What more do you want?
Written: Apr 21 '06 (Updated May 28 '06)
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Background
My problem was simple. It was August 2005. I am a college student, and my only telephone was a Cingular cell phone. My family uses Cingular, so calls to them are free, but I always cringed when I needed to make a call - local or long distance - because it used my precious (and overpriced) cell phone minutes. By the way, did you ever notice how the price of cell phone minutes never seems to go down? The companies add more features and force a bundle upon you, locking you into the cheapest reasonable plan of about 40 dollars per month. . . quite frustrating. Furthermore, my "free" Cingular-to-Cingular minutes are barely usable at home thanks to spotty service inside my apartment. Anyhow, I also purchased a fax machine and needed a landline to get that working. So, after looking into the pricing of local telephone service, I saw that for somewhere between an extra 5 or 10 dollars per month, Vonage would offer me a host of extra services and most importantly long distance calling. I chose the 25 dollar Premium Unlimited service plan.
Premium Unlimited Plan
Price: $24.99 + taxes = $27.72 per month
Minutes: Unlimited. . . call anywhere in the US or Canada, Italy, France, UK, Spain, and Ireland
Included Features: Voicemail, Call Forwarding, Simultaneous Ringing (more on this later), Call Waiting, Caller ID
Configuring Hardware and Vonage Account
You will find that many big box stores these days are authorized Vonage retailers, so you needn't order from Vonage.com and wait for your hardware to ship. I happened to pick up my gear at Best Buy. While some phones are now manufactured with Vonage or other VoIP services in mind (meaning they have ethernet jacks and the tricky circuitry to turn internet into phone built in), VoIP gained market share with the adapter method, and that's the route I took.
I already had a standard phone and was looking to minimize setup costs. I purchased a Linksys VoIP adapter with a full mail-in rebate, effectively erasing all costs to upgrade my current hardware. The packaging includes a few easy instruction sheets detailing the steps to get your Vonage account up and running in minutes. Simply connect the adapter to your router (a Linksys WRT54G in my case. . . I'd recommend it if you need a reasonably priced, reliable router) and then attach a telephone cable from the adapter to your standard phone. The adapter has two phone jacks on the back; in my case, one for the phone and one for the fax machine.
Overall, setup was a breeze. I followed the instructions included with the adapter and was able to get a telephone number in my home area code, 300 miles away. This is perhaps one of Vonage's most intriguing features. No matter your location in the country, you can choose from most any area code for your new phone number. The clear advantage here is that I am just a free local call away from my family (catering to the non-Vonage users who still must watch those long distance fees). I'd say everything was operational within 20 to 30 minutes.
My Favorite Features
Call Forwarding
From the Vonage Dashboard (the online control center for your Vonage telephone account), you can customize call forwarding options. In 1 second intervals up to 50 seconds, you can select how long you would like your Vonage phone to ring before forwarding to another telephone number (cell phone or work phone, for example). I have configured this to 15 seconds, at which point my cell phone will receive the call. This is particularly convenient when I am at class and would not have known that someone called. If no one answers at the second phone number, the call is routed to voicemail.
SimulRing
This is a clever take on call forwarding. Let's say you don't want the caller to wait 15 seconds before a call is transferred to your cell phone. Vonage can simultaneously ring your Vonage line and up to 5 other telephone numbers. Once again, if no one picks up, voicemail does.
Voicemail
Vonage voicemail really impresses me. While you can call your own phone line (as you would your landline to access your answering machine), Vonage also lets you access voicemail online and even by e-mail. The final option is the most clever, in my opinion. The moment a voicemail is left, an e-mail is sent off with an attached .wav file as the voicemail. Imagine if you have a smart phone. . . using push e-mail (or if you're a compulsive e-mail checker), you will instantly know when a message is waiting for you. Even otherwise, I find it tremendously helpful. I have GMail Notifier for my GMail account and am promptly notified of a voicemail via a pop up message.
Call Quality and Reliability
I have found call quality on my Vonage line to be superb. Press talk on the phone and I receive a dial tone 100% of the time. My only very minor complaint is the time it takes to connect. There is maybe 2 seconds of lag before a steady dial tone is present, and it takes another 2 seconds or so to place a call. This is almost cell phone like, in the sense that you dial and do not hear the phone ringing immediately. Nonetheless, call quality is on par with traditional landlines from your local company.
Customer Service
Thanks to impeccable service, I have only had one occasion to call customer service (more on this later). Nonetheless, I found the customer service representative to be extremely knowledgeable and eager to assist me with my difficulty.
911 Dialing
Thankfully, I have never needed to test this service. As a result, I cannot relay any hands on experience. However, I can tell you that Vonage has made every effort to ensure proper 911 service to all customers. I have registered my permanent address with the Vonage website, so when I call an emergency call center, they will know my exact location. For those who are unaware, VoIP has come under fire for poor 911 services. Calls are not always routed to local emergency call centers, and VoIP does not inherently relay geographical information to call centers. Obviously, if you move your adapter to another location (thereby moving your phone number), it's best to update your 911 address should you have an emergency. I am confident in Vonage's ability to properly route my 911 call, and I would not hesitate to use this service in an emergency.
Problems Encountered
Well, I really just had one problem. I was a TiVo user when I first got Vonage, and I quickly found that (for whatever reason) TiVo and Vonage don't get along well together. My Series 2 TiVo relied on a telephone line to retrieve guide data, so I saw no reason for my Vonage line not to play nice. However, as explained to me by a very helpful Vonage customer service agent, Vonage uses a packet system to transfer voice data over the internet, and the packet sizes don't always mesh well with the demands of TiVo. Amazingly, he talked me through various known solutions to this issue. We tried to tweak various settings on the TiVo (something I'm not even sure the TiVo customer service people would've done), and a few changes were made to my Vonage account to optimize conditions for a successful TiVo guide update. Unfortunately, we never did get TiVo and Vonage to cooperate, but I can't fault Vonage.
Conclusion
I love Vonage. After almost 9 months of use, I am satisfied with all aspects of service. The price is reasonable, the feature content is satisfying, and I was still able to use my old phone. Vonage will give you the first month of service for free, there are always deals on new hardware, and you will even save if you recommend a new customer. This VoIP upstart is well planted, and I would not hesitate to recommend this service to people looking to save money on their current phone bill or simply add another line such as myself.
Thanks for reading!
Recommended:
Yes
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About the Author
Reviews written: 12
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