Comments on: Save Money with VoIP (Voice over IP)

By: ewan benin

ewan benin — Sun, 23 May 2010 18:46:18 +0000

I’ve use vonage here in Canada since 2006. I have the 500mins plan for Canada and the United States ($19.99 a month). I don’t use the phone a lot and this is an excellent plan for me. They also have an unlimited calling plan to Canada and United State for $39.99 a month. Their long distance charges to other countries are very competitive too.

Set up is easy with vonage, the device can be purchase at Staple, Walmart, Futureshop, Best buy office depot or directly from vonage. I paid $89.99 for mine and just transferred by old phone number from Telus to vonage.No land line is needed, vonage device connect to your computer.I have a phone in my living room and bedroom. No extra charge for voicemail, call waiting, caller id and I can check message online too. Also, for those that have family overseas, you can purchase an adapter and take overseas for your family and they call from that phone (computer connect is needed) is on your Canadian phone number and its cost you nothing more.

Enough said, I sound like a sales person for them and I’m not.

By: Shirley

Shirley — Wed, 19 May 2010 04:56:27 +0000

No one has mentioned iTalkBB. VoiP with phone adapter. Can use with router or not. I am using low bandwidth with a Seimens Dect phone from Costco. Sounds better than high speed with VTech 5.4. Some echo some times. 7/m on 2 year plan. Unlimited N. America calls incoming outgoing and the no. is portable. Take the small adapter with you travelling for free calling anywhere you go to N. American calls.
italkbb.com and use the English language tab on the side. They are in Canada.

By: Money Green Life

Money Green Life — Mon, 17 May 2010 22:31:42 +0000

Perhaps another reason why landline industry is dying. For people like myself who are single and have no other connections outside the US, VOIP is not much useful when most cell phone plans include free nationwide minutes. But for people like yourself with families, I can see how it could save a few bucks every month.

By: brother toner cartridges

brother toner cartridges — Sun, 16 May 2010 17:20:30 +0000

I believe Voice over IP service is going to save us a lot of money if we know how to do it. I never use it before since My family and I stay at the same place. I’ll try to use VoIP next year when my best friend will move to US

By: twocents

twocents — Sat, 15 May 2010 16:29:47 +0000

I use magicjack with a 5 years paid plan, all the calls to US and Canada are included.
I think the calculated monthly cost does not overpass 3 dollars per month. One detail, you should have good internet connection.

By: Robert

Robert — Sat, 15 May 2010 16:16:52 +0000

@Steve For Post 15 – Shaw has no contracts on any of their services, bundled or not.

By: Rob

Rob — Sat, 15 May 2010 16:04:16 +0000

hi John Torrington ,

you said you use Magic Jack & pay just $10/year extra for a Canadian phone number….where do you get it for just $10/year…

http://www.canadianmagicjack.ca/ charge $99.95 Yearly Fee for a Candian number..

thanks
Rob

By: Doctor Stock

Doctor Stock — Sat, 15 May 2010 06:27:54 +0000

I was looking at getting rid of my land line… but the incentives on other services by bundling packages left me at a disadvantage. And the cell phone plans were really rich… any ideas?

By: Marc

Marc — Fri, 14 May 2010 22:13:57 +0000

Using voip.ms,switched 3 weeks ago. It was a little bit of hassle to set up, but well worth it.

I was able to port my number and it’s .99 month for my incoming number, 1.50 for 911/month and half to one cent minute for calls in NA. I figure it will be ten dollars per month, down from 40.

It was $25 to port my number and 60 for the phone adapter.

By: bob

bob — Fri, 14 May 2010 21:44:47 +0000

I don’t get it.

If you need to have high speed internet to use your phone, then you need to include that cost in your calculations.

And, by the way, Shaw doesn’t require any contract to sign up for their bundles.

With high speed, the phone is only $20.95/month.

By: DAvid

DAvid — Fri, 14 May 2010 15:12:03 +0000

Steve asks: “Back to you, can anyone beat this price for home phone service?”

Yup! Try the net-Talk TK6000. $100 forever, and no need to have your computer running like MagicJack or Skype. Plug it into your router, plug a plain ol’ phone into the device, and you’re set.

Cost: $1.40 per month if you keep it 5 years.

DAvid

By: mode3sour

mode3sour — Fri, 14 May 2010 02:33:45 +0000

@Ian I use voip.ms too! Far cheaper/better than Vonage/skype/magicjack imo

@saveddijon I’d like to know how a landline works when the telephone pole falls over

By: Andrew Jacob

Andrew Jacob — Thu, 13 May 2010 23:53:24 +0000

I have used MagicJack for almost a year and it works very well. It has the additional benefit of being very portable, since you can use it with any computer and as such, we were able to use it and call North America from South East Asia on a recent bycycle trip. As well, voice messages are also sent by email, and thus can be accessed without a telephone on any computer.

A one time cost is $40 is good for a year and about $12/yr thereafter.

great deal

By: Jake

Jake — Thu, 13 May 2010 21:47:17 +0000

I’ve been using a company called les.net for several years now, with very good call quality. Very cheap too. All you need is an ATA adapter for your phone, a little bit of knowledge to set it up which can be quickly learned, and an internet connection.

If power outages are a concern, consider getting a battery backup for $50. It’ll run your internet and phone for hours. :)

Also folks, never pay full price for internet or phone. NEVER bundle phone/tv/internet with one company or else you lose your bargaining power. Competition is what makes these companies knees shake, and if you know how to talk to them, you can get dirt cheap rates.

By: Oldi

Oldi — Thu, 13 May 2010 20:15:51 +0000

I have been using VOIP for over 5 years now.
We started with Primus, they offer for 29.99 with unlimited local and long distance US and Canada. Now I am with VOIPGO for $144/year for the same service we used to have with Primus but I am going to try a free service now. It is free for local calls only but is worth to give it a try, it is free right? http://www.freephoneline.ca/. For long distance I will pay 13.99/month for ulimited call to over 50 countries – http://www.worldline.ca/
Good luck on your search

By: saveddijon

saveddijon — Thu, 13 May 2010 19:36:07 +0000

One thing that wasn’t fully mentioned (but implied), and which is a killer for me:

VOIP likely won’t work during a power failure or any other kind of emergency.

And that’s a big difference. A regular POTS (plain old telephone service) may seem expensive for the capabilities you get, but it, and the switching gear behind it, are designed for high reliability. The POTS network is independently powered. It will be there if your power goes out, or the cable pole falls over, or…

Even if you aren’t dialing 911 (which is, as mentioned in the article, not guaranteed to work well with VOIP or even a cell phone) you will still appreciate emergency communications with loved ones or non-911 services if that’s required. (With a cell phone you have no control over which tower picks up the call. There have been incidents near Ottawa where a cell phone located in Ontario was tracked by a tower in Quebec. The Quebec 911 operator was not able to access Ontario dispatch services to efficiently handle the call. If you’re having a heart attack, every second counts.)

Even if you have a POTS line at home, please ensure that at least one phone in the house is not cordless. The cordless phones will eventually go dead in a prolonged power outage. Your 50 year old Nortel 500 set won’t.

And no, I don’t work for the phone company…

By: Aury (Thunderdrake)

Aury (Thunderdrake) — Thu, 13 May 2010 19:32:39 +0000

Skype is a brilliant thing.

Chances are, once I get much more independent, I won’t be using a typical phone like most people do.

WIth the cons in mind, I can tolerate the lack of an emergency number along with a drop in quality, as well as dependency to an internet connection. Fits my call requirements perfectly, which is little. :P

By: Big-D

Big-D — Thu, 13 May 2010 17:21:14 +0000

@Stephen .. Linksys makes them (They are now owned by Cisco – so it might say Cisco on them). Mine is a Linksys that I got in 2000 and still works fine. You can buy them at Fry’s or Walmart, etc. or get them used on E-Bay for not much less.

@ Steve Zussino .. You can use it on ADSL (or RDSL or any form of DSL depending on your analog phone company) or Cable as long as you have about 256kbps up and down stream bandwidth for the phone conversation. I happen to have cable which is 16 Mbps down and 2 Mbps up. I have done it with 2 Mbps up/down ADSL when I lived in Seattle and St. Louis and Dallas. xDSL is just not available where I live at now.

By: Greg

Greg — Thu, 13 May 2010 16:41:08 +0000

I wanted a real phone so that it would work with my alarm system and so that 911 works and also it works if the power goes out. We have Telus for $20 per month with bundle. We live in BC and make regular calls to Ontario and Australia as well as the US. I found http://www.telehop.ca for long distance. They are 2.4c per minute in Canada and 2.7c to Australia (you can choose your 2 favourite countries and get a slightly better rate than the standard rates). I have used Telehop for several years and have been very happy with their service.
I also use Skype and SkypeOut and I really like them, but they are simply not reliable enough for long calls (my wife ofter talks to her sister for 2 or more hours at a time) or for emergencies.
I have played with several VOIP systems and they all work with varing degrees of reliability but for now nothing is as reliable as the POTS system.

By: Steve Zussino

Steve Zussino — Thu, 13 May 2010 16:36:14 +0000

@John,

I would love to try MagicJack, but I have heard poor things about them in forums – lack of support.

Would I still need to have a PC turned on constantly?

@Mike,

I didn’t list the prices for bundles because bundles is where they get you to sign contracts.

Currently, I pay $10 / month for high-speed Internet with Telus.

No contract – although we have this price until Dec 2010.

I might try Magic Jack but I like the flexibility of Skype for when I am travelling – I hate carrying extra hardware around.