I hesitated writing this post because I just assumed everyone knew about Vonage. After speaking with my neighbor I realized I was wrong.
Vonage is a VoIP (or Voice over Internet Protocol) that lets you make phone calls using your high speed Internet connection instead of a phone line. Vonage converts sound into data, sends it over the Internet, and converts it back into sound at the other end. The people you talk with will never know the difference, because a VoIP call sounds just like a regular phone call.
The best thing about Vonage is the price. Our phone bill is $29.99 each month. This includes unlimited long distance to the U.S., Canada, Europe and Mexico. Other features include; caller id, call waiting, three way calling, call transfer, call forwarding, auto redial, voice mail and more.
There is a set up fee and a fee for the phone adapter, but we had the set up fee waived and the adapter price reduced just by asking. You can also keep your current phone number. You do need a high speed internet connection to use Vonage, but that seems to be pretty common these days. We have had Vonage for two years and I have been please with the service. I love being able to call friends and family any time (not after 7 or 9pm) and talk as long as I want without worrying about the bill.
With Vonage, there are no surprises when the phone bill comes. Every month, no matter how many calls we have made, the price stays the same. If you are looking for a way to cut your phone bill, I would check out Vonage.
For more Tightwad Tuesday visit Mary’s blog.
What do you use for internet? We’ve looked at cutting out (or down) tv and the quoted price always stays within $5 so we just get everything.
We seriously considered Vonage because of the price, but there were 2 pretty major reasons why we decided to spend a little bit more money to stick with the service we have.
1. Unless they’ve changed their fine print, you give them permission to withdraw funds from your bank account/credit card at any time without further warning. Since the account we would have used is usually kept at a near $0 balance, only enough to cover the bills, I didn’t like the idea of them having permission upfront to choose to change the day they withdrew money or to continue to attempt to withdraw funds without me having time to make sure money was there.
2. Calling 9-1-1 works differently, and I didn’t like the idea of my 9-1-1 call being routed through any random dispatcher instead of my local 9-1-1 dispatchers.
If they could make me more comfortable about those two things I would seriously consider switching if my call quality stayed the same.
I used to use my cell phone for long distance, but now we have Verizon Fios which is also a flat monthly rate. I like using my home phone much better, and like you said, it’s nice to not worry about when you call or how long you talk. I don’t remember what the rate is because we have it bundled with other services.
Have you heard of magicJack? I just got mine in the mail today, so I haven’t had a long time to test it, but everything I’ve done with it today has worked great! You plug the adapter into your USB port, then plug any regular phone into the adapter, then make your phone calls. Incoming and outgoing within the us and Canada are free, as are international calls if they are magicJack-to-magicJack. The first year is $40, then its $20 a year. You do have to have high speed internet. I tested incoming, outgoing, and voicemail – all worked great.
So far, I highly recommend it! http://www.magicjack.com
A couple things to add:
- If you have friends/family in Canada or Puerto Rico, those calls are included too.
- Since we primarily use our cell phones, we are on a Vonage plan that is only $15 a month and allows for 500 minutes, which we always come under. Under the 500 min plan, each additional minute is only 3.9 cents. So, you can go over by 250 minutes (750 minutes total) and still be better off on the $15 plan.
- One of the coolest features is that when someone leaves a voicemail, you can have the audio file emailed to you. My wife and I both get an email with our voicemails. The other great feature is that we have it set up so that when someone calls our home (Vonage) line, it rings at home, and it rings my wife’s cell phone simultaneously. Then she can choose to pick up the home phone if she’s home, or take the call on her cell if she’s out.
I didn’t know this! I wonder if it is in Alaska?
I wish we could take advantage of it, but we are on dial-up. To take advantage of it, we’d have to invest a lot of money (and time), to switch things. With my website, set up through AOL, I would have to start from scratch to rebuild that ministry, and I don’t feel like messing with it.
I’ve heard of Vonage, but had wondered how well it worked. Thanks for sharing!
This is something we will have to look into after we give up our cell phones next year.
Another vote for Vonage. But like Todd, we also are also on the $15 plan since I don’t make a lot of phone calls each month and we use cell phones for long distance and make most calls on weekends. I’ve been with Vonage for about 4 years and love it. Never had any problems. Great bargain tip!
I dont even have a home phone – use my cell phone for it all. If I ever get one will check it out.
I had Vonage for a while… my frustration with them was reliability. I can’t tell you how many times people would call my cell & tell me that my house phone wasn’t rining. Or, I would try to call out & get a rapid busy.
Then, trying to cancel… they tried for over an hour to get me to stay.
I highly recommend Majic Jack.
Have had Vonage since the first of this year now (2011) and it works perfectly.
Had to adjust the QoS setting in my router so that I had reserve bandwidth for the Vonage adapter, but the what apiece of cake. The Vonage adapter itself also has a setting for that, in case you don’t have your own router. Have never had an issue with clarity when downloading or uploading after making that adjustment.
I had the Vonage World Plan up until just yesterday (9-22-11) but have downgraded to the 750 minute plan which still has all the same features for $5 less. Probably should’ve dropped down to the 350 minute plan and cut my bill by more than %50. Probably will do that after a couple months on the 750 plan and remembering to check my monthly usage!
To anyone that suggest Magic Jack, that thing is a total POS!! I tried that before ordering Vonage. Had it for less than 2 hours before I returned that crap thing. For anyone that was calling me, it was a long distance call for them and, no, not about to have to add another thing as someone above suggested to make it otherwise. Also hated having to leave computer on 24/7 to use this thing!
Even at about $35 a month with taxes and fees for the World Plan, that’s still about $30 less a month over a standard phone line with NO long distance calls, for me!!
Perfectly satisfied with my Vonage service.