I recently was turned on to a new service called Grand Central . I've long been a fan of Follow-Me phone services, although in the companies I've worked in, the phone systems have never been able to do exactly that, follow me wherever I went.
But now, with Grand Central , I can get the Follow-Me functionality that I desired.
Essentially, here is what the service does:
Let's say that you work in an office. In this office, you have a phone. But when you aren't in the office, people leave voicemail for you.
Let's say that you don't work in the office all the time. Sometimes you work on the road with your mobile number. Sometimes you work at home, at yet another number.
With Grand Central, you have one number. You define your other numbers that you want Grand Central to try and contact you at, and when someone calls your Grand Central number, they say their name. Grand Central then simultaneously calls all the numbers that you've defined in the Grand Central control panel to try to locate you.
So let's say that customer Bob is trying to get ahold of me. He calls my Grand Central phone number. I'm not in the office, I'm at lunch but have my mobile phone with me. Grand Central rings my mobile phone, and my office phone simultaneously. I answer, and am told that Bob is calling, do I wish to accept the call, or send it to voicemail. If I accept the call, I answer the call as normal. If I chose to ignore the call, Bob leaves a message for me on Grand Central voicemail, which is then sent to me via an email.
Where this really starts to get interesting is this:
You can define timeslots where, for example, from 8-5, your home phone number isn't rung when someone calls the Grand Central number. You could also define it such that after 5pm, your mobile phone didn't ring.
It's a follow me service, but it's also a call screening service. Very handy. For now, it's free. Check it out at www.grandcentral.com .
