How setup works
Fifteen minutes, from your phone
Della needs three things: your parent's number, the people who should always ring through, and one forwarding code dialled on her handset. Nothing is installed on her phone, and her number does not change.
What actually changes on her phone
One setting: conditional call forwarding. It tells her carrier that calls she doesn’t answer should go to Della instead of to voicemail. Combined with her phone silencing unknown numbers, unknown callers ring quietly, go unanswered, and land on Della.
Her number stays her number. Nothing is ported, no app is installed, and the people in her contacts still ring through exactly as they always have. If she misses one of those calls, Della takes a message — she becomes the voicemail, which is the point.
If Della is ever unavailable, calls fall back to a plain voicemail message. Forwarding is handled by the carrier, not by us, so an outage on our side degrades to “leave a message” — never to a dead line.
The five steps
Your account and her number
We look up her number to detect the carrier, which decides which forwarding code you’ll need in step three. Card required to start the 30-day trial; nothing is charged until it ends.
Her Trusted Circle
The people who should always ring straight through. Import from Google Contacts, upload a CSV or vCard, or photograph her paper address book — we read the names and numbers, and you correct anything we got wrong. Mark the doctor and the pharmacy as fast passes.
The forwarding code
One code, dialled once from her handset — or set through her carrier’s app if your family shares the account. The wizard shows the exact code as a tappable link, plus how to silence unknown callers on her iPhone or Android.
Two verification calls
We test it rather than assume it. Della calls from an unlisted number to prove forwarding reaches her, then calls from her own number so your parent can answer, hear who Della is, and agree to being recorded. Both have to pass before you leave setup.
The code word
A phrase only your family knows. Della asks for it whenever a caller claims a family emergency. You’ll get a printable wallet card for it — and we never speak it aloud, log it, or send it to a language model.
Forwarding codes by carrier
The wizard fills in Della’s number and gives you a code you can tap. This table is here so you can see exactly what will be dialled before you dial it.
| Carrier | Turn on | Turn off | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| T-Mobile | **004*number# | ##004# | Covers busy, no answer and unreachable. Ring delay is adjustable up to 30 seconds. |
| AT&T | **004*number# | ##004# | Della’s number is domestic, so plans that restrict international forwarding are unaffected. |
| Verizon | *71number | *73 | Busy and no answer only. We never use forward-all — she keeps answering the calls she wants. |
| Mint, Cricket, Metro, Visible | Host network’s code | Host network’s code | These run on the three networks above. We detect which and show the right code; support varies by plan, and the verification call in step four is what confirms it. |
The first two weeks
Della starts in Learning Mode. For fourteen days she takes messages rather than turning callers away, and every unknown caller becomes a suggestion for you to approve or ignore. It exists because a wrong decision in week one is worse than a missed one — she builds the allow-list before she starts enforcing it.
On day fourteen she switches to active screening and emails you a summary of what she learned. You can switch earlier, or stay in Learning Mode as long as you like.
What Della will never do
- Pretend to be your parent. She gives her own name on every call.
- Hard-decline a caller claiming a medical emergency. That rule is not a setting and cannot be switched off.
- Show a caller ID that isn’t hers. Calls she puts through display her number, by design.
- Call anyone on your behalf. She answers; she doesn’t dial out except to reach your parent for a call she’s bridging.
More on the recording side of this in recording and consent.
Stuck on a step? The wizard has a “text these instructions to someone with the phone” option at every stage.
Back to Della