Re: Telephone Service

Walter R. wrote:
My telephone charges creep upwards, almost every month, mostly due to increased government mandated charges. I pay AT&T now $ 26 a month for what is essentially local service. Long Distance is on a separate bill from ECG.

What are the alternatives to increasingly expensive land-lines? We live in a low area and have poor cellphone connections. What is this Magic Jack thing? Does it work? What are the drawbacks?

What is VOIP? Just heard about it? Is this another valid alternative.

Thanks for any input.

IIRC VOIP stands for "voice over internet Protocol. You can purchase the service from Vonage (about $30.00 per month). Free VOIP is available from SKYPE, however you may not have incoming service (others can elaborate about this).

I have a Magic Jack (MJ) and use it quite a lot. I believe that it is also a form of VIOP. It costs about $30 initially and then about $10.00 per year. Even though I have the MJ I still maintain my land line because the MJ is not 100% reliable.

MJ, SKYPE and Vonage all require a high speed internet connection (i.e. cable, HS digital or equivalent).

Each of these services(and there may be more), have their strong points and weaknesses. For example I don't think that MJ has provisions for international calls, whereas SKYPE does. I'm not sure about Vonage.

Rather than going into them all here I suggest you start goggling them for info.

HTH,

EJ in NJ
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