Setting Up the Built-In Phone
Agreements, 911 addresses, numbers (new or moved from your old company), callbacks and spam monitoring.
Before You Start
The built-in phone is an add-on. Dashboard → Phone → Setup shows whether it’s switched on for your agency; if not, click Ask TraceForge to switch it on and you’ll get an email when it is. You can sign the agreements in the meantime.
Everyone needs a computer with Chrome or Edge and a headset with a microphone.
The phone isn’t part of the free trial: it opens once your subscription is paid. Turning it on charges a one-time $299 phone setup fee up front. Cost after that, on your monthly TraceForge bill (paid in advance; numbers or people added mid-month are charged for the rest of that month right away): $25 per person with 2,500 minutes each (shared across the agency, about 2 hours of talk a day), $2 per regional number, $5 per toll-free number, $150 a month for spam-flag monitoring plus a per-number charge that depends on how often numbers are checked (25¢ monthly, 50¢ every 2 weeks, $1 weekly or $4 every weekday), and $3 per 911 office. Minutes over the allowance are $0.015 each. Billing shows this month so far.
The Steps
- Agreements: read and sign the Phone Service Terms and the 911 Notice (draw or type your signature).
- Office addresses for 911: add every place people call from, including anyone working from home, then pick each person’s office. A 911 call sends dispatchers to that address.
- Phone numbers: buy regional numbers on Phone → Numbers (Plan from my accounts suggests area codes), and use Bring numbers over to move your existing toll-free numbers.
- Callbacks to regional numbers: send them all to the shared voicemail box, or ring chosen people first.
- Spam-flag monitoring: register your business so your numbers are checked for “Scam Likely” labels.
- Turn the phone on. Then everyone signs in, allows the microphone, makes a test call and dials 933 once.
Moving Your Numbers In
Fill in the details exactly as your old phone company has them (business name, authorized person, account number, PIN and the service address), attach a bill from the last 30 days and sign. TraceForge builds the signed letter and sends it. Toll-free moves are sent no more than about two weeks before the switch date.
Don’t cancel anything with your old company. The move ends their service on those numbers by itself; cancel only after the numbers show up in TraceForge. If there’s a problem (for example a wrong PIN) the reason shows next to the move.
911
The 911 button on the phone bar calls 911 from your office’s 911 number, and your admins get an email saying who called and from where. If the dispatcher calls back within an hour, it rings the person who called.
Test (933) reads back the address on file without calling emergency services. Keep a cell phone or landline handy too: without internet or power, the browser phone can’t call 911.
The Phone Tab
Dashboard → Phone keeps everything in one place. Live shows the calls happening right now (who, which debtor, how long), who's online, ringing or on a call, and today's totals. People & extensions lists everyone's phone status, extension, numbers and today's calls; click Number everyone to hand out extensions. Call log has every call with filters by date, person, direction, result and number, and plays voicemails.
In the phone bar, type a number in the dial box and press Enter to call it; press Enter again to hang up. Typed numbers get the same calling-hours check, and the call is logged on the account that number belongs to.
Caller ID: Point Callers always show a local regional number for the debtor's area code or state. Closers and Admins with a toll-free number of their own get a Toll-free / Local switch on the phone bar (set who a number belongs to on Phone → Numbers).
Call recording: turn it on at the top of Phone → Call log (Off, On with a notice, or On). The whole conversation is recorded, including after a transfer, and plays back from the call log (Play call). Some states require everyone on a call to agree to recording; check the states you call, or use the notice option so callers hear “This call may be recorded.”
Transfer: on a call, click Transfer and pick a person. Their phone rings; when they answer the call is theirs. If nobody answers within 25 seconds, the caller comes back to you.
Listening in (admins): on Phone → Live, click Listen, Whisper or Barge next to a call. Your own phone bar picks up by itself. Listen: you hear both sides. Whisper: only your person hears you. Barge: everyone hears you. Switch any time, or click Stop.
Releasing Numbers
On Phone → Numbers, tick numbers and click Release to give them back to the phone company in one go (they stop costing anything). Numbers used for 911 are kept.