In running a business, working from home or even in your personal life, you may encounter the need to make a three-way conference call, a call in which individuals residing or working from three separate physical locations may need to speak with one another simultaneously over the phone. You have three main options for make a three-way conference call.
Instructions
Two Phone Lines
1. Locate a telephone product that has three-way calling as a feature in the equipment. The phone should have the ability to connect with two separate phone lines, with two ports into the phone that can accept a cable. If it is a wireless phone, the dock should have two phone line ports.
2. Make sure that you have access to two phone lines in the location from which you need to make the three-way conference call. Generally, you will require a phone service account with two separate phone numbers in order for this to work.
3. Plug both of your phone lines into your telephone and make sure that you can get a dial tone on each of them. Generally, a three-way conferencing phone will have buttons to access "line 1" and "line 2." Push each button and make sure there is a dial tone.
4. Push line 1 and dial the phone number to the first party who needs to be on your three-way conference call. Once you have established contact, place the person on hold by pushing the hold button on your phone.
5. Push the button for line 2, and dial the second party who needs to be on your conference call. Once you have established contact, you should push the button for three-way calling on your phone and this should bring both parties from line 1 and line 2 into the call. You may need to take the person on line 1 off of Hold in order to allow that person on the call.
Skype
6. Sign up for a Skype account if you do not already have one (see Resources below). The initial sign-up process is free. You will need to download and install the Skype software in order to make calls through Skype, but this is also free. Make sure to do this before proceeding if the software is not already on your computer.
7. Purchase phone minutes if you do not already have them present on your Skype account. This involves paying a lump sum for 100 minutes of calling time in order to call phone lines from your Skype account, and the price is generally very reasonable. If you already have phone minutes on your Skype account, proceed to the next step.
8. Connect a computer microphone to your computer, as well as a set of headphones. Technically you do not need headphones to make a call on Skype, but if you try to use your computer speakers as the audio, the people you are speaking with are going to hear an echo of everything that is said (because your audio output will be picked up by your computer microphone).
9. Log into your Skype account through the installed software. From the Contacts menu, add the information for the individuals that you need to call. The individuals must already be present in your Contacts menu in order to begin the conference call.
10. Go to the Calls menu and select the option entitled "Start a conference call." From the menu that pops up, add the two contacts with whom you need to speak, and click the "Start" button. Your computer should then dial the other participants in your conference call and you can begin the discussion.
Tags: conference call, Skype account, three-way conference, three-way conference call, your computer