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 Review by CUBS_FAN 
member for 8 years, 881 visits, last login: 7 days ago
updated 34 days ago
 Chicago,Cook,IL
 Contract price not specified.  about 5 days "The Website is so easy to navigate with plenty of help info. Automatic bill pay is convenient too.Incoming/outgoing call logs." "If there is a power outage(rarely) your phone don't work. Once in a while I get an echo" "As long as your Internet provider is steady, Vonage will be too."
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Called on the phone and within a week the 4 port Ethernet Motorola voice gateway router arrived. Within another week I had my existing phone number transferred. I was given a "virtual number" on a temporary basis. You must disconnect the telephone line from utility pole going inside the telephone interface box, so the voltage coming from the Telephone Company does not interfere with the VOIP.
The first thing I noticed was when making a call it takes about 5 seconds for the call to connect and start to ring. I also noticed the call volume much louder.
I have E911 service. When making a call to 911 their operator sees my name and address immediately.
All the features from AT&T, (Caller ID, Call waiting, 3-way call, call forwarding etc.) are available and a few that are available only with Vonage. A nice feature, automatic call forwarding if the Internet is experiencing an outage. When logged into the web site or what they call *Dashboard* you can configure the audio quality of your phone line by adjusting how much upload bandwidth is utilized. Set at maximum quality uses about 90k of your upload. They have a convenient Download/Upload measurement page. Also, while logging in at work or anywhere there is internet access, the incoming and out-going calls are logged complete with caller ID. Good for those parents who have teenagers at home while you are at work. Your phone bill automatically increments when *non-free* calls are made.
*Local and long distance calls to all 50 states and Canada are free just like many cell-phone Companies. Calls to the UK, Spain and Dublin and other European countries are free too.
I have the Premium Unlimited Plan @ $24.99 per month plus about $17 in fee's. If all your calls are free your monthly bill would be under $50 for the unlimited calls.
I can go on and on about my experience with Vonage, but I've been typing for over 30 minutes.
5/12/2007
I've had Vonage for a while now and noticed the same good quality making calls to the U.S. But, making international calls to Asia has poor quality with breaking up. Sometimes I simply call the person back, or, actually have to power on reset. I know the problem is within Vonage because I've used a calling card and I get GREAT sound quality without break-ups..
The phone support from Mumbai India is a bit frustrating. They sound like friggin robots. Once you get to level 2 support from New Jersey it gets a little better.
During the Christmas holiday there was an earthquake in Taiwan. I don't know if it is related, but to place a call to Asia, it would take about 45 seconds of dead silence just for the call to go thru. Sometimes I would get a "Line is busy" message. When I finally got connected, the person I was trying to call said "I wasn't on the phone all day". Once apon receiving the busy line message it was over 1 minute. Vonage would proceed to charge me for a call over the 1 minute mark.
1/25/2008
Since my last update until about 2 weeks ago I had nothing but problems with my internet. Since the problems have been fixed I can now experience "beautiful crisp and clear" phone calls. Ever since I joined Vonage the call quality was noticeably "choppy" at times but not to the point of getting aggravated. I'm guessing the "Choppy" quality was due to my internet getting close to a overload with the amount of subscribers that my Download/Upload channel at the CMTS can handle. Since last May I'm guessing Comcast signed up one too many people and never made the accommodations via their network.
Vonage's rates for international calls are reasonable and you can use a prepaid calling card and simply dial the local access number which is unlimited.
9/20/2008
Still going smooth since my internet connection was fixed earlier this year. I'm still dialing a local number and using a prepaid telecom to place my international calls. I might stay with Vonage as long as they can stay alive. 
7/10/2010
Almost 2 years later and I'm just happy they are still in business! The cost per month is hovering around $40 per month and no problems..
4/18/2013
Back in November of 2012 I cancelled Vonage. After 2 months I had enough with MJ's blocking calling card access numbers and went back to Vonage. They have a 30 day money back guarantee and I noticed I was finally able to get my number ported after the 30 day period passed.
I found out that they now have free calls to Globe Telecom subscribers in the Philippines. So now I'm enjoying unlimited international calls and monthly phone bill around $36.83.
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 Review by UFO BOGIE 1
member for 5 years, 43 visits, last login: 48 days ago
updated 48 days ago
- Wichita,Sedgwick,KS
- $25 per month
- "Fair Service, support Pretty Good ???"
- "Over Priced"
- "Dropped Vontage, went to a GO Phone"
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I had ATT. for about 6 years , got tired of them, always took to long to talk to a PERSON.. Time for a change . So I went with Vonage, Just have had the service about 60 days so far, & Very Happy I made the move so far,.. I like the cost, and the extras you get, a lot more for free, that you have to pay for with a land line , so far I really like the service, Tech support has been a lot better too. & there cheaper too.. Will let ya know how it goes in a few months. Update...7/2/08... Vonage..Rocks.. Very Happy with the service.... Glad I made the move to Voip. 2/1/09.. And Vonage is still giving me pretty good service.. Think I'll stick with them.. 8-25-09... Dropped Vonage..Thay are getting to expensive . so I got me a Go Phone & run on it & Magic Jack this is workin pretty good for me,, I'm not on the phone that much.. so now my phone bill is running about 120 bucks a year...(; Happy-Happy
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Review by Mr_A1
member for 9.1 years, 3219 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 51 days ago
- Dickson,Dickson,TN
- $16 per month
- (12 month contract)
- about 5 days
- "BasicTalk price is very good."
- "Make sure you do some research to open correct firewall ports so you can receive best quality possible."
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Due to AT&T CallVantage service being discontinued, I decided to try Vonage as a value replacement. The changeover was easy and the equipment came fairly fast, but the call quality and features are not the same as AT&T for the same amount of money being paid per month. I will definitely be changing over the AT&T U-Verse Voice when I order their tv and internet services. Vonage still has a long way to go to provide better services like outgoing caller id along with other features now found on other carriers like a phone book, etc and really need to do something about improving their call quality.
Update: After about 5 years after this review was written, I have returned back to Vonage using their BasicTalk Plan; they have definitely improved. The BasicTalk adapter although easy is not that great, but at least my old VPortal adapter still works and was able to be changed back to it with the correct ports opened in my router. The call quality is a lot better than years ago, and for the price it just works since I need to have some sort of home phone line at my home.
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 | | uverse sucks No comparison to Direct TV! U-VERSE is BAD technology! | |
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 Review by CheckFire
member for 9.3 years, 3035 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 73 days ago
- Abbotsford,BC
- Contract price not specified.
- "Low cost , no long distance charges"
- "network issues can degrade service"
- "good product , low price"
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I have had the service for 6+ years now and it has never let me down.
Even with having a problem with my ISP not being able to provide
solid throughput I have only had minor quality problems with Vonage.
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 Review by Jeffrey
member for 10.4 years, 4244 visits, last login: 1 days ago
updated 80 days ago
- Huntington Station,Suffolk,NY
- $35 per month
- about 3 days
- "Call Quality, Price, Features"
- "Tech Support"
- "Great Service, Good value for the $"
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3/3/2013 Update:
No complaints about services. Still missing a feature or two and the price is increasing a bit, but still a great value and service I'm happy to pay for.
1/12/2011 Update:
Service continues to be excellent once again. No issues, and features, price and reliability, are one of the best buys in the business. Only wish they would get that app for CDMA smart phones.
3/4/2010 Update:
Vonage service continues to be excellent. No issues or problems to report, the service still works quite well. Currently, two Vonage voice lines and 1 fax line all working with no problems. Family members enjoy the features and calling plans [to other countries] so everyone loves it. A+.
The price above ($33) is for one line.
1/14/2009 Update:
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Still fantastic service and call quality. There are no issues to report, no changes in service or expectations. Price remains at a great point, and Vonage, for me, is an excellent VoIP service that works well for me with no problems. Only thing is that I would like to change my outgoing name for the caller ID from "unknown name" to my name, and I'm sure there is a way to do that, but I just haven't even researched it. That would be my only "complaint", but it's not really a fair one since I haven't even researched how to fix it yet.  Anyway, continued great service from Vonage. Would recommend them highly.
5/11/2008 Update:
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Still fantastic service. No issues, call clarity still fantastic. Features still amazing. No way I'd give up Vonage. I had to call my parents in several cities in Australia in March of 2008, and it cost less than $1 extra to talk to them for 45 minutes. You can't beat that! A+++ Service.
10/15/2007 Update:
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It's been a little over 6 months since my last review, and nothing much to say other than that quality is as good or better as before. In addition, new features were rolled out this summer as well as world-calling plans. Service and price remain outstanding, and I love what Vonage provides. We still have 3 lines (2 voice, 1 fax) here and all working fine.
Vonage and Sprint recently settled, which is good news. Litagtion with Verizon is still on-going, and no one really knows how that will pan out.
The only negative that I can find is that tech support is not the best---I often find an answer to my technical question at third-party websites, and not Vonage's. Little tricks here and there if a hiccup occurs in the service, for example.
I plan on keeping Vonage - the service and is just too good, and the price is too perfect for me to go anywhere else.
--- April 7th, 2007 update ---
Vonage continues to be great for our phone system. We have 3 Vonage lines, 2 regular and 1 fax that work perfectly. Call quality remains excellent, as do the features. Since my last update, they have offered free International calling to select European countries the customer subscribes to their highest unlimited package, which we do.
The recent court trouble with Vonage will hopefully turn out in Vonage's favor in the end, as we'd hate to lose our Vonage access given the unparralleled quality, features, and price.
That being said, BBR has been an invaluable source of help for me on the occasional time Vonage has gone down (3-4 times per year, totalling perhaps 24 hrs per year). Not "five nines" for reliability, but darn good, and well worth the price.
24 hrs / day = 8544 hrs/year.
24 hrs downtime per year (approx)
= 8520 hours uptime per year out of 8544.
=99.719% uptime. 
9/15/06 Update:
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I wanted to do a Q6 month update, but that didn't happen. So here I am. Vonage, aside from a small handful (greater-than-1-less-than-5) of issues that each of which lasted less than 24 hours since my last update, I continue to give Vonage high marks. In terms of a grading scale, I'll give them an A-. Price has gone up slightly (taxes?), and quality has remained constant--generally very, very good. All the perks - voice mail, call forwarding, etc. have been a great addition to our lives here. As mentioned above, we picked up a 2nd voice line and a fax line, and they too have been very good.
The only downside at this point (that I see) is technical support. I'm actually going to lower my rating on them to a 2 (from a 3) because of a recent issue. Apparently, in a recent firmware push to our ATA's (Motorolla V1005), one of them was successfull and one was not. For the life of me, I coudn't figure out why it was happening or how to fix it. Luckily, I wasn't the only person having the problem. In the Vonage forum here on BBR, user's described my exact situation, and collabratively, we were able to fix it. Apparently, one of the people in the discussion called Vonage Tech Support and they were unable to fix the problem. The user in question then came to the Vonage forum and after some experimentation, was able to get his ATA back working after a series of moderately difficult steps. I find it fortunate that I can continuously come to a place like BBR for help, but I find it troubling that Vonage can't help people in some instances. Granted, much of Vonage's complaints from customers are out of their control, but this was in their control, and I had to come to BBR to get it fixed, not Vonage.com.
For this, I'm lowering my rating of their tech support, but I continue to highly recommend Vonage as a low-cost alternative to high-cost POTS lines, where people also have a reliable, low-latency, high bandwith connection.
--12/09/05 Update ---
It's been a while since I made an update to this, so I figured now was a good time to do so. After 1.5 years of Vonage service with one Vonage line, and about a year with the second line, we have had hardly any problems.
The only "Vonage-specific" problems we have had are:
1) Occasionally, our VM indicator light stays on. A reboot of our Motorolla ATA usually solves that problem.
2) "All circuits are busy" happens a few times a month, but upon hanging up and redialing the # that generated that error, the call goes through.
We used to have Cablevision's Optimum Online as our ISP, but we now we have Verizon FiOS and have had Fios since May of 2005. Since Fios, there has been zero (I really mean zero) problems with voice or call quality -- when we had Optimum, occasionally there would be some echoing or stuttering, but again, that was relatively rare.
We just purchased a 3rd line from Vonage (dedicated fax line for $9.99 month), and that too has been great.
Three phone lines in the house now - all Vonage -- 2 voice, 1 fax. Total bill for all 3 comes to less than $70 per month, which was the cost of our old POTS line including all the taxes, fees, and the moderate long distance calls we made. Now, our bill is always the same, quality and features are better, and with Fios, no latency so voice quality is exceptional.
Big thumbs up for Vonage.
Note: Since the parents have become more accustomed to the "perks" with Vonage, they have said to me they don't know how they could live without the "free" features Vonage offers compared to our old POTS; Voicemail, call waiting, and especially, call forwarding.
After deciding that paying MCI $75/month for local and long distance was too much, we checked out Vonage in May of 2004.
Setup was a little confusing, and only because of the limitation of the Motorolla ATA. Apparently, this device can be used either in front of or behind the router. By default, the device is setup to work in front of the router. However, this device is a poor NAT device, and based upon the comments and suggestions found here at BBR, the decision was made to change the settings on my ATA so that it could just be plugged into a switch.
Before I did this, the ATA would lockup a lot. But, after putting the device after the router (and into a switch), the connections have been rock solid.
The advantage of putting the ATA behind the router is stability. The disadvantage is that the ATA's internal QoS is disabled. There is no way to use the QoS with the ATA behind the router. However, with my cable provider (Optimum Online), connection speeds are sufficient that no QoS is needed. (10Mb/1Mb). Additionally, my router has it's own QoS settings that can be used (if needed) to prioritize devices based upon their MAC address. So, the Motorolla's own QoS settings that are now disabled since it's plugged into my switch have no effect on me.
Other than that, call quality and value for the money are fantastic. No complaints at all. One time out of a hundred they'll be a dropped call, as well as the occasional voice mail issue. However, these are minor issues and in no way would they make me change.
We liked it so much, that we just picked up a 2nd ATA for our 2nd Vonage line.
Great value.
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 Review by jaa
member for 12.9 years, 6105 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 80 days ago
- New Canaan,Fairfield,CT
- $17 per month
- about 5 days
- "Perfect quality, good value"
- "Website reliability a little shakey"
- "Excellent value!"
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Ordered my line, got it in a few days. Plug-and-play - absolutely no problems. Took 4 weeks to get my number from at&t assigned - Vonage did everything after I sent in the paperwork, and sent an email with about 12 hours notice when the cutover was to occur.
The quality is excellent - better than my regular phone line. The value is incredible - 500 minutes anywhere in North America loaded with features (voice mail, callerid, etc) for 25% less than the cost of a stripped down POTS line from at&t!
The phone service has been 100% reliable since we got it. The website has had some issues.
We have a second phone line from at&t that we use for outgoing local calls and fax, as well as dialtone when the power is out. Vonage will forward our calls to the POTS line automatically when our internet is out. We also like POTS for 911 service - even though we setup Vonage for 911, I like having the true e911 through POTS.
One line, 500-minute plan. Total monthly bill: $19.50.
Been over 3 years now - working great!! Love the features (and the price!!).
Update: Over 4 years now, still working great!! Better quality and reliability than our POTS service from at&t.
Update May, 2009: 5 years now. Switched from the $20/mo 500 minute plan to the $300/yr unlimited plan. Now worry about minutes. No issues.
Update October, 2010: Over 6 years; service is still great. I REALLY like receiving my voicemail in my email - WITH a transcription of the message so I can read it instead of listening.
Update December, 2011: Another year of excellent service. $365 per year including all taxes and fees.
Update August, 2012: Still going strong. Thinking about dropping my POTS line now.
Update March, 2013: Finally did it - dropped my POTS line. Just cell and internet phones.
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Review by .
(review was emailed in)
lodged 104 days ago
- undisclosed location
 Business customer- Contract price not specified.
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jkjhkhjhkh
Comments:
Hackster3Hackster3
join:2002-05-07
Richmond Hill, NY | Vonage I have had Vonage for 4 yrs. and I must say their isn't a month that goes by without some sort of problem! Either someone dials my home phone and I get the call on my cell. Or I pick up the home phone while it is ringing and no one is on the other end! $39 a month opposed to $135 for Verizon, I'll keep it! But it really does suck!!!! | |
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 Review by DJRank1
member for 7.7 years, 189 visits, last login: 63 days ago
updated 110 days ago
- Pittsburg,Contra Costa,CA
- $24 per month
- "Very afforable"
- "Callers on other end have trouble hearing me"
- "Good"
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I have been on Vonage for a few months now and I would like to say that it's a very good service. I've never had any problems, it's very convienient with all of it's features that they provide. The sound quality sounds great but sometimes callers that i'm talking to complain that they have trouble hearing me. Other than that the service is great! I ditched my telco company so they are totally out of the picture! I have everything running through cable with Comcast for the TV and internet and Vonage utilizing the internet provided by Comcast. I would recommend Vonage to anyone willing to save some money and have a little more features than what AT&T provides. Good job Vonage! =)
2/1/13
UPDATE: This is an old review but wouldn't mind having Vonage again...
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 Review by mahermusic
member for 11.8 years, 3492 visits, last login: 11 days ago
updated 113 days ago
- U.S.A.
- $15 per month
- "Low $$$, Crystal Clear Sound Quality, Much better service than Verizon"
- "None"
- "Get it.... save the moolah!"
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We just had our 10-Year anniversary with Vonage on March 7, 2013. Service is reliable, and sound quality is crystal-clear. No problems ever in those 10 years.
Also got nine Vonage referrals within that time, some of those going on or past their 8-year anniversary.
I'm so happy I ditched POTS all those years ago.... I've saved SO MUCH $$$ from AT&T and Verizon over that time.... makes me smile just thinking about it!
Attaboy, Vonage!!!
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| | They screwed up my phone number switch I just lost my number because of the incapacity of these people to do anything right .
I am realy upset with Vonage. Their quality service is zero. | |
| | | reply march 7 2013???? you sure about that | |
| | | | Re: reply Yup, of course! | |
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Review by scokill5
member for 11.4 years, 7 visits, last login: 141 days ago
lodged 141 days ago
- Rowlett,Dallas,TX
- $35 per month
- about 5 days
- "Call quality great, no outages"
- "No forward thinking features"
- "Great service, not as big of savings as it used to be with more competitive pricing"
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I've had vonage pretty much since the service started years ago. I did switch to Verizon's Voip service briefly before they discontinued and they were completely horrible, so I switched back to vonage.
I have Verizon FIOS service and have never had one issue with Vonage whatsoever. Call quality is great, website is average but I don't use it that much, have never had to call customer service, but I'm sure they would be average at best as are most telcos.
When I first subscribed if you were on a $25/month deal, you were charged $25/month, and then along the way they started adding taxes and fees like all the other telcos. So now $25 is more like $35. Can't blame them for it, but now they are more in line with everyone else. You could probably get a bundle of internet/TV/phone with the phone portion cheaper than vonage. I have FIOS but don't like FIOS TV, so I have internet and a business line for my wife bundled. I pay a little more for the business line in the Verizon bundle than our home line with Vonage by the time you add features, unlimited long distance, etc., I guess if you just want a home phone to backup you cell phones, you could go to a minute based plan and save some money though.
I do have to make international calls for work sometimes and it is nice to have dirt cheap to free rates for these calls.
My biggest complaint is that selective call screening has been a feature that has been requested by throngs of users over the years and they still won't offer. My work around is a google voice account which I use simul ring to send to both my home phone and google voice. I setup call block to intercept sales calls and use the spam control on google voice. When someone on the blocked or spam list calls me, google voice sends to disconnected recording and my home phone gets 1/2 a ring and the call goes away. Over time, this has cut my unwanted calls almost down to zero. Before I did this I was getting 5 calls per day and now maybe 2/month get through and I just mark them as spam and they never get through.
All in all Vonage is a great choice if you want to save some depending on your situation, but you have to do some research and analyze the alternatives. I wouldn't consider unless you have rock solid broadband internet.
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