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 Review by DeeChandel 
member for 5.2 years, 967 visits, last login: 1.7 years ago
updated 4.2 years ago
 Edmonton,AB
 Contract price not specified.  "Cost, customer service, quality of voice, reliability" "Website could be better" "Excellent service and quality"
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------ update February 22, 2009 ------
I have been using their service now for over six months and have two pay-as-you-go accounts. The service has been very reliable and the voice quality very close to POTS. Customer service is very responsive. Also, still the cheapest rates for most countries. Keep up the good work Nitzan!
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I have been using FN for nearly two months and have nothing but positive thing to say about their service. The voice quality is excellent and customer service is top notch. Their rates are amongst the cheapest in the VOIP world.
I would recommend their service to anyone without hesitation. Thing to be kept in mind is that they are mainly a BYOD service provider.
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Review by westec2
member for 4.3 years, 0 visits, last login: 4.3 years ago
updated 4.3 years ago
- Tucson,Pima,AZ
- Contract price not specified.
- "Quality & Price"
- "Outgoing CallerID options, if anyone would actually pay for it anyway?"
- "Amazing!!!!"
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This service is really amazing... we cut our phone bill from $22-40/mo to $0-5/mo. We're using Pay As You Go, F9 is the cheapest I could find that had good reviews.. and I can see why. I'm sold on voip now.
I used the faq on the F9 website to do the setup for a new linksys pap2t from amazon, and used ipkall for a free phone number. I did ditch dd-wrt on my linksys wrt54g router, and switched to tomato for it's better QOS options (do a google search for instructions to setup voip on tomato.)
I connected the pap2t line 1 output to our media center so that it goes out to each room in the house.. all work great, including 3 cordless phones 
I gave a 5 for tech support even though I didn't need any... I saw the guy from F9 helps people a lot on here.. that's really nice considering how little $ they must make off us (or at least, people like me.)
The lacking feature on the website is a comprehensive list of rates, but if you type in the number, it tells you anyway.
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 Review by fukitol
member for 11.9 years, 5094 visits, last login: a few hours ago
lodged 4.3 years ago
- Fishers,Hamilton,IN
 Business customer- $5 per month
 about 2 days- "cheap, but rock-solid"
- "Web site needs a bit of work"
- "gets 'er done"
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I've had Future Nine's PAYG plan for a couple months, for my small business. Actually, PAYG is for outgoing non-800 calls only ($0.01/min. in the U.S.); all incoming calls, as well as outgoing toll-free calls, are no extra charge. Customer service is always responsive whenever I've had a concern - which happens almost never. Call quality is perfect, except when my Internet connection is acting up (not F9's fault).
Only down sides:
- The Web site is rather utilitarian. I don't know how much this impacts F9's ability to get new customers.
- I'd love outgoing CNAM, which F9 doesn't provide. However, that's one reason why it's cheap. Wholesale carriers who provide this feature charge a rather extortionate amount for it.
Overall, two thumbs up.
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Review by shollander
member for 11.1 years, 154 visits, last login: 2.2 years ago
updated 4.3 years ago
- USA
- $13 per month
- (month by month)
- about 5 days
- "price, voice quality, tech support, CID name, no hidden fees"
- "no automatic billing, no safe forward number, no E911"
- "Highly recommended !"
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UPDATE: Just successfully ported my number in exactly 3 weeks. Service is still excellent, no problems to report.
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This is my first time using a BYOD provider so I bought a Linksys RTP300 from ebay (approx. $16.50 incl. shipping). Once I got rid of the Vonage firmware it was a breeze to setup F9. They have very clear instructions on their website. (I must admit it is much more enjoyable to use my own device which can be configured to my own specs, than being stuck with the providers device and configuration .) Call quality has been excellent, much better than what I have experienced in the past from voip providers (Packet8 and ATT). I did have a little issue in getting my DID number. It took them 5 days to get it to me, claimed it was because their carrier was being slow because of the Thanksgiving holiday. Otherwise I have not had any serious issues.
Tech support is excellent. Always a quick and relevant response.
Call quality is excellent on both ends.
No hidden fees. They are commited to charging you only the advertised price. No taxes and fees. With my previous provider (ATT) for a $24.95 monthly plan, I was paying over $30 /month after taxes and fees. With F9, They advertise $13.50 a month and that is all that is deducted from my account at the beginning of the month.
Everyone seems to complain about their website. It's not the prettiest, but there is a lot there and it grows on you after a little.
One thing I wish they had was a way to charge my credit card automatically. The way they have it currently set up is you have to manually add money to you account (through paypal or google checkout). It's just a little inconvenience. They told me they might add this functionality at some point in the future.
Another missing feature is a safe forward number. The ability to set a phone number to ring only when your ATA is offline. If you need to be reachable 100% of the time, this could be a problem. (There is a way to configure a second number to ring after your ATA rings, but then your voicemail will never pick up. If you use an answering machine instead of voicemail this is not an issue for you.)
They don't currently offer E911 but it seems that they have plans for adding it in the near future.
Keep in mind that they are still in beta, so some (minor) features are missing, but will hopefully be added eventually.
All in all, it is a value that cannot be beat. Their prices are without question the lowest around (including international rates - I call the UK for less than 1 cent a minute!) and the service is also great - not what you would expect for the price. You can read this article »ezinearticles.com/?Things-to-Kno···=1464025 from the CEO of Future Nine, I think he hit the nail right on the head.
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 Review by Ben
member for 5.9 years, 1621 visits, last login: 7 days ago
updated 4.8 years ago
- Glen Carbon,Madison,IL
- $1 per month
- about 1 days
- "Call Quality Seems Good. BYOD OK. Nitzan is helpful. Usage based pricing isn't outrageous."
- "Website isn't fancy. Not recommended for average Joes/Janes. No toll-free numbers at the moment."
- "You should consider them, if you're an American."
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August 2nd, 2008:
I have the pay-as-I-go, pay per minute option. Costs are $.01/min. for American phone calls. I currently don't have a DID through them.
I was interested because I wanted to get an additional outgoing channel that I could use as spill-over (in case I run out of channels).
I was not impressed with the website. It's not a huge deal to me, but it might turn off some people. If the service is fine, I can care less.
As far as I know, you're expected to BYOD. To me that's perfect. Any VOIP service I can't set up as a SIP trunk in Asterisk is useless to me, as Asterisk is what got me interested in VOIP in the first place. After signing up, there's even a page where you can copy and paste to get Asterisk settings, which is awesome I think.
However, if you just want to plug stuff in and start calling ASAP this isn't for you. Some configuration is required.
Nitzan, who posts here and runs F-9, is quite helpful. That's a LOT more than what can be said about other providers, where you might have to deal with Tier 1 support (who usually knows little) before you get to Tier 2 support.
I asked him about toll-free numbers, which unfortunately he doesn't have right now. It's not a big deal.
For pay as you go $.01/min. is tough to beat. That's only $.60 for an hour of calling.
Nothing against Nitzan, but since the service is new I can only recommend them as a back-up or secondary service. I'm always somewhat leery about relying on a new company as the primary provider. If he keeps the company going a long time perhaps I will change my stance on this issue.
The lack of 911 fees is another bonus. I have a POTS line so I don't want to pay 911 fees.
While not a big deal, when I used Paypal my account on F-9 didn't show the new balance instantaneously. This meant I had to wait a few hours before I could try making any calls. So this means that if you want to keep using the service you can't wait until you have only $.10 left before you add more money. They also offer Google Checkout, but I didn't want to do that because it means registering for that. I already had a Paypal account because of E-bay, which I'm sure everyone here has used from time to time.
Why did I say that you should consider them if you're American? It's because as far as I know he doesn't offer DIDs in other countries. That's the only reason why.
While it's not something you should rely on exclusively, it's something to consider to supplement what you already have. If you're comfortable with BYOD then I'd say give them a shot. He says he'll refund any money paid if you decide the service isn't for you.
Even if I decide that this isn't for me, I'll still recommend giving this service a shot.
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Review by jw08
member for 5.5 years, 823 visits, last login: 3.6 years ago
lodged 4.8 years ago
- Tulsa,Tulsa,OK
- Contract price not specified.
- about 1 days
- "Pay as you go - no monthly fee - the BEST rates."
- "Took a while to get adapter."
- "High quality - low cost - can't be beat."
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Used Vonage (Solid provider) - then Sunrocket (went bust) - then moved to Viatalk (unreliable for me). Needing a backup provider for viatalk and also needing a UK DID i first found callwithus .. and then recently Future-Nine.
I needed an adapter from them - and unfortunately they were out of stock when i needed one .... so it did take around three weeks from asking for adapter to delivery ... however once it arrived - it was plug and play. Call quality to and from the UK (where 95% of my calls are for) has been excellent with only one or two bad connections in several weeks ...
I love the fact that i now have a way to dial the UK for less than one cent per min, compared to Vitalk ($0.0306) and Vonage ($0.0400) its a bargain ! Especially when you consider that you are only paying for the calls that you make - there is no $10, $15, or $25 monthly fee on top.
My interactions with support have all been handled quickly and professionally.
I'd sign up again in a heartbeat.
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Review by wierdo
member for 12.2 years, 1828 visits, last login: 23 days ago
lodged 4.9 years ago
- Tulsa,Tulsa,OK
- $8 per month
- "Price, tech support, US termination"
- "Hit and miss to some destinations, SIP only"
- "It's still beta, but very good for the price, especially if you have a backup"
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I've been using Future Nine for about a month now. I used to mostly use Voxee for termination and Teliax for destinations that Voxee had issues with. With Voxee going away, I had to rethink my strategy.
I started out on straight PAYG, but then needed a DID, so switched over to Bare Essentials plan, since is only an extra $2 a month and includes 250 minutes. The switch happened in a few hours. My only complaint about the process, and it really is nitpicking on my part, is that it takes about a day to get a DID from Future Nine. They do not stock them like other providers do. A side effect of that is that you can't get a list of available numbers and choose one that is best for you.
As far as the termination quality, in the US it's stellar. Internationally it's very good when it works. At this point, I couldn't recommend Future Nine as your sole source for international termination. When I called a particular cell phone (on the Orange network, FWIW) I would get connected to a different destination. Since I was able to easily redial with Teliax, it wasn't a big issue. Other calls, say to a landline, in the DR have been no problem. I've also called Estonia and Brazil with no issues, so it may well be just the one destination.
Of course, things are always changing with Future Nine, what with it being in beta, and improvements are always being made. Since I had my troubles, they have rolled out a new dialing plan that allows you to choose where on the cost/reliability/quality scale you prefer. You can choose between grey, white, and premium routes on a per call basis. Having the premium routing option available may have solved my earlier issues.
Having dispensed with the bad, let me talk about the good. First, the price. Excellent. As in could hardly be better without opening wholesale accounts with large monthly minimums. On top of that, there are no hidden fees. I couldn't ask for more.
Secondly, tech support. Whenever I have an issue, or more often a special request, the response is lightning fast. Sometimes I don't think Nitzan sleeps. Aside from Labor Day weekend, when the response time was a still excellent 6 hours when I really expected a response on Tuesday, I've never waited more than 2 hours for a response. Just as importantly, if there's some technical way in which the service isn't working for me, there is no issue getting it changed so that it works the way I need it to work. Just this morning, at some ungodly early hour when everyone should be in bed, I found that the trunk was returning as answered immediately upon sending the call. I needed it not to return the answered indication until the far end answered. Within half an hour my account had been changed so that the answer was not returned until the far end picked up.
Not only that, but I got an explanation as to why the default was to return answered immediately.
I simply can't say enough good things about the technical support as it currently stands. I have some odd needs, and thus far there's been no issue getting them met.
Thirdly, call quality. I have yet to experience poor quality to any destination. Whatever number in the Dominican Republic I was getting may not have been the right number, but the audio was as clear as can be. Other destinations, both in the US and abroad have been nothing but excellent.
In short, I highly recommend Future Nine if you are calling solely to the US, need a DID, or if you're willing to keep a backup provider around for certain international destinations. I expect that last caveat will be going away as the kinks get worked out of the beta service, but we'll have to see how it goes.
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Review by sponk
member for 8.3 years, 829 visits, last login: 1.6 years ago
updated 4.9 years ago
- Mississauga
- $10 per month
- "Very realiable (good call quality), excellent rates, great customer service and rate change notification!"
- "None so far."
- "Very good value for money. Definitely worth trying!!"
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I signed up with Future-Nine as a prepaid user, so there is no monthly cost, but just my calling credits purchase.
The account was setup instantly and I even received $3 free in calling credits.
What I really appreciated them doing is sending out notifications to customers if the rate for their frequent calling destination changes by double/triple. This enables me to adjust my calling habits accordingly!
So far the call quality, their rates (especially international) and customer service has been excellent and I plan to use them extensively for my international calls.
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