with respect to Freephoneline, but the same concepts apply to Fongo Mobile.

"I get between 11 (voip.freephoneline.ca and voip2.freephoneline.ca) and 24ms (voip4.freephonline.ca) on average, depending on the server I'm testing to. Preferably, you want pings below 100ms.
Anything over 200ms is unacceptable.
What you don't want to see is 40, 45, 50, 35, 500, 40, 30, 45, 700. That's bad jitter.
You want relatively consistent pings without a lot of variation.

One reason why jitter can occur is due to other devices on your LAN (local area network) using bandwidth. That’s why properly enabling QoS in your router for your ATA (or smartphone, in this case) is always a good idea.

Bad jitter can produce broken-up audio or choppiness during phone calls. Severe jitter (or large ping spikes) can cause calls to drop (and incoming calls won’t arrive while the ping spike is occurring). Ping affects delay.

I recommend testing pings/jitter between 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. to see if local congestion is a factor (this often is your ISP's fault). Sundays are the best days to test (because that's when most people in your area will be home). 8 p.m. - 11 p.m. is prime time. During prime time (between 8 p.m. and 11 p.m.) cable internet nodes may be oversubscribed in your area and face congestion issues (and congestion can also exist with DSL). So I suggest testing services between 8 p.m. and 11 p.m., particularly on Sundays, when everyone in your area will be home.

Ping is a measurement of data packet transmission, and ping does affect delay or lag. All gamers know, almost inherently, that lag affects them negatively. A PC gamer will pound his or her keyboard in hope that a character will respond on his or her monitor, quickly, but when there's a delay or lag, reality doesn't meet expectation. A gamer can see this problem visually. Over VoIP, anything over 200-210 ms, you will typically start to encounter crosstalk due to increased delay, even if the untrained ear doesn't notice. All VoIP services are subject to the same scientific principles including the fact that speed of transmission affects delay, and Fongo Mobile is not some magical service that is somehow exempt from issues arising from high pings and jitter. When pings and, especially, jitter are high, it's a pretty horrible experience, just as it would be with any other VoIP service. When pings and jitter are fine, Fongo Mobile works well.

Lastly, anyone using any communication service (or even when playing online games or using other online services) should understand that the longer the path to the server being used, the greater the potential exists for a problem to occur somewhere along that path. Again Fongo Mobile's servers are located in Ontario."



Some people have had Fongo Mobile work well in Europe, but experiences differ and are anecdotal.

When I come back permanently can I port the DID back to Freedom or other mobile provider

Yes, visit: https://support.fongo.com/hc/en-us/arti ... -port-out-.

-OR- if I get a new mobile in Canada can my original number keep working on the Fongo App?

Yes. Fongo Mobile uses cellular data or Wi-Fi. It doesn't matter whether you get a new number as long as your smartphone has internet connectivity and internet service.

Will the app be able to send and receive SMS (e.g. for 2FA) ?

Receiving SMS is free. Sending SMS to non-Fongo Mobile numbers is not.

Visit https://support.fongo.com/hc/en-us/arti ... d-ons-SMS-

With respect to short codes and verification texts, visit https://support.fongo.com/hc/en-us/articles/212434926.

Will I receive calls from Canada, US worldwide and they will ring on the App ?

Can you? Yes. Will they? That depends (refer to pings/jitter above) on the reliability of your cellular data service or Wi-FI (ISP) when attempting to use Fongo Mobile's servers in Ontario from Europe.

Can I make phone calls to Canada for free?

To provinces, yes

Can the app receive or call Canadian government 8xx numbers and services (e.g. CRA)

Yes.

what DID will it show to them ?

Whatever number is provisioned in your Fongo Mobile app will appear on outbound CID (caller ID).
If you ported in a number into Fongo Mobile, then the ported number will appear.

What exactly would I need to purchase and what would be the steps to move forward.

Visit https://support.fongo.com/hc/en-us/arti ... e-port-in-

Especially visit https://www.fongo.com/services/fongo-mo ... n=getfongo.

Estimated transfer times can be found at https://support.fongo.com/hc/en-us/arti ... n=getfongo.

By the way, Fongo support staff is not obligated to post on these user-to-user support forums. If you require an official response, submit a ticket: https://support.fongo.com/hc/en-us/requests/new.

Good luck!

[AlexTO]

Wow! Thanks so much for taking the time to answer.

I tried the support ticket but AFAICT it required Fongo 11 digit number.

In any case, I think I have more than enough info to research a bit more and make the decision.

I actually run an Asterisk PBX and I buy/port DIDs from Vitelity. The one thing I dunno how to do is the SMS part. I contacted Vitelity and seems very complicated/regulated but apparently they can provision SMS on some of their DIDs, but I would have to set up the SMS part myself, and never done it before. So was thinking it's probably cheaper to pay a service like this and save me a lot of headaches I can't afford right now.

Thanks again for taking the time to answer me, and for such a detailed response.

Best,

--
Alex

[Liptonbrisk]

I tried the support ticket but AFAICT it required Fongo 11 digit number.

For what it's worth, it's free to get a Fongo Mobile number: take a look at the "Getting Started Is Easy" section from https://www.fongo.com/services/fongo-mobile/.
I appreciate you may not want to bother if you decide you don't want to use Fongo Mobile, but I just wanted to let you know there's no cost involved to obtain a number.

Thanks again for taking the time to answer me

You're very welcome!