Moving my mother in law's land line to VOIP

[MikeBianco]

My mother in law lives in an assisted living facility and currently pays Verizon about $40/month for a land line. She's kind of locked into this. She does not have internet service. However, my cable company's public WiFi (Cablevision/Optimum) has a hot spot that is strong and accessible from within her apartment. I can log into this with my ID/PW.

I recently transferred my personal land line to Google Voice by first transferring it to prepaid cell phone, they to GV. I was thinking of doing the same for her.

I have an OBi200 connected to my router.  I want to buy her something like the OBI200 with the OBiWiFi dongle, but will I be able to configure the WiFi to connect to the public WiFi hot spot with my ID/PW? Can I plug my laptop directly into the OBi200 to configure it?  Will the OBiWiFi definitely be able to talk to the public wifi hotspot?

Thanks

[SteveInWA]

Hi Mike:

Short answer:  don't do it.

Longer answer:  there are too many potential issues with this, that can cause confusion, anxiety and/or stress in an elderly person.  The WiFi access point may be clogged with other people's traffic, resulting in voice drop-outs, distortion, or hang-ups.  Google Voice cannot call 911, and you'd have to add that, and periodically test it.  Google Voice's features, such as voicemail, are potentially too complicated for her.

A better solution is to simply port her land line to a prepaid cellular phone service with however many minutes she will need per month, and leave the phone plugged into a charger near her bed.  If she has any physical impairments, such as poor vision or hearing, consider getting her a "senior-friendly" cell phone handset, such as the one offered by Consumer Cellular, or the "Snapfon".

[drgeoff]

In addition to the points made by SteveInWA, the hotspot idea is unlikely to work. An OBi has no way to send ID and password to log in to a hotspot.