VOIP Tech Chat → Teleblend

No one stayed at Teleblend.

Originally Teleblend was run by humans and robots (hence the word blend) but now only the robots are left.

But you forgot the #1 boss of Sunrocket, Lisa Hook. She and her fellow AOL executives ruined Sunrocket, yet now she is in charge of all American phone number assignments as CEO of Neustar.

I didn't see what you said ... but as background to what I said, keep in mind that many of us BBR long-timers suffered through or, at the very least, were deeply frustrated by the SunRocket debacle in 2007. We all were initially 'fan-boys & fan-gals', praising and defending SR to the hilt ... only to learn in the end that we had been deceived and lied to. This all occurred in the days when porting out a number was a relatively frightening experience because of the immaturity of the VoIP to VoIP porting process.

There is no love lost for the way we were treated and misled in this Forum by some of the then SR (and ultimately Teleblend) staffers leading up to the final days of SR.

Remember good old Georgepan?

Low blow.

His glass was half full and ours was half empty ... in the days leading up to SR's demise ... but George was passionate and sincere in his posts (unlike others who were downright nasty).

His handle, by the way, had been retired by BBR quite some time ago.

I still think he was an affiliate, hence why he disappeared after Sunrocket folded.

Or he may have simply been embarrassed and came back under a new nom de guerre.

I just threw out the sunrocket ATA and boxes a few weeks ago, good times sort of lol
They had so much promise and I seem to remember the final version of the website and portal was great......then the shit hit the fan and some of us went packet8 and some into the blender.

Doubtful but possible. I actually went back and was reading some posts from him, he was on multiple sites selling Sunrocket.

Why? You can still use them with a PBX or another voip service? There have been instructions to do that for years...

This is what I'm going to do and I want your opinion. My ISP, DSL Extreme is renting out equipment in the ATT office and it's maintained by ATT.
I can get their service called Fusion, double my download speed upload speed and have a phone like a VoIP line but it's a hard line.
10-20megs down and a several up and the phone service is $54.00 a month. The phone company is responsible for the up keep of the line all the way to the box here.
I'm paying Teleblend a ridiculous amount of $37.00 a month for crap. After the first year the promo fee only goes up a bit. It's been up and running for them for close to a year now, I see no complaints about it on the board. In addition I'm good friends with one of their Suprv. Techs and we talk on the phone when problems arise.
check it out if you want.

»www.dslextreme.com/fusio ··· idential

Don't know over there, but 'round here (South Florida) cable connections are much faster (especially upstream) and cheaper than DSL.

all we have is TWC here...they're advertising heavily right now on TV.
i've been with this company for almost 10yrs...this deal is phone and dsl for 54$ with about 10-20 down that's fine for me.
Right now I'm paying $37 for net and TB screwing me for another $37.
This is better all the way around for me. I have an unlimited hardline maintained by ATT.
Going to give i a try.

and they better not try laying a ETF for $39.00 on a month to month arrangement!

Cheaper? Yes, absolutely, for the first 6 months of CONcast special.

Cheaper for what you get, I think. DSL upstream is just...yucky.

Little known fact ... George had been scheduled to travel to the sun with the SunRocket crew ... but he changed his plan when he learned that the trip to the sun would be carried out at night to avoid being incinerated upon arrival.  His exact words were "What is there to see on the sun during the nighttime hours? Mars is much cooler!"  So he has now signed on for the MarsRocket project, planning on traveling to Mars in 2014 under the auspices of Dennis Tito's Inspiration Mars Foundation.  He may ultimately become a MarsRocket reseller.

The word is that former SunRocket and current Teleblend staffers will be joining George on the mission to Mars.

I thought he said he's now a real estate licensed MarsRock reseller!

"But..but..but he showed me pictures, and gave me a lot # and everything! <sniffle>"

Fortunately, zbw, according to the TB TOS, you will probably not be charged the $39.00 terminate fee.

Here's the pertinent part of TB's TOS relating to the ETF:

Service Term for no contract products. The Service is offered on a month-to-month basis ... The Customer is responsible for a Service Disconnection Fee (SDF) of $39.99 per line being cancelled.

Service Term for one year contract products. ... If the customer cancels Service ... within twelve months of the Activation Date, the customer will be responsible for an early termination fee of $39.99 per account. ... Early Termination Fee is waived after the initial contract obligation is fulfilled.

Service Term for multi-year contract products. ... If the customer cancels Service ... within the period of the contract beginning on the Activation Date, the customer will be responsible for an Early Termination fee of $39.99 per account for each year of the contract remaining [!!]. ... Early Termination Fee is waived after the initial contract obligation is fulfilled.

Service Term for products with free months of service and 2 year contract. ... If the customer cancels Service ... within the twenty-four month period, the customer will be responsible for ... an Early Termination Fee of $39.99 per account. ... Early Termination Fee is waived after the initial contract obligation is fulfilled.

Service Term for products with free months of service and 1 year contract. ... If the customer cancels Service ... within the twelve month period, the customer will be responsible for the monthly charges for the free months offered in addition to an Early Termination Fee of $39.99 per account. ... Early Termination Fee is waived after the initial contract obligation is fulfilled.

Promotional Products with no contract. If the Customer agrees to a promotional product with no contract, if stated [???], a Service Disconnection Fee (SDF) may [???] apply. The Service Disconnection Fee of $39.99 will apply to each line ...

Service Term for Annual plans. ... If the Customer cancels the service ... within twelve months of the Activation date, ... the customer may [???] also be responsible for an Early Termination Fee of $39.99 per account.

 
I am particularly struck by the last paragraph ... the Annual Plan, probably the most subscribed plan ... wherein "the customer may [???] also be responsible for an Early Termination Fee."

thanks buddy....come the first of the month i'm starting the new service. i'll keep TB so i can port the number, as soon as I have the number I'll quit. they better not try any monkey business with continually billing me. activation date on the new service should be around a week from the first.
Thanks for your help... good to hear from you...

Your welcome it's good to hear from you, too ... and I'm glad you've finally come to your senses.

You might want to preempt ongoing TB charges by calling your Credit Card (CC) company and notifying them of your TB service cancellation. Ask them if you need to put that in writing. Worst case, tell the CC company you lost your card ... and they will send out a new card with a new number. If TB then submits a charge, you will be notified by the CC company and you have a chance to argue your case.

Agreed.

Be aware that under the FCC's number porting rules, TB cannot stop the port.

They can still try to bill you, and hassle you, but not deny the port.»www.fcc.gov/guides/porta ··· roviders

The word [shenanigan] may possibly have come from the Irish word [sionnachuighm] which means "I play tricks", though this is not definitive.

And various reports do suggest that TB may have done shenanigans with their billing.

in a way i want them to ''try'' to pull something over on me.
but your suggestion about a lost card is good.
when they say we can't get our money, i'll just say for what? you no longer are providing me a service. but i won't start anything until i am sure I have that number ported. so I'll probably be paying for two services for a month.
i can live with that... no one can literally understand me and my speed is no factor... their crappy service is where it starts and stops.

later my friend.

We still have time for our final Easter Picnic!
I say have it on TB's lawn and the eggs.. well just say we shouldn't hard boil them, if you get my drift.
One final GOOD BYE to a PITA!

Which other VOIP provider(s) have the "message screener" feature? To expand upon Bill44130's comment, that feature enables you screen a voicemail message while it's being left, even optionally interrupt the VM to "answer" the call. You need to install a piece of software on your PC for that functionality, but it's really slick (at least it was when I used that feature as a former SR customer).

TB customers (who are porting away),
A year or so after TB came into existence, they slammed some former SR customers' #'s (who had ported away from SR/TB to other VOIP providers) back to TB. They also reactivated their TB accounts (as if they had never left TB). When it happened to me, I was able to detect this when a voicemail I received (which was forwarded to my e-mail) contained a FROM: e-mail address belonging to TB (or maybe even SR). If you don't currently have your TB voicemails being forwarded to e-mail, you would be wise to enable that feature ASAP before your TB service terminates. It may help you discover that your # has been slammed back to TB, should that occur.

VoIP.ms has an Advanced Voicemail feature that is free to use, and you also have the option to forward your messages to your email address as an attachment.

CallCentric allows activating their Voicemail to E-mail Forwarding Feature (configurable on a per mailbox basis - up to 3 unique e-mail addresses per voice mailbox).

VOIPo note that you can have an email notification sent to a valid email address with a .WAV file attached.

Now, I realize that is not the same as 'listening in' to someone leaving a message ... but if no other provider offers it, the OP will just have to bite the bullet. And if no other provider offers it, it must not be a 'can't live without it' deal breaker for potential customers.

As with all the excellent feature sets from the 'good guy' VoIP providers, an end user may not need or use every single option offered. As a purely personal choice, I let unrecognized CallerID numbers or Unknown Callers go to voice mail without the need to 'listen in'. Why waste my time while I'm in the middle of some activity ... when I can collect my voicemail to email messages at my leisure and respond with a callback (or text or email) in due time?

[It's hard to 'listen in' on an incoming voicemail when one is in the middle of a down swing with a 9-iron on the 18th fairway, a par 5, looking to win the golf match ... playing for money.]

I'm willing to bet that, once the OP actually gets a taste of one of our well-liked providers, he/she will go bonkers exploring the awesome features sets they offer.

Please do not mistake my reply as being defensive or arrogant ... I'm just reporting a personal opinion.

I remember hearing of those occurrences!

Thanks for the reminder.

It is not only a good warning, but also a reflection of that company's behaviour.

When the SunRocket exploded in 2007, I had four complimentary accounts. TB contacted me, saying that to keep these accounts, I would have to serve as a moderator on their forum.

Before accepting, I checked out the forum. One poster complained that they were trying to set up service with Vonage, but calls to Vonage from their TB line were not going through. I tried such a call myself, using a Polycom phone. I was surprised that shortly after dialing, the display changed to a non-existent number. Investigation showed that they were (presumably intentionally) re-routing the call; their server sent the new destination in the P-Asserted-Identity header of the 183 Progress message, from which the phone updated its display.

I told TB that this was IMO grossly unethical, I did not want to be associated with such a company and they should just cancel my accounts.

In their response, they admitted sending Vonage calls into the Sun, but insisted that this was an idea of one of their engineers, not approved by management, and that the redirect had been removed and the person disciplined.

Although the redirect had indeed been removed, I did not believe their story and asked that they proceed with cancellation.

In 2011, they started billing for these accounts and then dunning me. After a few emails back and forth, the accounts were finally cancelled, four years after the initial request. The only good news is that no payment was required.

Actually there is another well respected provider that has this feature OOMA. With ooma you can screen the message in real time and decide if you want to pick it up. Here is a link to the ooma telo feature »www.ooma.com/app/support ··· creening

That's an excellent point about Ooma. 1+.

However that particular feature (if needed) is available only on the Ooma Premier upgrade, just so folks are aware of that.

if u go to teleblen website and pull down the view & pay bill statement.. did u notice the bill already laid out (future) for a yearly? WTF..