phone# just for texting and receiving messages

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jimnto
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phone# just for texting and receiving messages

Post by jimnto »

This began because I came across a phone number for a role playing game.

So..I want a phone number mostly for:
  1. Playing a message when people call (me telling a story of the day)
  2. Receiving phone messages
    and
  3. receiving text messages

And I would likely want to use my computer for all this.

Am I in the right place? Which service do I use and what is the actual cost?

I am in Toronto - thank you

Jim N
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Liptonbrisk
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Re: phone# just for texting and receiving messages

Post by Liptonbrisk »

jimnto wrote: 01/03/2026 This began because I came across a phone number for a role playing game.
Sounds fun!
Playing a message when people call (me telling a story of the day)
All Fongo calling services allow you to play a personalized voicemail greeting.

Receiving phone messages
All Fongo calling services allow receiving voicemails, and you can have them forwarded to your email address as audio files.
receiving text messages
That rules out Freephoneline.
And I would likely want to use my computer for all this.
That rules out Fongo Home Phone if you want to provide a customized voicemail greeting using a computer mic. Fongo Home Phone uses analogue phones or handsets.

You're left with Fongo Mobile, except it doesn't work natively with Windows. Fongo Mobile works on iOS, MacOS, Android, and ChromeOS devices.

However, when running Fongo Mobile on a smartphone, Windows 11's Phone Link app does show incoming text messages to my Fongo Mobile number on a smartphone.

Fongo Mobile voicemail can be handled from a computer indirectly by enabling voicemail-to-email in your Fongo Mobile account dashboard (so the audio arrives in email): https://www.fongo.com/services/fongo-mo ... voicemail/.

It's free to receive SMS texts to Fongo Mobile numbers. However, to send text messages to non-Fongo phone numbers, a paid texting add-on is required: https://www.fongo.com/services/fongo-mo ... g-add-ons/.


Those particular features are free to use with Fongo Mobile (except for sending SMS to non-Fongo numbers).

It's free to test Fongo Mobile to see whether its features provide what you want: https://www.fongo.com/services/fongo-mobile/.

Fongo Works Pro may interest you as well, but it's not free. Fongo Works (non-Pro version) does offer some free features: https://www.fongo.com/services/fongo-works/.
For more information about Fongo Works, and if you want official responses, contact Fongo: https://support.fongo.com/hc/requests/new
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These are user-to-user support forums. Fongo Support staff is not obligated to respond here, and there's no guarantee forum posts are read by staff.

Also, none of the volunteer moderators here work for Fongo. We don't have access to your account(s).

If you would like an official response, you can submit a ticket here:
https://support.fongo.com/hc/requests/new.

Visit https://status.fongo.com/.
If "Support System" indicates "Partial Outage", ticket response time can take up to a week (or longer).


You can check your ticket status by logging in at
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(zendesk) only and is completely separate from your Fongo Mobile account or any other Fongo account you may have. If you don't have a zendesk account yet, click "Sign Up" after visiting the link.
Use the same email address that you use to submit tickets. Do not use the same password as your Fongo Mobile
account. Again, these accounts are all unrelated.

Support staff does not respond to tickets on weekends or Canadian holidays.
Support hours are 9 a.m. until 4 p.m. EST. They are not obligated to respond
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Fongo does have https://twitter.com/Fongo_Support. I'm not sure if anyone
there responds to direct messages.
Similarly, they appear to be on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/FongoMobile/. I don't know whether they'll respond to you there.
Please do not send me emails; I do not work for nor represent Freephoneline or Fongo. Post questions on the forums so that others may learn from responses or assist you. Thank you. If you have an issue with your account or have a billing issue, submit a ticket here: https://support.fongo.com/hc/requests/new. Visit http://status.fongo.com/ to check FPL/Fongo service status. Freephoneline setup guides can be found at http://forum.fongo.com/viewforum.php?f=15.