I’m Firing AT&T
Published by Ninth Stage October 24th, 2007 in Commerce.I’m firing AT&T and looking for suggestions for a new phone company.
VoIP or twisted pair are fine, I’m not too choosy. Right now I’m leaning towards Cordia’s VoIP service. Good? Bad? Alternatives?
I have a couple friends who are using Vonage and they seem to be liking it. My ISP isn’t reliable enough to change over from a land line so I’m still paying Verizon’s extortion.
I dropped QUEST (which was costing me $52 a month) for Verizon Wireless (which is costing me $39 a month) and (a) got my name out of the phone book (b) haven’t received a single “phone survey” or “special offer” on the phone for five years, and (c) every year or two I get a new phone for free … if I want it and (d) if I want to get personal calls on my phone while I’m at work, I can … or I can ignore them. AND no roving, no long-distance charges.
Why in the world would anyone want a landline phone?
Better yet, I got a phone for my sweetie and we talk to each other as often as we like, as long as I like, for free. AND no roving, no long-distance charges. Our plan includes free anytime all-the-time conversations with our extended families, too.
Just saying … Verizon’s ‘extortion’ seems mighty sweet to me.
Jerry, it’s still a lot of money for some of Verizon’s ground line plans, especially if you’re not using too much phone in the first place..
Ninth Stage, it depends on what level of incoming calls your expecting.
If you’re not taking too many calls out, for around 2 cents per minute of outgoing calls plus 3 dollars a month for incoming calls, Gizmo Project is cheap, reliable, and provide excellent sound quality. It’s not intended for heavy outgoing call use, though, so if you use more than 1000 minutes per month (20 bucks), it just won’t work. No activation fee or shipping, and the account is very mobile, but in return unless you’re prepared to set up an Asterisk box or a compatible VoiP gateway, it’ll probably need to be hooked into a computer.
Cordia has had a lot of issues with customer support folk, and their set-up isn’t too easy, but they’re probably about as inexpensive as you can go and still get good call quality. Lingo is pretty similar, although they seem to sacrifice some quality for better customer support and advanced features. They’re both much more similar to real landlines — much less portable, but more ‘normalish’.
Vonage and comparable services are more expensive, but you get more features with the base package (such as default e911 support, which Cordia charges extra for), and the larger companies tend to be more reliable.
Civis, I’ve considered Vonage, heard good and bad so I thought I’d try another provider. Heck, I might end up with Vonage anyway.
Jerry, the landline is for my biz. AT&T is killing me for two business lines and DSL.
Gattsuru, since it’s my biz line I think I’d want a higher level of services. If I still had a personal landline I’d do it.
I’m going to switch my fax line to a web-fax service - my final problem is getting rid of AT&Ts DSL and replace it with another ISP at work.