Giving each number a job
Main line, direct line, out of hours: different rules for what happens when nobody picks up.
Read about virtual systems
Harrisburg, PA
Business VoIP in Harrisburg, PA
717 and 223 cover this region together and have since 2017, which settles the code question quickly. The one worth thinking about is different and almost never asked: most businesses publish more than one phone number without ever deciding what each of them is for, and that is where calls get lost.
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Two codes, one region, three cities
717 is one of the original 1947 codes and covers south central Pennsylvania. 223 was laid over exactly the same ground in September 2017, so ten digit dialling has been normal for eight years and nothing printed since is incomplete.
The pair covers Harrisburg, Lancaster and York, which are three separate markets that happen to share a numbering plan. So the code tells a caller the region and not the city, and a customer in one of the other two will not infer anything about where you are from your number.
Port a 717 number if you already hold one because it is printed on things you have paid for, take 223 if that is what is offered, and say which of the three markets you actually serve rather than leaving three digits to imply it. Porting is on business phone numbers.
How many numbers do you publish, and what is each one for?
Almost every established business ends up with several published numbers. A main line, a number on an old sign, a direct line somebody gave a big customer years ago, a mobile on a van, a number on an invoice template, sometimes a separate one for a department that no longer exists in that shape. None of it was designed. It accumulated.
That is not automatically a problem, and consolidating to one number is not automatically the answer. The problem is that nobody has decided what each number is supposed to do, so they all behave the same way, which means the urgent call and the routine one arrive in the same place and are treated identically.
The useful exercise takes half an hour and costs nothing. List every number a customer could reasonably dial. For each one, write down who currently answers it, what happens when they do not, and who you would want to answer it. In most businesses two or three lines of that table are wrong, and at least one number rings somewhere nobody is monitoring.
Then give them different jobs deliberately. A main number that reaches whoever is free is doing a different job from a direct line for a major account, which is doing a different job again from an out of hours number. Each should have its own answer for what happens when nobody picks up, and an out of hours number that falls back to the same daytime voicemail is not an out of hours number at all. Virtual phone system is what those rules are called.
One caution about retiring a number you have decided is surplus. It is almost always better to keep it and route it than to let it lapse, because you do not control who has it written down. A number that has been on a sign or an invoice for years will be dialled for a long time after you stop thinking about it.
None of which makes the service local
There is no Pennsylvania phone product. The software is the same one a business in Idaho is sold, it runs a long way from here, and the only thing your address decides is the three digits at the front.
How it works and what it asks of your connection are on the main business VoIP guide. The rest of the state, including the valley that runs three codes, is on business VoIP in Pennsylvania.
Who gains here
The working economy here runs on state administration and the professional services around it, a very large distribution and warehousing sector along the corridor, healthcare, food production and agriculture, and the trades serving all of them.
The administrative and professional side has the clearest version of the multiple numbers problem, because its callers are often counterparts working from a record that may be years old. A number in somebody's file that rings an unmonitored line is a call you never learn about, and they will not chase it. Auto attendant and extensions covers keeping the front end short once the call does arrive.
The distribution side wants what it always wants: somebody reachable when a load is moving, which is not confined to office hours, and a person who can decide rather than take a message.
Who should not bother: one person, one phone, one number, customers who already reach you. That is a monthly cost against a problem you do not have. And if the connection into your building is unreliable, deal with that first. VoIP vs landline is the honest case for keeping copper.
The decisions behind the numbers
None of these are about Harrisburg. The first is the half hour that usually finds something.
The numbers you inherited
Why keeping and routing an old number beats letting it lapse, and what porting involves.
Read about business numbersThe greeting in front
Menus and extensions, and why a counterpart working from a record should not sit through options.
Read about auto attendantWhether to switch at all
The honest case for keeping a copper line, which still applies to some buildings and connections.
Read VoIP vs landline
Common questions
Harrisburg VoIP questions
We have four published numbers. Should we consolidate to one?
Probably not by retiring the others. You do not control who has an old number written down, and a number that has been on a sign or an invoice for years keeps getting dialled long after you stop thinking about it. Keep them and route them, and give each one a deliberate job: what it should do when somebody answers and what should happen when nobody does.
How do we find out whether any of our numbers ring nowhere?
Dial them, from outside, including after hours. List every number a customer could reasonably have, then call each one and write down what actually happens. Most businesses doing this for the first time find at least one that rings somewhere nobody is watching, and that is a call you were never learning about.
Does a 717 number say we are in Harrisburg?
It says south central Pennsylvania. The same pair of codes covers Lancaster and York, which are separate markets, so a caller learns the region and not the city. If your service area is narrower than that, say which places you cover rather than leaving the digits to imply it.
List the numbers and dial them
Tell us how many numbers a customer could reasonably dial and what each one does today. If they all land somewhere sensible, we will tell you to leave it alone.