GrandCentral Communications has announced that they will offer unlimited inbound calling to its users for free. There will also be an enhanced, paid version of the service which should appear sometime early next year once the company has finished its’ beta testing period. In the meantime, the free version should work just fine for most people out there. The free service will provide you with a single GrandCentral phone number which you can then answer phone calls with from any of your phones. You’ll have access to voicemail, have control over inbound calls, and have access to other unique features.

Not familiar with GrandCentral? Here’s the basic premise: You get a unique phone number from GrandCentral and you give that number out to all of your contacts. You then take all of your existing phone numbers – whether they’re your work number, home landline number, cell phone… whatever, and then assign it to this account. Now when someone calls you on your GrandCentral phone number, you can answer the phone call from whatever phone you may be at. If you change cell phone providers or home phone providers – no problem! People still know you by your GrandCentral phone number.

You can even route specific phone calls to specific phones. Say it’s your significant other – well then you’d probably want all of your real phones to ring if he or she is calling (or maybe not!??!). If it’s work related, maybe the work phone should only ring. That’s all possible with GrandCentral.

The service also provides a single unified voicemail box for all of your incoming calls. You can access the voicemails over the phone, over email, or through the web.. very cool.

The service also provides caller ID services (even if you don’t have caller ID on your phone). There’s a feature called “ListenIn” which allows you to listen to a caller as they leave a voicemail message. You can then opt to talk to them while they’re leaving that message. Finally perhaps the best service of all – you can block unwanted callers – especially all those unsolicated cold callers out there.

GrandCentral began beta testing their service in September of this year and since then, over 500,000 calls have been logged nationwide – not too shabby! Some new features that have been added since then include:

  • Screening Options: GrandCentral now offers three screening options for new callers: 1) screen all unknown callers, 2) screen blocked callers only, or 3) turn screening off.
  • Enhanced Privacy Filters: Users have the option to either mark unwanted callers as SPAM and send all future calls directly to the SPAM voicemail folder or they can be blocked and the “this number is no longer in service” message will be played on all future calls from that caller.
  • Improved Address Book Importing/Exporting: Contacts can now be imported from Gmail, Yahoo, vCards, CSV files, Outlook or Outlook Express and can also be exported to vCards or CSV files.
  • Click2Call: Customers can return a call from their Inbox or call anyone in their Address Book with the click of a button using Click2Call.

Although not a “gadget” per se, GrandCentral has the potential to radically change how you go about using your phones. If they can manage to make money and stay in business, then the notion of having a single phone number for the rest of your life seems very cool indeed. The only complication would be people who only have a mobile phone. With the advent of number portability, you can in theory have your mobile phone number for the rest of your life – no matter what provider you use.

[Check it out]

 

GrandCentral to offer Unlimited Free Service and Expanded Feature Set

FREMONT, CA – November 29, 2006 — GrandCentral Communications, Inc.
(www.grandcentral.com) today announced that it will offer unlimited inbound calling to its users for Free. An enhanced, paid version of the service with additional features will also be available once the company completes its beta testing early next year. Both plans give customers a local GrandCentral telephone number that will allow them to answer all of their calls from any of their existing phones (cell, work, home, etc.), enable access to voicemail by phone, email, or online, and provide unprecedented control over inbound calls and other unique features.

“We’ve always planned to provide a free level of service to our customers and are happy to announce that there will be no artificial limits on the amount of calls received through a free GrandCentral account,” said Craig Walker, CEO of GrandCentral. “We’ve gotten tremendous feedback from our beta customers over the past few weeks and are extremely excited to see and hear how GrandCentral is changing the way people communicate. We’re also excited to announce a host of new features that have been requested.”

GrandCentral solves the mess of modern communications by giving customers one phone number that reaches them at any device they choose and gives unprecedented control over how calls are handled. With GrandCentral, customers can control which phones ring, which ring-back tones are played and which voicemail greetings are heard, all based on who is calling. GrandCentral customers can also ListenInâ„¢ on voicemail messages, record calls at the touch of a button and seamlessly switch calls between any of their phones. From now on, customers will never miss a call they want to take, or take a call they want to miss. The service works with all existing phones and service providers.

Beta testing began in September of this year and since then over 500,000 calls have been logged nationwide. In the last two months, GrandCentral solicited feedback from its beta customers and began implementing new features that give people even greater control over their phones.

Expanded features

  • Screening Options: GrandCentral now offers three screening options for new callers: 1) screen all unknown callers, 2) screen blocked callers only, or 3) turn screening off.
  • Enhanced Privacy Filters: Users have the option to either mark unwanted callers as SPAM and send all future calls directly to the SPAM voicemail folder or they can be blocked and the “this number is no longer in service” message will be played on all future calls from that caller.
  • Improved Address Book Importing/Exporting: Contacts can now be imported from Gmail, Yahoo, vCards, CSV files, Outlook or Outlook Express and can also be exported to vCards or CSV files.
  • Click2Call: Customers can return a call from their Inbox or call anyone in their Address Book with the click of a button using Click2Call.

About GrandCentral

GrandCentral Communications is a next-generation personal communications company. GrandCentral provides consumers with One Number…for Lifeâ„¢ by giving users one phone number that integrates all of the existing phones, numbers, and voicemail boxes into one. Users are given unprecedented control over how incoming calls are managed through a simple web-based interface. The company is privately held and based in Fremont, CA. For more information on GrandCentral, or to sign up for a free account, log onto www.grandcentral.com.

CONTACT:
Andrea Roesch or Kim Miller
Tier One Partners
510-366-4040
pr@grandcentral.com

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