how-to block ads
|
»next review in page
Review by ae31451 
Posted: 1.4 years ago
member for 5.5 years, 1 visits, last login: 5.2 years ago
 Sarasota,Sarasota,FL
 Business customer
 $30 per month
 about 1 days
 "Almost everything"
 "CNAM Service is lacking... Only number is provided on CID"
 "Wonderful, I've had no problems and service is priced right."
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
I'm using CC for call overflow. We have 10 copper lines, and route outgoing calls over SIP.
Followup comments: | Forums » comments on review of Callcentric |
 | »next review in page (previous review)
Review by jbraden
UPDATED: 1.4 years ago
member for 4.5 years, 82 visits, last login: 1.4 years ago
Lincoln,Middlesex,MA
$3 per month (month by month)
about 5 days
"Great technical support, reliable, a-la-carte pricing"
"none"
"One of the better choices for VOIP"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
I was a SunRocket customer when that company went belly-up. I signed on with ViaTalk at that time, and there were months of pain while ViaTalk tried to absorb the tremendous flood of new customers. Things have finally improved, but soon after getting ViaTalk, I decided I needed another provider as a back-up. Since I still had my SunRocket Gizmo, I was able to use BYOD at CallCentric. I signed up for their IP Freedom plan initially (completely free), and CallCentric customer service helped me get my Innomedia MTA-6328 set up to use their service. It took some trial-and-error since I was one of the first trying to use this adapter. The IP Freedom plan lets you exchange calls with other CallCentric customers, and also with other VOIP customers whose provider supports the SIP Broker service. CallCentric even sponsors a number of PSTN telephone numbers around the world which provide free access to the SIP Broker network. See »www.sipbroker.com/sipbroker/action/login for information about SIP Broker.
You can also get a free PSTN number in the state of Washington from »www.ipkall.com/ and use that to access your CallCentric number. Since this is a back-up phone service for me, I rarely had the need to make outgoing calls, but recently I signed up for the Pay-Per-Call plan to make this a fully functional phone and I've taken advantage of the extra line. This adds a charge of $2.37/mo for 911 service in the US (plus a one-time setup fee of $2.03), but there are no other charges unless you make outbound calls. Those cost about 1 cent/min. for toll free numbers and 2 cents/min for regular US numbers.
Overall, I'd recommend CallCentric as one of the better choices for VOIP. They have the absolute lowest cost VOIP options for free and pay-as-you-go plans and offer a high quality service. Their unlimited plans are also very competitive if you do a lot of calling, and their international rates are almost always the lowest of any provider.
Followup comments: | Forums » comments on review of Callcentric |
| »next review in page (previous review)
Review by (hidden by request)
Posted: 1.4 years ago
(review was emailed from domain xoxy.net)
Los Angeles,Los Angeles,CA
$3 per month (month by month)
"Very good customer service; well-designed website and control centre"
"None, really"
"An excellent service"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
Very good customer service; well-designed website and control centre.
No bad points I can think of.
An excellent service.
Followup comments: | Forums » comments on review of Callcentric |
| »next review in page (previous review)
Review by rdcuff
UPDATED: 1.4 years ago
member for 1.4 years, 1 visits, last login: 1.4 years ago
Allentown,Lehigh,PA
$3 per month
"Dashboard, plans / packages, support"
"Have to buy your own ATA but that is easy to do"
"Recommended if you are willing to buy your own ATA"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
I have used both Skype and Gizmo Project (now Gizmo5). I had a Zingotel account but canceled it due to mediocre call quality and lousy customer support. After buying my own ATA (Grandstream 486 from »www.voipsupply.com) ostensibly to use with Gizmo5, I came across CallCentric and their consistently good marks while searching for bring-your-own-device ("BYOD") plans, so I decided to take the plunge.
I was up and running in about 5 minutes.
I am using a $2.95/month PSTN in my home area (so others can easily call me).
So far I am using their pay-as-you-go plan (1.98 cents/min to USA) that will probably be less expensive for me than their unlimited plans.
Don't be intimidated by having to set up an analog telephone adapter (ATA). If you can use a web browser you can do it, especially with CallCentric, because they provide very easy-to-follow setup procedures for 10 different analog adapters.
I purchased my ATA from Voipsupply.com and would highly recommend them. Very quick turnaround -- 3 days from order to receipt using FedEx Ground.
The ATA setup went fine - took roughly 2 minutes to fill out the setup information using the web interface of the ATA.
The web-based product ordering functions were simple and painless and were processed immediately.
So far, call quality is better than it was with both GizmoProject and Zingotel. Only slightly worse than PSTN quality with better-than-average latency.
There are no contracts to sign...everything is handled month-to-month, so cancellation does not appear to be onerous.
You have very little to lose...you can start off by using a softphone -- Callcentric has their own which you can freely download -- and can then start with a $5 deposit to a pay-as-you-dial plan.
So far, highly recommended, as most others here are saying...will update as I gain experience.
Followup comments: | Forums » comments on review of Callcentric |
| »next review in page (previous review)
Review by chuck_brown
Posted: 1.4 years ago
member for 7.3 years, 8 visits, last login: 1 year ago
Frisco,Denton,TX
$12 per month
"Great website, the dashboard and support area are excellent."
"None at this time."
"So far so good..."
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
I've been burned by SunRocket (pre-pay) and now going through the Vonics outages (pre-pay). I like the option of pay-as-you-go with Callcentric and the rates seem to be reasonable.
I have my own adapter and I followed their on-line directions and had it setup and working in less than 20 minutes. You can setup an account for free to give it a try.
I'm in the process of porting my number and I'll report back after I've used the service for awhile. But, so far so good!
Followup comments: | Forums » comments on review of Callcentric |
| »next review in page (previous review)
 Review by benc
Posted: 1.6 years ago
member for 2.4 years, 789 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Glen Carbon,Madison,IL
$6 per month
"Toll-Free Rates seem good. Other rates seem good."
"No phone support."
"I like the Calling Card feature, and it's the chief reason I have this."
| |
I got this a little while ago.
One nifty little feature is their "calling card" feature. You can designate one of your incoming numbers to be used for this. You can also decide on a PIN number.
If used in conjunction with toll-free, it means you can use payphones, hotel phones, or any phone line and make outgoing calls at whatever rate your rate plan charges.
I use Pay Per Use Outgoing ($.02/min.) along with Toll-Free ($.03/incoming minutes). So that's $.05/min. It's not a good deal if you make a call local to whatever phone you're using, but it's a really really good deal if you want to use a payphone or hotel phone and make a long distance call.
Reliability: Seems good, although not as good as POTS.
Apart from the lack of phone support, any other downsides apply to VOIP in general and aren't specific to CallCentric in particular.
As for the upsides, at least the rates reflect what you're getting. So I don't get the feeling that they overcharge at all.
Plus another upside is that they don't require or expect you to use their ATA/VOIP device, if you want to use it at home.
Personally, I don't use it at home. That's what my POTS line is for. But the calling card feature is cool. It might be useful if you want additional voice lines for an Asterisk PBX, but reliability isn't paramount.
It's hard to judge the reliability, since I don't have an SLA for my Internet connection. However, so far it hasn't had any multi-day outages like some VOIP companies.
Because it's VOIP, I wouldn't rely on it as a primary line. But for the money, I think it's a good value.
Followup comments: | Forums » comments on review of Callcentric |
| »next review in page (previous review)
Review by claus143
UPDATED: 1.7 years ago
member for 2.6 years, 18 visits, last login: 1.5 years ago
Lawrenceville,Gwinnett,GA
$2 per month
"Great service, very inexpensive"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
I had the basic (free) package - IP Freedom - for about a month and I decided to go with something else. I bought a DID number from them and I'm very happy with the purchase. They have the lowest prices on web for DID numbers. Overall, a great experience with this VOIP provider.
Followup comments: | Forums » comments on review of Callcentric |
| »next review in page (previous review)
Review by dkbryant
UPDATED: 1.8 years ago
member for 1.8 years, 39 visits, last login: 1.1 years ago
Cypress,Harris,TX
$10 per month
"No Tax, Few Fees, Perfect Customer Service, Completely BYOD"
"No CNAME on Caller ID (Number only) yet; No Call Transfer yet."
"Far and away, hands down, the BEST VoIP you can find, bar NONE!"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
First off I'll start with the price. There are three basic configs.
1) FREE VoIP to VoIP. Great to test it out for a few months before you buy in.
2) Pay-Per-Call
---- Free VoIP-VoIP
---- Outgoing call rate of 1.98 cents / US-US minute
---- Unlimited incoming calls for $2.95 / month per phone # (DID).
---- All Fees total $2.37 / month. The state of NY is the only one taxed.
+++ Total monthly bill AFTER FEES = $5.32 / month per phone # + 1.98 cents / outgoing minute.
3) Unlimited*
---- Free VoIP-VoIP
---- Unlimited outgoing calls for $19.95 / month per phone # (DID).
---- Unlimited incoming calls for $2.95 / month per phone # (DID).
---- All Fees total $2.37 / month. The state of NY is the only one taxed.
+++ Total monthly bill AFTER FEES = $25.27 / month.
*NOTE: There is a 1.98 cents / US-US minute on 3-way calling and international rates are still charged on outgoing. All clearly spelled out in their FAQ in English, not Legalease.
=== So $10.00 a month = unlimited incoming + 236 min outgoing
=== So $15.00 a month = unlimited incoming + 489 min outgoing
=== So $20.00 a month = unlimited incoming + 741 min outgoing
=== So $25.00 a month = unlimited incoming + 994 min outgoing
=== So $25.27 a month = unlimited incoming + unlimited min outgoing
Features (I use):
-- No overages, pure Pre-Pay. You prepay in $5 increments into your account, and that is the only money they touch. So for unlimited plans, you would make $30 deposit the first month, $25 deposit the second month and a $25 deposit the third month. You can make the deposit at anytime, so long as the account is positive your phone is on.
-- Call Waiting, 3-way, ## Caller ID.
-- Realtime Call reports - You can log into the web page and get real-time (1-2 second delay) reports of all call activity going WAY back.
-- Directory - You get 100 phone-book entries you can make. Anyone in the phone book or in CallCentric's Public address book gets full NAME Caller ID.
-- Call Treatment - You can set up simple or very complex call treatments. They can be set on precedence and ORed together. You can make it pretty verbose.
-- SIP Broker Peering - **257 gets you from CallCentric to SIPBroker, once at SIP broker you can make tons of VoIP-VoIP calls.
-- CallingCard - You can call into your account and use it as a calling card. Even the AT&T calling cards are usually 3 cents / minute. 1.98 cents / US-US minute is hard to beat.
-- Click 2 Call - Web based telephony - This lets you enter two phone numbers (from and to), then their server calls the "from" number and transfers the call to the "to" number. Makes a call into two incoming calls. Once you bang around VoIP for a while you will find a use for this. Both To and From can also be SIP URIs.
==================
Now, here's how you put it all together. First thing you need is a good broadband connection. If your broadband is bad, no VoIP will be good regardless of what they claim. Mine is 3500 Kbps down and 350 Kbps up. This works perfectly.
Next thing you will need is a VoIP ATA. I got an Innomedia SIP MTA-6328 because its one of the devices CallCentric has tested and since SunRocket folded you can get them CHEAP on ebay. Mine cost $1.05.
Next thing you might want to do is to get a handful of CallCentric free accounts. I started with 6 accounts (1 home, 1 fax, 2 PC phones, 2 VoIP Cell phones).
Now once you get all that, it's time to put it together. The first order of business was to unlock the MTA (locked by sunrocket). If you want to skip this step, buy and Unlocked device from Linksys (about $60). To unlock the InnoMedia I used this procedure:
»gizmopasswords.blogspot.com/
Do read all the comments for some hints. One hint is to download the NET-SNMP binaries from sourceforge so you can unlock it from either Windows or Linux.
Once the MTA is unlocked just follow the step-by-step at the CallCentric web site. They give step-by-step on quite a few devices, so you can pick whichever one you feel comfortable with. One deviation from their config that I suggest is to try the High Bandwidth codecs if you can. There suggestions steer you to the low bandwidth codecs for stability, but if you need the low bandwidth codecs, you probably don't have enough bandwidth to seriously use VoIP as a land-line replacement (in my opinion). Another suggestion would be to turn on QoS. For the InnoMedia MTA, I reserved about 200Kbps down and 2000Kbps up for VoIP when calls were in session. More than I need, but I love the stellar quality I get with it.
Now for me, the next course of action was to turn VoIP on for my cell phones:
»forum.xda-developers.com/showthr···t=299950
Now I tested for a few weeks till I was satisfied, and put some money down on a pay-per call account. Now that I had funds I could make outgoing calls to non VoIP lines at 1.98 cents / min. This is where the CallingCard feature came in handy. Since I don't use VoIP exclusively on my Cell, being able to turn it on and off was nice. Whenever I wanted to make an outgoing call I used the CallingCard feature since calling the Calling Card access number was VoIP to VoIP, then from there I could hop to a PSTN line. So I have one CallCentric # with funds attached to it, and 5 other accounts that draw from those funds via CallingCard calls. For the cellphones, CallingCards can be integrated using this:
»forum.xda-developers.com/showthr···4&page=2
Final hurdle was VoIP on my PC's. At home X-Lite works great. I'd suggest you buy a bluetooth earbud and skip the need for PC headset and mic. PC Telephony with a bluetooth headset is just fantastic. Only problem left to me was VoIP at work. I work weekends on occasion and my Lab has no Cell reception or land lines. Port 5600 (VoIP) is blocked by my company firewall so no PC phones work. The answer was gtalk2voip. I set up an account and use call-treatments to forward my calls to GoogleTalk. Since GoogleTalk is an allowed app, it's ports are unblocked.
VoIP 24 hours a day. Great Quality and Great Service. I'm a believer.
Way to go CallCentric.
-Dan
Followup comments: | Forums » comments on review of Callcentric |
| »next review in page (previous review)
Review by veldy
Posted: 1.8 years ago
member for 10.3 years, 260 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Minneapolis,Anoka,MN
Contract price not specified.
"Excellent Customer Service. Very quick response and thorough. BYOD does not force provisioning."
"Busy signals to some destinations when other providers get through."
"Highly recommend if you they have what you are looking for."
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
Call Centric has a highly configurable service with a lot of features. I really like how they do business. Call quality to their test number was good (17771234567). You are stuck dialing 10 digit number with their default setup, which is a pain. Fortunately, I found the following dialplan which solves that problem (not listed on their site):
(*xx.|*xxx|.75xx|[3469]11|0|00|[2-9]xxxxxx|[2-9]xxxxxxxxx|1[2-9]xxxxxxxxxS0|011[2-9]x.|**275*x.)
Substitute the 763 with your own area code to get 7-digit dialing to work properly.
I was not able to get a FAX issue solved though. I use an SPA-2102 with 5.1.12 firmware and followed all their directions, tried several tweaks of my own [and unfortunately misled tech support with errant screen prints, but they were still helpful]. I suspect their T.38 implementation may have an issue but was unable to fax over straight G.711, but if you want to use them for FAX service, try it out for yourself as they are quite cheap to test with (I have not given up yet).
They were a great voice service [except calls to certain 651 area code numbers were always choppy ... probably an upstream provider that they should deal with - I didn't bring it up to them].
They have free accounts. You can try calling other callcentric lines for free. You can deposit a small amount ($5) and make a lot of test calls to real phone numbers and see for yourself. They really are risk free.
I recommend them to anybody looking for something fresh and supportive.
Followup comments: | Forums » comments on review of Callcentric |
| »next page (previous review)
Review by erikthebean
Posted: 1.8 years ago
member for 2.4 years, 656 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Manchester,Hillsborough,NH
Contract price not specified.
"Freakin Great"
"No caller id name"
"Who cares about the caller id name"
| Web-site:
Ease of Installation:
Call Quality:
Reliability:
Tech Support:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
|
This service is A+. So many options from payg to monthly service. Always stable, and they have every phone number around. Now only if they sold their own ATA's that would be great too.
Followup comments: | Forums » comments on review of Callcentric |
|
|
Callcentric
(27)
·
·
I have it set up so that when I call from my cellphone my wife sees the caller ID name as something too obscene to say here.