Last summer I switched to lingo.com, an IP phone service that proved to be cheap but unreliable. Starting last week Lingo failed altogether and their tech support folks (available only by phone, which is kind of irksome) failed to call back, so I ordered Vonage, which is the same $25/month but does not include Western Europe in its unlimited calling region and has higher international rates.
Here’s how Vonage has worked…
- Vonage sends you a brand-new Linksys broadband router with included IP phone jacks and three Ethernet jacks; if you were relying on your old router for 802.11b or to use as an 8-port hub you may have to buy some new networking gear
- the customer service Web site is very slow and about 25% of the time page requests produce an error page with a “try again later” instruction
- tech support is available through a form on their Web site; this form asks for your name, phone number, account number, etc., even though you’ve already logged in and it should have all of his info as part of your account profile
- tech support via phone results in a “we’re experiencing an unsually high volume of calls; try again later”; customer service (billing, etc.) can be reached after a 15-minute wait in queue
- they say that they never received my FAXed letter of authorization to transfer my old number from Lingo and want it refaxed
- when set to simultaneously ring my cell phone Vonage does ring the cell but I can’t hear callers (they can hear me though)
They say that it will take two months for them to transfer the phone number from Lingo, so I’ll have to pay $25/month to Lingo for forwarding until that happens.
[Update: I believe that I unfairly maligned Vonage in regards to not being able to hear callers on calls simultaneously rung to my cell phone. It turns out that it is my PalmOne Treo flaking out on the very day that I installed Vonage! This makes Treo #10 that has failed, I think. It lasted about two months, just like the others. Anyone have a suggestion for a GSM phone that will do a calendar and contacts sync with Microsoft Outlook?]
[Dec 3 Update: When voicemail is pending, the Vonage system fails to change the dial tone. A second try to reach technical support (at 1:30 pm Eastern time) resulted in the same “we’re too busy to talk to anyone” recording. The voice quality of calls is somewhat low, with some constant static.]
[Dec 19 update: I took the advice of various folks and ordered a Motorola MPx220 phone with genuine Windows inside. I ordered it on Dec 7 from Amazon.com but, although they said that it was in stock they have yet to ship it.]
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