Getting started
Connecting a phone number
Open Phone numbers and click Order number to search available numbers by country and area code. Once ordered, the number appears in your list within a minute or two.
Assign an agent to the number and it starts answering immediately — inbound calls route to that agent with no extra configuration. You can reassign a number to a different agent at any time; the change takes effect on the next call.
Numbers carry a monthly rental fee plus per-minute usage, both visible on the Usage page. If you already have a number elsewhere, you can forward it to your Vocarium number as an interim setup.
How a number is paid for
Every number is paid for in one of three ways, and its row on Phone numbers says which:
- Included in your plan — a plan with a numbers allowance covers that many numbers in its monthly price. There is nothing separate to pay and nothing to set up.
- On your card — a number of its own, charged monthly at the price shown when you order it. This is what you get for numbers beyond what your plan includes.
- From your prepaid balance — the monthly rent comes off your balance instead of your card, which suits an account that keeps a balance topped up anyway.
When a number is released
Releasing hands the number back to the carrier. It happens in three ways, and only three:
- You release it. The deliberate one — you decide you no longer need the number and let it go from the dashboard.
- A card payment fails and stays unpaid. We retry the charge once a day for three days, emailing you each time with the release date and a payment link. If the three days run out, the number is released — unless your balance covers its rent, in which case it switches to being billed from the balance and keeps working.
- A plan that included it ends. Whether you cancelled the plan or its payment lapsed, the numbers it covered lose what was paying for them. Same fallback: if the balance covers the rent they move onto it, and if not they are released.
Cancelling a number you pay for on its own works the way cancelling a plan does. It keeps answering to the end of the month you have already paid for and is released then, not on the day you cancel. We email you when you cancel and again when it goes.
A released number is not recoverable. It returns to the carrier's pool and may be given to somebody else, so we can't promise to get it back for you. If a number is printed on a van or a website, treat every one of those emails as urgent.
Numbers billed from your balance are the exception to all of this: they are never released for non-payment, because there is no card to decline. A balance that runs out simply goes negative and calling pauses until you top up. The number stays yours until you release it yourself.