My main phone receives calls from clients, family, friends, and important "others," like my car repair shop and officials and the bank alerting me about suspicious use of my credit card. I was going to subscribe to an answering service to route some of these calls away from me, but reactivating my old BlackBerry with a new number, which I like better than current models, just to receive calls and texts from clients that I don't have to talk to the second they call me, makes more sense. I think. There are certain categories of callers that I can route to voice mail and call later. I don't want to reach for the phone every time it rings only to see that "Oh, it's client X again, I'll let it go to voice mail." I can check all.texts and messages on that phone at the end of the day and not worry about answering it right now if I know from he ring that it's from a category of caller I can call back later. What would you or do you do to segregate callers?
The way I do it is to have distinct ringtones for my family and friends and everything else has a quieter ringtone that I know to ignore.
Why didn't I think of that? Oh wait, I know ... I keep my phone on silent because I work in courtrooms where your phone can't be heard to ring. Maybe I can get distinctive vibration patterns.
there are apps to add a second number to your existing smartphone, it's like having multiple phones all in one device https://smallbiztrends.com/2017/10/second-phone-number-apps.html edit: you should contact your service provider, many allow a second line on the same phone for a small monthly fee
I have added the google voice app to allow me to give the other number to folks I don't want to have my personal number. You get to choose the area code of your choice.
~ I like the second phone idea with a different number. Treat it like an old fashioned answering machine for unimportant stuff . Can also be used if your main phone is lost . ☎
get google voice and then you have a second number and can install it on your phone, it's free, so cost nothing to try