He writes:
I've been on one of the cheapest plans from vonage for several years, and generally happy with it. I probably use less outgoing minutes on it than I do on my cell phone, and hardly ever go over the 500 minutes allocated. On christmas I got a nice new email from them saying that they were changing my rates from $14.99 to $17.99.
I know that this is only a $3 increase, but when you are staring at all of your expenditures, it can be a tipping point. I also find it interesting that what they claim is their most popular plan got no increase in fees.
Here's some key passages from the email:
At Vonage, we're committed to providing exceptional phone service at a great value you can rely on. On December 1, 2008, the price of our Residential Basic 500 Minute Plan increased from $14.99 to $17.99. The new price will be reflected in your February 2009 bill. We're proud that we remain one of the most competitive choices among home phone providers.
...
As an option, you might consider the Residential Unlimited Plan for only $24.99 a month. For just $7 more you will get...
Vonage remains a cheap alternative to a traditional landline, but we wish they'd just do away with the cheap plan and grandfather in existing customers instead of slowly letting the price creep up to push customers into higher plans.
The Christmas day email was a nice touch, though. If you don't like Christmas.
Remember, if you're on the cheap plan and don't want to pay the higher rate, you have to cancel by the date when the increase goes into effect, or Vonage will assume you agree to it.
(Photo: raymaclean)
]]>I passed on the IPO because their numbers were so horrible, and they clearly had no business plan to turn it around. I will be bummed if they go out of business, but maybe then I'll take the leap to skype. (Their business plan in the IPO was to basically advertise more and get more customers, even though they were already losing money on each customer.) Plus I was concerned that when vonage had to start assessing 911 fees and phone taxes that the other telcos have to, they might lose a lot of customers.
And all of you griping about the taxes and fees, you can thank the gov't for that. They're standard on phone service, and while it was nice to avoid them for a while, the laws have caught up with the new fangled phone service.
If you are in another country, you can call back to the US and Canada for free. People who have the MagicJack anywhere in the world can call each other any time for free.
I think eventually all calls will be made by something like this. You can save money on trips this way. I am guessing you should take a phone along with you. I don't know how foreign phones work with it.
]]>If you are in another country, you can call back to the US and Canada for free. People who have the MagicJack anywhere in the world can call each other any time for free.
I think eventually all calls will be made by something like this. The Magic Jack is only 3" X 1.5" X 0.6" so you can easily take it with you anywhere. I am guessing you should take a phone along with you. I don't know how foreign phones work with it.
]]>This is a no-brainer.
Zero!
LinkSys (Cisco) SPA3102 POTS to VoIP router (< $60 at Amazon).
Naked DSL from your Telco, priceless.
]]>@jaya9581: What was the company calling about that could possibly have caused a death threat?
Oh, and you probabaly owuldnt have been able to sue them for anything. It was a simple mistake in how they configured their phone system. At my company, I can configure the phone system to show what ever I want on peoples caller ID. We figured this out, becasue when people at the office would call my cell phone, it would only show their extension. Info on the caller ID is no directly connected to the outbound connection the call connects from, it is added information for the sake of being able to Identify the caller.
]]>I went straight to Voice Pulse and short of Vonage screwing up my port and then failing to allow me to cancel, everything has been smooth sailing ever since. $15/month without the added surcharges and fees that Vonage is so fond of.
Just be firm with the "Retention" department. I spoke to this woman for close to a half an hour saying "No", "that is none of your business", "please cancel", and "are you authorized to close my account".
]]>@allstarecho: na... they'll screw you by setting collections to hunt you and put it on your credit report... i guess try harder or EECB?
]]>Some of the fees were legitimage govt-mandated fees that they were finally forced to start collecting, and some were, well, because they could.
]]>I pay on top of this about 2 cents each outgoing minute, and a bit less than 2 cents each incoming minute. Since I only use ~10-50 minutes a month combined, it's a good value.
I disagree though that $17.99 is a "great bargain" for the 500 minute package; it's pretty over priced. You can find comparable VOIP services for less.
DSLreports has a good forum for Voip, it's where I found my provider. A quick rifle through should find good options depending on your usage pattern:
Looks like VOIPo is a newish provider by HostGator that offers good priced VOIP as an alternative.
]]>The Christmas email is just a coincidence.
Everything costs more, moving from $14.99 to $17.99, is it really that much of a big deal or story? And Vongage is right, they are still a great bargain. What is wrong with them charging what the market will bear?
]]>I recently did that. Decided to go cell-only, but wanted to keep the number that was on Vonage, which I'd transfered from the local phone company a few years ago. Transfered it to AT&T. While cell-phone number ports will take only a few hours, it took a week to transfer the number from Vonage to AT&T. And when I called AT&T they told me they were just waiting for the response from Vonage. I'm not sure if the hang up was Vonage, or the local phone company where the number had originally been allocated.
Thankfully Vonage no longer requires that you call them up and cancel your account after you transfer the number from them (That's what the support pages said a while ago when I first started looking into this.) Once the number was transferred the account was rather painlessly cancelled.
]]>I finally got a call from a woman one day who had actually answered the call and spoken at length to the caller, and then called back out of curiosity that the Caller ID did not match the person on the phone. Turns out, six months after I ported my number - which I was using on a daily basis, mind you - Vonage reassigned it to a local business. So they could call out on their 123-456-7890 line just fine, but anyone who CALLED that number would be connected to me. Don't ask me how it worked, all I know was that it did. The nice woman gave me the company's information, I called them, and it took angry calls from them and me to Vonage to get the problem straightened out.
My only regret is that I didn't prosecute Vonage for enabling over a year's worth of harassment. Not only did I get calls at all hours of the day and night, I also received several death threats over it.
]]>I think the way to properly cancel is that I'll really just have to inform my cell carrier that I want to transfer the number and when the number transfers, vonage service will end.
I'd be perfectly happy with paying less for the vonage and only using it for incoming calls, or voice mail, I just feel wrong claiming I'm going to cancel if I don't get a lower rate.
]]>@laserjobs: My dad is okay with MagicJack, but he hates that the software takes up two drive letters on his computer to run, which really screws with his CD burning software
]]>Monthly Service Charge
Monthly Service Charge $17.99
FUSF (VoIP) $1.52
State/Local Taxes and Fees $1.50
Regulatory Recovery Fee $0.99
Emergency 911 Cost Recovery $0.99
State 911 Fee $0.90
Total $23.89
I already switched to VoicePulse, another provider that's been around for 5+ years and has far better reviews on dslreports.com/gbu
Their $14.99 Local Unlimited plan has unlimited local calling and 200 minutes of long distance for $15.89 after taxes and fees. Their unlimited plan comes to $26.49, $5 less than Vonage's equivalent plan and only $3 more than Vonage's bare minimum plan.
]]>Go figure.
]]>If you have a computer running most of the time then get magicJack for $40 for the first year and $20 each year after that.
]]>I got this email weeks ago too. I called them to tell them that I'm considering a triple-play from Comcast for Fios. I then asked them if they had any retention offers.
I got unlimited for the original 500min/month rate of $15/mo for a year, not prepaid.
Check out FatWallet forums for this any many other competitive retention deals offered by service providers. DirecTV is next on my list.
]]>WTH is up with these christmas day horror emails? Do they think by telling the consumer on a generally happy holiday, that they'll be more likely to forgive??
pfffft, fat chance. I hold grudges.
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