| VoIP to Lower Telecom Bills
By Allan
Keiter
Last
month, we discussed making
your cell phone your only phone,
a solution that makes sense
for only a small portion of
the population. This
month we discuss VoIP, a way
for the rest of us to save
$300-$500 on your home phone
service.
VoIP (Voice over Internet
Protocol) is simply the use
of your Internet connection
to make phone calls instead
of the traditional phone company's
wired network. It is the use
of digital technology instead
of analog.
This technology is much more
efficient to deliver, and thus
can be offered at much lower
prices than traditional phone
service. Vonage, the most well-known
of the providers, offers unlimited
calling to the U.S. and Canada
for $25 a month. SunRocket,
offers a full year of unlimited
service for $199, including
all taxes. In
addition to unlimited calling,
VoIP offers all the features
consumers expect, including
voicemail, caller ID and call
waiting.
Much
of the savings from VoIP
come in two areas --- taxes
and long distance. Since
VoIP is considered a data service,
it is not subject to many of
the taxes and user fees associated
with traditional landline.
While these might be 30-35%
of your landline bill, they
are almost always under 10%
with VoIP and can be as little
as $0, as seen in the SunRocket
example. With unlimited
long distance it comes down
to this --- the more long distance
calls you make, the more you
save with VoIP over traditional
landline.
VoIP
does require a broadband
Internet connection, with
cable modem preferred over
DSL, since DSL requires you
to maintain a traditional
phone line to access. While
voice quality can be just
as good or better with VoIP,
it will only be as good as
your Internet connection.
At the extreme, if your connection
goes down, or you lose power,
you’ll have no phone
service.
911
also functions differently
with VoIP. Since a traditional
landline is fixed, emergency
personnel will know where you
are if you dial 911, even if
you can’t speak. Since
VoIP is not fixed (you could
actually take your adapter
on a trip and set up service,
with your home number, anywhere
that has a high speed connection),
an extra step is required ---
basically registering your
location with your VoIP provider
--- to facilitate accurate
911 call processing.
For much more on this emerging
technology, visit the MyRatePlan
Consumer Guide to VoIP at www.myrateplan.com/voip.
Allan
Keiter is president of MyRatePlan.com.
Founded in 1999, MyRatePlan
offers unbiased content,
filters and calculators
to help consumers make
more informed decisions
about the products and
services they research
and buy online.
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