Question

Can I have my name displayed on the receiving party's phone for every outbound call made from a Vonage number?

Applies To

• US Voice Traffic
• CNAM

Answer

CNAM stands for Caller NAMe delivery also known as Caller NAMe presentation. CNAM can only be added to US domestic local numbers, and there is no cost for applying CNAM.

It provides the ability for terminating carriers to display the caller’s name along with their telephone number on receiving party's Caller ID screens. For this, the receiving carrier can subscribe to national CNAM databases to get the calling party’s name for display in the Caller ID field.

There are no mandatory rules that require receiving carriers to deliver Calling Party Name (CNAM) information to their customers. The receiving carrier can subscribe to national CNAM databases to get the calling party’s name for display in the Caller ID field, however, the receiving carrier gets charged for that. Because of this, not all carriers deliver CNAM every time.

On average, 50% or less of all delivered calls in the US include the CNAM in the Caller ID.

Additional Information

If you notice that the receiving party's device is not displaying CNAM, it could be due to one of the following limitations:

• The terminating device has settings blocking CNAM display.
• The receiving party's carrier is using their own DB which does not have updated information.
• The originating or the terminating carrier is not retrieving the CNAM from the CNAM database.

In the above situation, the user could first verify their device capable of receiving CNAM and if everything works as expected, it is recommended to reach out to the associated telecom operator to verify whether they're able to terminate CNAM locally.

If you need to display CNAM for outbound voice calls, contact your account manager or submit a Support request. Also note that when choosing the CNAM, it is limited to 15 characters currently and displayed as uppercase.