Phone Answering Service Blog

How Does Call Forwarding Work?

Written by Andrew Charles | April 09, 2024

Setting up call forwarding for the first time may appear intimidating, but fear not! Once you understand how it works, you'll find it surprisingly simple. So... how exactly does it work?

We know it can seem daunting or confusing to set up call forwarding on your own, but we’re going to show you how easy it really is. 

We’ve been helping our customers forward their calls for many years. And, we have many resources on how you can forward calls depending on your specific provider which we’ll get to in a second. So, we decided to write this blog to help you as you set up call forwarding on your device.

Then we’ll send you off with a resource on what are the types of call forwarding options available today.

So, in this blog we’re going to look at a few things:

  1. What is Call Forwarding?
  2. How Does Call Forwarding Work?
  3. Instructions For Forwarding Calls on Your Device

So, firstly, what exactly is call forwarding?

What is Call Forwarding?

Call forwarding is a feature on your phone line that redirects incoming phone calls to another phone.

This “destination” can be any phone number. It could be a landline, cellphone, voice mailbox, or a call center. 

If you’re already working with a call center or answering service, they’ll assign a unique telephone number for you to call forward to. In your answering service company’s software, that number is associated with your account. We recommend that you ask about your call centers process for call forwarding, so you have full clarity around how call forwarding works. 

How Does Call Forwarding Work?

We now know that if you turn on call forwarding, all your calls will be forwarded to the answering service. So, what does the complete flow of one call look like?

Let’s break it down step by step:

  1. You turn on call forwarding.
  2. A caller that calls into your business has their call forwarded to the answering service.
  3. At the call center, an agent receives the call. On their software, the information you have provided when you set up your answering service is displayed automatically.
  4. They take the call by following the script the call center agents have been trained with (list of questions/notices) you provided during setup then forward the information to your business.
  5. You turn off call forwarding (depending on what type of call forwarding you choose).
  6. You receive calls to your business like usual.

It’s that easy! But, there’s a few things you should know about call forwarding before you set it up, like what are the call forwarding options available today or instructions to set up call forwarding on your device.

Instructions For Forwarding Calls on Your Device

The ways you can forward calls on your iPhone or android are endless. It’s pretty much dependent on your mobile carrier or provider. That makes it tough for us to give an answer to the question “how do I forward calls on my iPhone?”. However, we’ve done research into the many mobile carriers out there and have created an extensive list on the ways you can forward calls on your iPhone or android depending on your provider.

So, here are call forwarding instructions to most of the major CLEC and VOIP telephone providers. If you don't see instructions for your phone company, contact us and we will update our list to include your provider along with instructions on how to call forward using it.

Aircall Call Forwarding

AT&T Call Forwarding

AT&T Wireless Call Forwarding

Cincinnati Bell Call Forwarding

Comcast Xfinity Call Forwarding

Consolidated Communications Call Forwarding

Cox Call Forwarding

Dialpad Call Forwarding

8x8 Call Forwarding

Frontier Call Forwarding

Google Fi Call Forwarding

Grasshopper Call Forwarding 

Intermedia Call Forwarding

GoToConnect Call Forwarding

Lumen (formerly Centurylink and Level3) Call Forwarding

Nextiva Call Forwarding

Ooma Call Forwarding

Ring Central Call Forwarding

Spectrum Business Call Forwarding

Spectrum Mobile Call Forwarding

T-Mobile Call Forwarding

US Cellular Call Forwarding

Verizon Fios Call Forwarding

Verizon Wireless Call Forwarding

Vonage Call Forwarding

Windstream Call Forwarding

Xfinity Mobile Call Forwarding

Xtream Mediacom Call Forwarding

What Type of Call Forwarding is Right For Your Business?

We hope you now have clarity around how to forward calls on your device. But, now that you know how call forwarding works, you might want to set it up for yourself. If so, you should know that setting up call forwarding is not difficult at all.

However, you would need to decide between the call forwarding options available today.

Or, you may want to know what are the step-by-step instructions to turn call forwarding off and on for your device.

If you would like to connect with us to explore how an answering service can free up your time instead of you turning call forwarding on and off, simply fill out the form below.