Anyone with experience with VOIP?

[Charly100]

Hi Everyone,

I was wondering if someone could help me regarding whether or not I should choose to set up VOIP for my small business? I have looked into it and I do think it is the best thing for small companies as calls are free to make as it's via the internet but there's a possibility that I will be based away from the office sometimes and attending things abroad and I just wondered how it worked if I was away? Is it okay as long as I am connected to internet? I will be having it on my mobile.

Also, I can't seem to find anywhere about people calling me...is it free for them to call me and free for me to receive them or do I need to direct a free phone number to it for them?

Any help is much appreciated! Thank you!

 

[Simon.P]

I am a one man band and use http://www.voipfone.co.uk/ and have found them very good.

 

[Charly100]

Thank you! I will check this out.

 

[GraemeL]

Voipfone for me too. I am also away from the office, including China. My office phone diverts to my mobile after 10 rings, wherever I am.
@cjd will give you good advice

 

[Charly100]

Great, thank you!

 

[cjd]

Give us a call - 020 7043 5555 - the guys will advise. They're tech support, not sales - they'll explain the best options. But be warned, not everything is free!

 

[cjd]

Skype costs more than business VoIP, does less and is lower quality. It's a very poor choice for business use.

Great for video calls to you children overseas though.....

 

[connersz]

I'm on VoipFone too. I have quite a good setup where an incoming call first rings the zoiper app on my phone (free incoming calls) and after so many rings routes through to my normal mobile number. I don't have an office as such, so this allows me to have a more professional looking setup.

 

[moo-tique]

I'm on VoipFone too

Second that. We have been using them for quite a while now and never had any problems.

 

[Jaymac-safety]

We use vonage another voip provider, fairly good functions voice mail to email, divert, ect
used them for a while and always been fairly happy

 

[Paulsou]

Voiphone all the way, cannot fault them, been with them nearly 2 years.

 

[Deleted member 252819]

We use Nimvelo (previously Sipcentric). Their user interface is much easier to navigate than Voipfone, and we find that we spend less overall. Either is a good choice, in my experience.

[Disclaimer: I have worked with Nimvelo on some content writing projects.]

 

[HazelC]

I have VOIP and it's great for me, had over a year now and no issues.

 

[Tier1Logistics]

Been a customer of voipfone.co.uk and I have to admit it's a great service and I highly recommend it.

 

[Luci28]

We had Vonage in once, was a total nightmare, we never used and every time we tried to cancel it they refused unless we paid an exit fee. They never explained about the 12month contract up front properly, they also increased the price half way through the contract.

One time we we rang them to cancel it, they where quoting us details of someone else's account, after about 10mins of trying to explain that was not our account they guy on phone simply replied "opps my fault I was looking at wrong screen".

Eventually when we did manage to get it cancelled, they still charged us our monthly fee which was only refunded after we reported them to OFCOM.

Goodluck with who ever you choose but I wouldnt recommend vonage to anyone.

 

[cjd]

Well Vonage is an American company.....

These days it's easy to find a good UK company, with monthly contracts and good customer service ;-)

 

[nsmithwsw]

We have been using BuzzNetworks for about 18 months now, started when we had one premises and the savings were incredible. Now we have three premises the ability to expand your network and the capabilities is incredibly. Would highly recommend both VOIP and BuzzNetworks

 

[Virtual Assistant service]

I also recommend Voipfone

 

[Matt1959]

+1 for VOIPFONE! been with them over 5 yrs. Prices havnt gone up over that time. Great tech service at the end of the phone which always gets answered (in UK) within 5 rings. Just about all you could wish for for this kind of service provider....

 

[Alex_T]

I've used VOIP in the past without success.. do your research. My broadband wasn't the best at the time which possibly didn't help. Good luck!

 

[RelyOnIT]

I've had a quote today for a hosted VOIP system I thought this was a pretty good deal

Ad Hoc Conferencing
Advanced Screening (find me/follow me)
Alias Routing
Anonymous Call Rejection
Busy Lamp Field
Call Park
Call Pickup
Call Return
Call Screening
Call Transfer
Call Waiting
Caller ID
Call Recording*
Class of Service Restrictions
Deny All Calls
Direct Inward Dialing
Direct Outward Dialing
Do Not Disturb
Extension Dialing
Fax
Hotline
Hunt Groups
Intercom
Music On Hold
End User Portal
Selective Call Rejection
Shared Line Appearance
Short Dialing Codes
Multimedia
Desktop Client
Presence
Instant Messaging
File Transfer
Video
Voice Mail & Unified Messaging
Whiteboard Sharing
Meet Me Conference (50 attendees)

£20.25 per seat including 3000 mins National & Local Calls / 3000 Mobile Mins - if you buy another seat then you get 6000 minutes etc

Phones are extra but they will do a rental scheme

I'd appreciate thoughts from others on this.

 

[cjd]

Company name?

 

[RelyOnIT]

why?

 

[cjd]

Because there are hundreds of utterly rubbish VoIP companies out there and that's a standard list of features with a standard bundled model. The industry is a jungle, you need to see the detail.

And why not?

 

[RelyOnIT]

Ok - suffice to say its a telecoms company I already deal with so I know they are not utterly rubbish and have a proven track record. I was was trying to get a feel for value for money and what other people had been offered in the way of deals. Sorry should've made myself clearer in the first instance.

 

[cjd]

Well my standard recommendation is to pick a company that's a member of ITSPA, preferably one that has their quality mark. That way you know that all the basics are taken care of - number porting, decent networks, arbitration schemes, good security etc.

After that be suspiscious of long term contracts, they're not necessary any more. Certainly sign nothing longer than 12 months, but monthly deals are now the norm.

Find out if they're simple resellers or whether they own their own networks. Resellers have no control of anything except price and marketing. Difficult if things go wrong.

Value for money is difficult to calculate - deliberately so. Bundling minutes with a high per seat cost is a standard tactic. If each seat makes a load of calls it might break even for you - generally it doesn't because not all staff make outbound calls. So you need to calculate your calling rates.

In the model above you'd be paying £60 for three extensions. In our model you'd be paying £3. But in ours you'd also be paying for the calls you make. In theirs, they hope (and know) that you won't use the included minutes. It's all in the detail.

In the end there won't be much in it. Certainly not anything that matters. In the end what actually matters is the quality of their service and the help you get when things go wrong. If you know the company and are happy with them, that's a good thing - most people do these things blind.

 

[RelyOnIT]

Well my standard recommendation is to pick a company that's a member of ITSPA, preferably one that has their quality mark. That way you know that all the basics are taken care of - number porting, decent networks, arbitration schemes, good security etc.

After that be suspiscious of long term contracts, they're not necessary any more. Certainly sign nothing longer than 12 months, but monthly deals are now the norm.

Find out if they're simple resellers or whether they own their own networks. Resellers have no control of anything except price and marketing. Difficult if things go wrong.

Value for money is difficult to calculate - deliberately so. Bundling minutes with a high per seat cost is a standard tactic. If each seat makes a load of calls it might break even for you - generally it doesn't because not all staff make outbound calls. So you need to calculate your calling rates.

In the model above you'd be paying £60 for three extensions. In our model you'd be paying £3. But in ours you'd also be paying for the calls you make. In theirs, they hope (and know) that you won't use the included minutes. It's all in the detail.

In the end there won't be much in it. Certainly not anything that matters. In the end what actually matters is the quality of their service and the help you get when things go wrong. If you know the company and are happy with them, that's a good thing - most people do these things blind.

So for the sake of clarity you would offer all these features inc DDI's with 01 numbers for a £1 per seat a month? and also call recording is included in your pricing?

 

[cjd]

Nope. It's all in the detail!

A DDI is £2pm. Call recording is 2.5p per minute if you just do it call by call. If you want to record all calls, we'll work out a deal. (Just in the process of changing everything about call recording.)

All our prices are here

http://www.voipfone.co.uk/prices_new.php

Our model is to charge for each thing you need rather than charge for everything in a bundled price - most of which you'll never use. It just depends how you use the service which offer is best for you.

If you're interested, I suggest you give us a call -020 7043 5554 and go through what you need. You'll get an honest answer, then you can decide.

 

[James.C]

This article titled 'How business VoIP can cut cost and increase reliability' should give you a good overview of the advantages of implementing a VoIP in your business.

 

[sometechcompany]

I personally recommend Skype, and you are right to ask the question. VOIP is the right thing ! I'm still amazed to see that companies are still paying hundreds if not thousands of pounds to set up line number. With Skype you can get a landline number for any country in the word, if I remember correctly it is £30 per year for a number, and then you can pay 2£ per month for a subscription with unlimited calls. Very competitive.

If you have many employees, they have a software allowing you manage all your numbers, and set quotas in a centralized and easy way. Worth looking into this option.

 

[TurfBucket]

A good internet connection is paramount on both your side and your suppliers.

 

[FSI-Mark]

There are some useful videos on YouTube - Search Hosted PBX solutions