Dad pulling the plug on Vonage

[washman]

After almost 10 years, he's had enough. Lately I've had to put in after work hours support with him, remoting into his modem, the router and lastly the Vonage box itself in an attempt to figure out why it keeps coming up unable to register with Vonage server.

He originally had the Moto 1005 Vt terminal but it began to really foul up the voice quality. So we replaced it with the VDV23. That one did ok until late this summer, then it started dropping calls so we got Vonage to send out another unit. It did ok too then started with the unable to register with Vonage server message when dad tried to make a call.

Adding to all this was his stint in the hospital for food poisoning. That along with a new issue, back pain that cannot be managed (he's going to the VA this week to find out more)bottom line is he's long past the physical stuff of bending over, unplug this, replug that, reboot this, cross your fingers yadda yadda. Good luck working with them over the phone and trying to do a 3 way call with a father that is a total non PC geek. I have the beginnings of an ulcer because of this.

Vonage was a good idea when mom was alive as she made a lot of international calls and it really did save them money. However with his advancing age plus the questionable stability of the service, he and I decided that it was time to go back to AT&T landline that works no matter what. Well unless a 'cane tears up the place as Frances did in 2004.

He's got an ATT number the trick now is to see if we can port his Vonage number over. I've read about 50-50 success of this happening. We'll see. At least now he's on a solid landline that works. I have my doubts because when they signed up with Vonage, they got the number from Vonage directly and ditched their at the time Bellsouth number.

FWIW I will stay on Vonage for the time being. I'm still young and mobile enough to reboot, do the happy dance and fiddle with router port settings to keep it stable. In fact, I still have the original Moto box when I first signed on in December 2003! I'm planning on buying my 1st home........sometime soon so I can take the box with me, get my local ISP online and I'm in business.

 

[a440]

Vonage is so silly.  

Do Google Voice.  It is what I have at home.  I have had it for about 5 years.  I pay NOTHING.  I just had to buy a Obi100 Box that cost me about $35.

Most of my international calls cost me 1 cent per minute.  You have a "Google Wallet" that you put money into.  I put about $10 once a year.

I use regular cordless phone.  If you plug the Obi100 into one of your old Bellsouth / At&T outlets all of your outlets become energize.

It is really easy to set up.  Google gives you a phone number with area code for your area just like AT&T.  

The only drawback is that you don't have 911 service.  To get around that I just have my local police department programmed on my phones.  That is where 911 directs you to anyway.

 

 

[gusherb]

It sounds like you're saying he's already got the landline from AT&T, correct? If you're even successful on getting the Vonage number ported over I THINK AT&T might require you to add it on as a second line then cancel the first line or something complicated like that...so it may be more trouble then it's worth. I'd be curious to hear what they say when you inquire about that.

An easier thing to do (IMO) even though it'd involve one extra step (because Google voice doesn't port in landline numbers) is pick up a t-mobile SIM card for cheap on eBay (they frequently run 99 cent specials on the t-mobile site too) and port the number into t-mobile from Vonage then port it over to Google Voice (20 dollar porting fee). And then forward all calls to the new AT&T number.

 

[petek]

Still loving my Ooma . It works great and has tons of features. It costs about $120 to purchase but after that it's only about $3.95 a month which is for 911. Free nationwide long distance and voicemail, number display. You can port your existing number over for something like $40 but if you sign up for their premier service (I did, the porting is free) plus you get a 2nd phone number to choose in any N. American area code (Canada or the US) I chose a second # in Newark NY (518 area code) since I have relatives around there and they can call me as if it's a local number no charge. Also gives you Canada/US free long distance, name and number display and some other features.. There's also an app that lets you tie your smartphone or Ipad into Ooma so you can use it on the road without roaming charges and for surfing the net. You can have all your calls directed to your cell at the same time as your home phone or just to your cell. If the system goes down it automatically routes your calls to your cell. It's never gone down. You can change your settings right from your account on their website..shows all in/out calls, duration etc, listen to voicemails, you can block numbers etc.. really handy. Can't say enough good about it.. Consumer Reports was right on this one,, it is the best home phone service.

 

[gusherb]

Ooma

We ported the second line over to them three years ago, I can't remember there ever being a moment of downtime. Our mainline is with a BYOD (bring your own device) VoIP provider - Callcentric, using an Obihai Obi100 to keep the wiring in the house live (which has all the vintage phones connected to it) and then a IP phone on my desk for those long calls... (There's even music on hold!)

 

[sudsmaster]

I also use Ooma. It works very well. Outgoing faxes are not reliable though. Currently using an integrated cable modem/router. If I were to change that to discrete modem and router I could put the Ooma box between the modem and router and that is supposed to make it work better.

 

But for now it's fine. I like that I no longer get tons of wrong numbers and telemarketing calls. Ooma has blacklists, both community and personal. I paid for the premium service, which comes to about $100/yr, plus $6/mo for local taxes/911. I think it's worth it.

 

Oh, and I'm told that faxes in general don't work that well with internet phones. Something to do with the way the internet chops up data into packets, which faxes don't like, esp. outgoing faxes. So I don't think it's an issue only with Ooma phones.

 

 

[hydralique]

For a number of years we had a dedicated fax line which was handy for business but fewer and fewer people use faxes so dumped it and tried to do an internet line instead. It didn't work well, or more to the point didn't work at all, so we simply abandoned faxes.

 

We are down to one AT&T landline and one through Time-Warner cable. Both work well but we finally gave up on AT&T internet in favor of Time-Warner. AT&T's speeds were consistent at 2.54 mbps download and .42 mbps upload. Compare that to TW at 108 mbps upload and 11 mbps download. Plus the AT&T modem usually demanded to be reset each morning and sometimes during the day, and if you tried to do a backup to the cloud everything slowed to a crawl. Calling their help line didn't help at all when the modem conked out because they've set it up so you can't talk to a tech until you've reset the modem; by the time you get to the tech of course it's working again. They can't seem to figure out that to diagnose a problem they need to check their end when it's not working, duh!

 

[mattl]

I often wonder if people use Vonage because of all the ads.  I see it as worthless and over priced as ATT landline.  I've used VOIP.MS for years and have never had an issue, let alone the need to reboot.  I dump $25 into my account 2 or 3 times a year and don't give it a thought.  I have a fax line with them too, $.95/mo though I rarely use it.  For over kill I have a TOTALLY free Google voice number too and I did not need a Obie box  to do it.

 

[chachp]

I thought people were pretty much abandoning "Home Phone

<span style="font-family: verdana,geneva;">I kept a landline for a number of years at a cost of about $50 a month mostly for my security system.  It seemed I used my cell phone for everything given all the "unlimited minutes" plans now available (I have no need for international or fax services).</span>

 

<span style="font-family: verdana,geneva;">So when the security folks approached me with a cellular option I went for it and got rid of the landline all together.  It costs me about $10 more each month through the security company but I'm saving about $40 a month on a landline that I never used.  </span>

 

<span style="font-family: verdana,geneva;">They came in and installed something, somewhere in the house that communicates with them using a cellular connection.  It's been a number of years so I don't remember where they put it.  There is a electrical line that runs into the garage and a panel in the utility room.  I suspect it's in that panel.  I can see on the touchpad when and how it tests the connection and in 5 years or so I have never had an issue with it.</span>

 

<span style="font-family: verdana,geneva;">I am surprised to read there are so many people who keep some kind of home phone.  Are you all not using cell phones as your primary phone or do you keep the home phone for some other reason?</span>

 

[frigilux]

Ben, once again your Dad is lucky to have you watching out for him!

I still have a landline only because two ancient TiVo's have to make a toll-free call everyday to download programming.

 

[cadman]

Ooma

After the last thread on recommendations for phone service, I too looked into Ooma and haven't looked back. I tried the 3 month free Premier service and liked it so much I upgraded after the trial period. Home phone service for less than $15/mo with ring through to my cell and zero downtime? Can't beat it! -C

 

[washman]

Cost is not the issue

reliability is.

Comunistcast has issues from time to time where they are constantly replacing poles and downstream splitter units. While that is aggrivating for internet the fact that Vonage or any other VOIP needs internet is no longer acceptable for him OR me for that matter.

Vonage for my dad served a purpose. Unfortunately his age and health issues mandates the need for reliable phone service, not trying to save a nickel. If he cannot afford a landline then he'll move into the VA for long term care.

 

[iej]

I have a VoIP landline but I have to say that increasingly I hardly use it anymore. It works perfectly but it's just easier to keep everything on my mobile.
Unlimited minutes, texts and 4G (2TB limit lol)

 

[cuffs054]

Love my Ooma

 

[washman]

Meh...........

he had to play holy hell to cancel his Vonage. ATT said they cannot port over until he actually cancels Vonage. He spent an exhausting 3 hours trying to do just that. Finally he lost it and threatened to call the BBB and voila! A supervisor got on and said it will be handled.

Now let us hope ATT can snag the number for him!

 

[circlew]

I have a friend who has a home phone provided by a cell phone company (I think Verizon). There is a base unit that plugs into an electric outlet, and this receives the signal the same as a cell phone would. It has a jack for a phone to plug in to, and they have a cordless phone base station plugged into it.

I do not like talking to him on this system; the distortion is bad, and volume seems to fluctuate. Previous to this they had the cordless phone connected to a Cincinnati Bell landline, and I usually could hear him OK, but not as good as when he would be on a decent corded phone. I'd much rather he just use a cell phone rather than that lousy setup.

I find that I can hear most clearly when I'm talking on my corded landline phone to someone else who is also on a good quality corded landline phone. I absolutely despise cordless phones, and tolerate the cell phone when I'm away from a corded set, In the end they are both radio technologies, and subject to the inherent qualities of such.

 

[iej]

I'm using an Irish VoIP provider called Blueface. Basically, they provide a fully featured hosted PBX so, you can do all sorts of fancy diverts and transfers, it has professional music on hold and all that stuff that you'd find on an office system.

I use a Panasonic TGP 550 with 4 handsets scattered around the house and I find the sound quality as good, if not better than a PSTN line.
In theory it should be better as its using wide band audio, compared to the PSTN systems rather ancient narrowband CODECs

The phone's basically a fairly full-featured business style desk phone with full featured DECT handsets that have most of the same functions.

All in all it's a nice system, but I just find I'm using my mobile phone more than I use the VoIP setup these days.

I don't think most of the ATAs (Analogue Terminal Adaptors) that are available for converting regular POTS phones to VoIP are much good really. You don't seem to get the same call quality on most of them that you'd expect on a POTS line. Where as a pure VoIP phone tends to do a really good job.

 

[gusherb]

Washman

I hate to break it to you but I think AT&T might've given you advice that will result in losing the Vonage number and not be able to port it to AT&T. The way number porting is supposed to work is you need to keep the service with the losing carrier active and initiate the number port with the winning carrier first. Usually once the account is closed or suspended it can't be ported...

 

[petek]

That's what I was thinking.. When I asked Ooma to port my old Bell landline I didn't contact Bell or do anything, the number was ported and the Bell account closed. Took about 7 days.