OBi Mary meet Obivoice man
There is a new kid on the block attempting a unique approach of picking up new clients in what I can see is a niche market. Obihai created this market by convincing people to buy their OBi product bundled with the ability to use the free GV service.
This upstart seems to be around since 2010 operating under the name of Intelafone (Intelafone LLC/Intelafone.com). The obivoice brand seems to be a spinoff of the Intelafone service to capitalize on the pool of OBi/GV users out there. The choice of brand name is interesting. It begs the question if obihai will challenge them on the choice of name.
The services included in the price seems to be interesting. I'll let you read the features yourself ( http://www.obivoice.com/index.php ). At the moment it is offering free GV ports. This is an aggressive move to quickly swallow up the potential new customers before they decide to go with the more established voip offerings such as voip.ms, Callcentric, etc.
Both entities use blogs to communicate to the public. The recent entry of the obihai blog implies that they are seeking voip partners after the May 15, 2014 GV switchoff, and obivoice mentions that they would like to develop a relationship with OBiTALK.
"Obivoice is looking to closely partner with OBiTalk in the new year to continue providing quality, affordable service to those who want to continue to use their Obihai devices as an alternative to standard home telephone service."
http://www.obivoice.com/blog/?cat=1
The obivoice and the official OBiPLUS services seem to overlap somewhat as they seem to offer some business like PBX functionality.
Both obihai and intelafone have draconian Terms of Service. If you take the trouble to read it, it seems that they can kick you out at any time for any reason. I think that most service providers have similar TOS and that may be par for the course.
Terms of Service
https://intelafone.desk.com/customer/portal/articles/1338220-terms-of-service
There may be other individuals involved, however it seems the main person behind this effort is Ryan Tilton.
"When I started a voip company in 2010 we started off with Google voice as a free service for our users as well."
Ryan Tilton
http://www.obivoice.com/blog/?cat=1
Ryan, take advantage of this opportunity and introduce yourself officially to the community on the OBi forum. Please tell us who you are and what you are offering.
The OBiVoice service is by IntelaFone (http://www.intelafone.com/) that I have been interested in after the May 2014 GV announcement. The website used to be http://www.intelafone.com/.
The $25/year 500 minutes of talk time per month would suit me just fine. I'm assuming this is for both in and out?
QuoteOver 20 Calling Features
E911 Calling, Call Blocking, Call Forwarding, Call Waiting, Call Detail Records, Caller ID w/ Name, Ring Scheduling, Fax to Email, Web Faxing, etc. All free!
The only con I see.
Quote$3 Taxes and fees will be assessed per user/line per month
I am unclear if there is a monthly charge for the number they provide.
Yep, the $3/line/month for taxes and fees was what had stopped me from signing up with IntelaFone as it was not clear to me.
So with the taxes and fees, the ~$2.00 month phone service becomes >$5.00 month phone service, right? If the bill doubles from promoted price, some people are gonna be real sore about it.
I went through part of the sign up process (but did not complete), nothing about it impressed me. You do at least get to see if they have a local number for your area code before you make a final commitment.
I wonder if this tax applies to clients outside the USA.
https://intelafone.desk.com/customer/portal/articles/1338220-terms-of-service
Billing
Accounts renew automatically unless cancelled. Accounts will renew on or around the anniversary of your initial order based on your selected term. All Intelafone services are prepaid at least one month in advance.
$3 Taxes and fees will be assessed per user/line per month
USF federal program fee, local taxes, & E911 taxes/fees - Intelafone is obligated to collect taxes and fees per state and federal regulations.
The federal program fee applicable to all accounts.
The Federal Program Fee is the contribution Intelafone incurs as a service provider to the Universal Service Fund (USF), which is mandated by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) as part of the 1996 Telecommunications Act.
USF applies to funding for Universal Service programs, which may include:
Affordable telecommunications services to schools, libraries, and rural health care facilities
Subsidies for local service in high-cost areas and low-income households
Telecommunications services for individuals with hearing and speech disabilities
The Federal Program Fee applies to all charges for interstate (from one state to another) telephone calls, not including taxes, for all 50 U.S. states, Puerto Rico, and other U.S. territories.
I spoke to Ryan Tilton, president and CEO of obivoice last night during a support call I made when I was having trouble getting my OBi registered for the 30 day / 60 minute free trial.
I specifically asked him if the prices on the obivoice.com plans were the totals or if any additional taxes and fees were going to be charged on top of the listed prices. He assured me that there are no additional taxes or fees and that the prices listed on the site will be the total price charged.
It may not be accurate to continue quoting from Intelafone pages.
I suggest that if you have questions on plan prices, just pick up the phone and call them at (855) 208-9700.
If the prices on the plans listed are the total/final prices, I will wait till OBiVoice revises the TOS (https://intelafone.desk.com/customer/portal/articles/1338220-terms-of-service) to take out the $3 Taxes and fees will be assessed per user/line per month or make it clearer that the users will not have to pay $3/month in addition to the listed prices.
I wrote an email to obivoice.com support mentioning that additional the $3 Taxes on the web site and Fees were in contradiction to a statement made to me by Ryan Tilton president and CEO of obivoice when he told me that the plan prices on the web site were the total prices charged and that there were no additional taxes or fees on top of that.
I too am awaiting pricing clarification, as well as updated web pages.
Yea I just got an email from him. I had also asked if VM pick up time was adjustable.
QuoteYes, you can change the ring time from 10 – 90 seconds in the online portal. Where are you seeing the 3/mo taxes and fees, we got rid of that. Is it still somewhere online? Thanks
I noticed in one his vids there appeared to be a monthly number charge of $1 in the web portal. I asked about that but got no answer.
One number is included with service. In the user control panel, additional numbers can be provisioned and they are charged for. Setup is $.99, but I do not know what they charge per month. Trying to get far enough along in the process of choosing a second number fails with trial accounts.
The web page at https://intelafone.desk.com/customer/portal/articles/1338220-terms-of-service has been updated. The $3 Taxes and Fees have been removed from the Billing Section.
https://intelafone.desk.com/customer/portal/articles/1338220-terms-of-service
Change of Terms
We may change the terms and conditions of this Agreement from time to time. Notices will be considered given and effective on the date posted on our website. These changes will become binding and effective the date they are posted to our website. No further notice by us is required upon your continued use of the Service. The Agreement as and when posted supersedes all previously agreed to electronic and written terms of service.
That was fast!
Ryan, thank you for the clarification. If the prices/services you are offering are indeed transparent (without surprises) I suspect you may need to hire some help with what I expect to be some new business coming from former OBi/GV users. Indeed, the offer is very competitive. I also believe that your voip service is not limited to obihai products.
Good luck.
I've set up my account. I'm trying to learn VoIP anyway and this is looking like the way for me to go.
Did you take the free trial or just dive in with some money?
I took the trial and so far it works fine. Ignore the suggested STUN server if you use an OBi.
Quote from: gderf on January 11, 2014, 11:42:33 AM
Did you take the free trial or just dive in with some money?
I took the trial and so far it works fine. Ignore the suggested STUN server if you use an OBi.
I signed up for the free trial to see how it works for me. Appreciate the heads up on the STUN setting since I use the Obi110.
Unless I hear bad things otherwise, I'll probably buy a year of service there come mid May.
A slight smell of fish. First taxes- all taxes, federal, state, local, 911 whatever. Which are not uniform but vary significantly, where live by municipality. Then, all of sudden, they disappear. Off course, TOS changing like chameleon. And who is the mysterious provider? GV is just fine, because it is free, but I would not pay for it. There is such a great choice of good and sometimes very inexpensive VOIP providers. My broadband is getting more and more pricey and even my equipment sucks money, like my 51W u-verse gateway. So a dollar more or less is really not an issue. I gave up on this race to the bottom a while ago. Obi should keep developing new equipment, work on the manual, make things easier to use for non techies and stay out of cheap schemes.I understand that they have a headache with the end of GV through Obi but it was their choice to push Obi as the GV device and barely mention the rest. lesson learned, hopefully.
ObiTalk, Reg.TM? If so, ObiVoice may be hearing from ObiHai legal counsel shortly.
Has anyone got the outbound CID Spoofing to work? I have tried several times to verify my number but every attempt fails with my trial account.
Quote from: giqcass on January 12, 2014, 06:59:58 AM
Has anyone got the outbound CID Spoofing to work? I have tried several times to verify my number but every attempt fails with my trial account.
It worked for me. Are you not getting the call at all?
Has anyone tried to use the FAXing from the Control Panel? I think it's non-functional on a trial account.
I got the call, listened to the message, typed the number, and they hung up. In addition I have already found errors in the billing time with just 3 calls. Even if each call is rounded up how did I use 5 minutes? These are incoming calls so it appears you are charged for both incoming and outgoing. I have not made an outgoing call or tried faxing yet.
January 12, 2014, 10:23 am 7 seconds
January 12, 2014, 10:20 am 1 minute, 58 seconds
January 12, 2014, 10:19 am 15 seconds
(http://nsa20.casimages.com/img/2014/01/12/mini_140112043806408899.png) (http://nsa20.casimages.com/img/2014/01/12/140112043806408899.png)
If I were more comfortable with the company and their service they have a terrific price for 2-year plans.
$39.99 24 Month Includes 500 minutes talk time per month.
$59.99 24 Month Includes unlimited talk time per month.
I got the idea that Obivoice provides land line & voip, otherwise what is the land line adapter for?
I also emailed Ryan. Got a pleasant reply stating that I would get the same service that I now get from Century Link. I was totally into going with voip.ms, when I found Obivoice, now I don't know what to do.
Did you go back to the Spoof Caller ID page and see what's there?
My trial usage is a bit off too. Not really worried about it since I would be going with an unlimited plan anyway.
Quote from: gderf on January 12, 2014, 07:17:33 AM
Quote from: giqcass on January 12, 2014, 06:59:58 AM
Has anyone got the outbound CID Spoofing to work? I have tried several times to verify my number but every attempt fails with my trial account.
It worked for me. Are you not getting the call at all?
It failed for me over and over again. The call just ended after I entered the digits most of the time. Several attempts resulted in "You have entered an invalid verification code." Some of the codes included the number 4 and that caused a problem because I was verifying my Google Voice number. Finally I got lucky and the "thank you for verifying your number" message came up. I have noticed there is no way to see what number is being used for Caller Id. There is a place where you can enter CNAM associated with your number. It says Caller ID but it won't allow you to enter a number in that field. Very frustrating but I got it working at least.
Quote from: colleenz on January 12, 2014, 02:24:07 PM
I got the idea that Obivoice provides land line & voip, otherwise what is the land line adapter for?
I also emailed Ryan. Got a pleasant reply stating that I would get the same service that I now get from Century Link. I was totally into going with voip.ms, when I found Obivoice, now I don't know what to do.
They only provide Voip. The term Landline adapter was just a poorly chosen way to say ATA adapter.
Quote from: gderf on January 12, 2014, 02:31:40 PM
Did you go back to the Spoof Caller ID page and see what's there?
My trial usage is a bit off too. Not really worried about it since I would be going with an unlimited plan anyway.
The spoof Caller ID page shows any number you put in there and tried to verify even if you did so unsuccessfully. I did get it finally.
I'm afraid the usage being off is a sign of other bugs in the system. I'll play around with it for the month but I won't keep it after that. I plan to see what other people think long term before I commit. I already have $20 credit on Localphone so no big hurry to find a replacement. If they get good feedback I'll probably go for a 2 year deal with them eventually.
I still have until May 2014 to see how well this OBiVoice service works before making the decision to sign up for the service.
Well I just spent 22 minutes on a phone call and the quality was perfect. My outbound caller ID showed up correctly. They do not appear to allow incoming sip calls from outside of their network. Call forwarding seems to be disabled at least on the free account so I could not test that.
Quote from: giqcass on January 12, 2014, 03:58:59 PM
Well I just spent 22 minutes on a phone call and the quality was perfect. My outbound caller ID showed up correctly. They do not appear to allow incoming sip calls from outside of their network. Call forwarding seems to be disabled at least on the free account so I could not test that.
Thanks for the info!
I started service with VOIPO a few months ago and paid $185 for the first 2 years. After that I believe the price goes to $185 / year. I have had no problems with them whatsoever. This Obivoice to me sounds too good to be true and I've always had the attitude that if it sounds too good to be true it usually is. I just don't know how they'll stay in business at those rates. I'm staying where I am. Even at $185/year it's basically $15/month for unlimited. I'm fine with that.
Chet_King is flooding the forum with SPAM. "Check out these guys! http://www.obivoice.com/" (Most likely a bot.) This leaves a very bad impression on them if they want to be considered seriously. That was a bad decision. If they expect to be considered seriously they should not have done that. My spidey sense tells me to proceed with caution.
Quote from: Ansextra on January 14, 2014, 11:48:38 AM
I started service with VOIPO a few months ago and paid $185 for the first 2 years. After that I believe the price goes to $185 / year. I have had no problems with them whatsoever. This Obivoice to me sounds too good to be true and I've always had the attitude that if it sounds too good to be true it usually is. I just don't know how they'll stay in business at those rates. I'm staying where I am. Even at $185/year it's basically $15/month for unlimited. I'm fine with that.
I've had MagicJack then MagicJack Plus for 4 years now and it's been working great for me, especially the Plus version that plugs into the router and doesn't need a computer to run. I paid $19.95 a year for the original MJ and $29.95/yr or $99.75/5yrs for the Plus. Of course, MJ no longer includes E911 but 911 costs me only $6/year where I live if I choose to add it to my MJ service.
Quote from: LeoKing on January 14, 2014, 12:19:36 PM
I've had MagicJack then MagicJack Plus for 4 years now and it's been working great for me, especially the Plus version that plugs into the router and doesn't need a computer to run. I paid $19.95 a year for the original MJ and $29.95/yr or $99.75/5yrs for the Plus. Of course, MJ no longer includes E911 but 911 costs me only $6/year where I live if I choose to add it to my MJ service.
I bought the MJ+ for $19.99 with a year of service. It seems solid so far. E911 is inexpensive in your area but I have heard it can be very expensive in other areas. I'll have to check my area.
Quote from: QBZappy on January 11, 2014, 08:34:53 AMRyan, take advantage of this opportunity and introduce yourself officially to the community on the OBi forum. Please tell us who you are and what you are offering.
Thanks for the invitation, QBZappy!
I want to thank you for all the discussion you have prompted about Obivoice. It is because of everyone's input and feedback that we have been able to grow as a business and improve as a service.
We are working with our current and prospective customers to tighten up the look and feel of the new Obivoice website and provide quality service that our customers want to spread the word about. Our orientation towards customer service has allowed us to get rid of inconsistencies in the Terms of Service and the confusion about taxes and E911 fees (Which I can tell you are all now 100% included in the listed plan prices).
Once again thank you all for submitting your input and impressions about our services so far and we hope you will continue to do so. I certainly appreciate the opportunity to discuss our plans for VoIP in 2014 with the very knowledgeable community here on the Obitalk forum.
-Ryan
Quote from: intelafone on January 16, 2014, 03:03:35 PM
Once again thank you all for submitting your input and impressions about our services so far and we hope you will continue to do so. I certainly appreciate the opportunity to discuss our plans for VoIP in 2014 with the very knowledgeable community here on the Obitalk forum.
-Ryan
I prefer not to give credit card information to companies I am not familiar with. Please consider making Paypal a payment option.
I can use the Virtual Account Number (VAN) from my Citi VISA but the PayPal suggestion is an excellent one and I like that option as well.
I was going to try them because the price was right with the options they have but they don't support porting my number, so I will be looking elsewhere.
@Robv2
Welcome
You don't really need to port. Just call forward the number to obivoice and use the call spoofing feature of obivoice to pass your number.
Quote from: Ansextra on January 14, 2014, 11:48:38 AM
I started service with VOIPO a few months ago and paid $185 for the first 2 years. After that I believe the price goes to $185 / year. I have had no problems with them whatsoever. This Obivoice to me sounds too good to be true and I've always had the attitude that if it sounds too good to be true it usually is. I just don't know how they'll stay in business at those rates. I'm staying where I am. Even at $185/year it's basically $15/month for unlimited. I'm fine with that.
My phone with 911, voice mail, call fowarding, voice mail transcription, caller ID, Cname , and 48state long distance plus other stuff has costed me about $35 total over 2 years.
I don't find it hard to believe you can get similar service for $40 per year. Most solutions I've looked at that without Google voice would work out to about $40 per month, in some cases less, many cost more.
I have the OV trial. Everything works very well with my OBi 110. Even the iphone app works well on crappy VM 3g. I will be purchasing the 2 year unlimited plan before my trial ends in a few days.
Quote from: giqcass on January 16, 2014, 03:32:23 PMI prefer not to give credit card information to companies I am not familiar with. Please consider making Paypal a payment option.
That is a good suggestion. We are going to be adding PayPal support by the end of next week.
-Andrew
Quote from: QBZappy on January 17, 2014, 09:03:49 AM
@Robv2
Welcome
You don't really need to port. Just call forward the number to obivoice and use the call spoofing feature of obivoice to pass your number.
Sounds like the simplest solution. I will set up an account and try it out. This way if it works smoothly then I'm in for a 2yr plan myself.
Looking at what they are offering, ObiVoice sound like they have the closest solution to current GV.
I'm not impressed by what Obihai have put on the table as their alternative to GV which appears to read like a current landline, with call charges, this charges etc.
Lets hope obivoice can live up to expectations
Quote from: MikeHObi on January 17, 2014, 09:11:22 AM
Quote from: Ansextra on January 14, 2014, 11:48:38 AM
I started service with VOIPO a few months ago and paid $185 for the first 2 years. After that I believe the price goes to $185 / year. I have had no problems with them whatsoever. This Obivoice to me sounds too good to be true and I've always had the attitude that if it sounds too good to be true it usually is. I just don't know how they'll stay in business at those rates. I'm staying where I am. Even at $185/year it's basically $15/month for unlimited. I'm fine with that.
My phone with 911, voice mail, call fowarding, voice mail transcription, caller ID, Cname , and 48state long distance plus other stuff has costed me about $35 total over 2 years.
I don't find it hard to believe you can get similar service for $40 per year. Most solutions I've looked at that without Google voice would work out to about $40 per month, in some cases less, many cost more.
What service are you using for $40/year? I'm actually fine with the ~$6/month I'm paying now for the features I'm getting. In two years I'll look around again. Alot can happen in that time in the technology world...
I don't think this service is ready for primetime. I'me getting 2+ second delays talking with my father (who is also on an OBi box with OBivoice).
Today, when we try to call each other, we're getting messages that "the extension you're trying to reach XXXXXXX [the recipients obivoice number] is unavailable beeeeep".
Can't get around this. Going to contact Ryan...
Not much delay here in MD. Maybe a 200-400ms to a cell. Same as all the other VOIP's I have used.
Quote from: Ansextra on January 18, 2014, 08:18:14 AM
Quote from: MikeHObi on January 17, 2014, 09:11:22 AM
My phone with 911, voice mail, call fowarding, voice mail transcription, caller ID, Cname , and 48state long distance plus other stuff has costed me about $35 total over 2 years.
What service are you using for $40/year? I'm actually fine with the ~$6/month I'm paying now for the features I'm getting. In two years I'll look around again. Alot can happen in that time in the technology world...
My comment on the $35 over 2 years is related to using google voice and callcentric for E911.
ObiVoice is the current provider advertising $40/year. I think that when Obi finally comes out with their provider list we'll find more than just one willing to be your provider for around $40 per year.
I took some good advice.
First try it before you buy it.
I tried it.
I liked it.
I bought it. (forwarding my GV number)
Total investment $25.00 for 500 minute per month with spoofing.
Well for now I do have MJ+ and it's ok on dsl or higher, but it's sometimes ok on virgin mobile broadband2go. But what I am getting now for $15 a month doesn't require internet and the OBi110 will still work to block unwanted calls (after doing my homework on this forum [thanks for all the neat info here]).
There are alternatives that I have found, but I don't know how everything works.
There are some companies that say that the new change won't affect them. As a for instance, when looking what to do when my service account with MJ+ expires, I can reprogram it and use it for free, too, to work with GV. But PCPhoneSoft specifically states that it will be unaffected by the upcoming GV change. In fact, they even have a phone for $20 that doesn't require all the reprogramming or a MJ dongle, etc.
I have spoofed my brother once in TX by calling him at his home # while using his cell # CID to call him. He freaked out and started searching all over for his cell thinking that someone had taken it. I apologized, and all he could say is how did you do that.
It seems that every device known to man revolves around SIP and access #'s, etc.
I guess that what I am saying is that there are many services out there, but $15 per month for voip? That seems quite high, even with all of the features of OBi. I really like the route that I am going, which is purchase a OBi110 (bridged) device [free shipping from wallyworld oders >$50 (the device is currently $46.99 and purchase a warranty or buy some cat food to push it over the $50 so you can get free delivery)] and use this device to handle the GV blocking that will soon be unavailable.
That way I can use the OBi110 with any system that I plug into its Pots jack. If I did have internet, I would probably use LocalPhone, which is the cheapest I have seen so far, other than MJ+.
ObiVoice wants $39.99 (double that of MJ+). Is there something so special about ObiVoice that I am missing? Like I said, MJ+ doesn't require a computer, just activation... and OBi110 doesn't require a computer, just programming. I think the two together would handle anything that GV does now without compromising any security by using G to boot.
Can somebody on this forum justify ObiVoice's $39.99 price? I can't, but I admit I partially clueless.
Quote from: KAura on January 22, 2014, 05:01:57 PM
ObiVoice wants $39.99 (double that of MJ+). Is there something so special about ObiVoice that I am missing?
First of all MJ raised the price to $29 per year now and it doesn't include 911, CNAM, CID spoofing, fax, or Visual Voicemail. Obivoice supplies all of those. 911 used to be included with Mj but that changed recently. ObiVoice also lets you use your own device. If you buy 2 years prepaid on Obivoice it's the same price as MJ for unlimited. Obivoice has a 500 minute a month plan that cost as little as $39.95 for 2 years.
Quote from: KAura on January 22, 2014, 05:01:57 PM
As a for instance, when looking what to do when my service account with MJ+ expires, I can reprogram it and use it for free, too, to work with GV. But PCPhoneSoft specifically states that it will be unaffected by the upcoming GV change. In fact, they even have a phone for $20 that doesn't require all the reprogramming or a MJ dongle, etc.
Keep in mind PCPhoneSoft requires a PC turned on all the time in order for the device to work. That applies whether you buy their dongle or if you use your expired MJ+ dongle.
Quote from: KAura on January 22, 2014, 05:01:57 PM
But what I am getting now for $15 a month doesn't require internet
May I inquire what service you found for that price without internet? My best guess is Straight Talk Wireless Home Phone, Those are essentially cell phones that plug into home phone wiring.
Wow... great response. Really appreciated!
I guess for an extra $10 (since MJ raised their prices) ObiVoice may be the way to go, especially since I am running two businesses under 1 roof and don't want to use either of those CIDs for personal calls, but want to spoof the business that I am calling from when using the same phone # ;)
It looks like I might have to bite the internet bullet and pay for internet. If I knew a way around ST Home that was cheaper than $15/mo I would probably do that too.
I do want a portable landline and don't want to rely wholly on internet for anything.
Quote from: giqcass on January 22, 2014, 08:44:48 PM
...My best guess is Straight Talk Wireless Home Phone...
That is correct.
Yep, the $15/month service he mentioned was the Walmart Straight Talk Wireless Home Phone service (http://www.walmart.com/ip/Straight-Talk-Wireless-Home-Phone/22084643).
Quote from: KAura on January 23, 2014, 07:13:24 AM
Wow... great response. Really appreciated!
I guess for an extra $10 (since MJ raised their prices) ObiVoice may be the way to go, especially since I am running two businesses under 1 roof and don't want to use either of those CIDs for personal calls, but want to spoof the business that I am calling from when using the same phone # ;)
It looks like I might have to bite the internet bullet and pay for internet. If I knew a way around ST Home that was cheaper than $15/mo I would probably do that too.
I do want a portable landline and don't want to rely wholly on internet for anything.
Quote from: giqcass on January 22, 2014, 08:44:48 PM
...My best guess is Straight Talk Wireless Home Phone...
That is correct.
If your business is just half way serious and quarter way profitable, i would not for a second consider junk like Magic Jack. BTW MJ charges all kinds of junk fees on the top of the advertised price which have not been mentioned here. Also, they do not connect for free to very many US phone numbers.
For a real business I would go with a real quality VOIP provider like Callcentric.
BTW if you do not want to depend on internet cell phones are pretty good, at least in metro areas.
I would need two numbers. It looks like a second number is $2 per month which doesn't make too much sense if it doesn't up the minute count.
Quote from: zarthan on January 24, 2014, 05:13:02 PM
I would need two numbers. It looks like a second number is $2 per month which doesn't make too much sense if it doesn't up the minute count.
Is that on the obivoice website somewhere?
Is texting to cell phones a standard feature like it is with GV and would these texts be treated the same as voice minutes?
I'm new to this, thanks.
Quote from: zarthan on January 24, 2014, 05:13:02 PM
I would need two numbers. It looks like a second number is $2 per month which doesn't make too much sense if it doesn't up the minute count.
Probably paying due to the E911 and DID you get with it. E911 is most likely the culprit for the charge.
Hi, New member here. Bought a OBI100 to use with GV about a month ago. Worked good but been looking for a replacement for GV by May. Heard about OBIvoice and tried their free trial. Everything worked as advertised. Read everything about them on all the forums. I'm about to run out of deals from Centurylink who I will be paying about $40 a month to for phone service. So I went for the unlimited 2yr plan and I'm in the process of porting my number to OBIVoice. Free was good but a little over $4 a month sounds a whole lot better than $40. Figured OBIvoice might be a gamble but if they stay in business for 3 months I'm already ahead. Being they have been doing this for several years as Intelafone they should have a feel for whats going on by now. Time will tell, I'll keep you all posted.
ET
Signed up yesterday for the 6 month $24.99 plan...use the obi100. Was using GV with CC for the e911.
I have caption phones due to hearing loss and the OV service is better for that than GV was...a lot of errors with GV. This is a different thing than Google transcription, which is horrible in it's own right.
The sound seems to be better with OV...it seems like GV got inconsistent the last couple of months.
The only problem I'm having right now is I ported my GV # and It was posted that porting for GV #s was free. I was charged $10 and haven't heard back yet about that.
==========================
edit:
the charge was refunded...unbelievable customer service!
Obivoice took care of me on the cost to port my GV number. The only cost was $3 from Google to "unlock" it.
hello I have a question regarding obi100 configuration and obivoice. I am planning to signup for the trial account. I have an obi100 with gv configured on sp1. My question is do I have to change my sp1 or configure sp2 for obivoice or just the generic sip provider just like stated in the obivoice website. thanks very much in advance.
You can just configure it on SP2. After that to test outbound calling dial **2 and the number you want to call.
Quote from: carl on January 23, 2014, 07:29:03 PM
If your business is just half way serious and quarter way profitable, i would not for a second consider junk like Magic Jack. BTW MJ charges all kinds of junk fees on the top of the advertised price which have not been mentioned here. Also, they do not connect for free to very many US phone numbers.
For a real business I would go with a real quality VOIP provider like Callcentric.
BTW if you do not want to depend on internet cell phones are pretty good, at least in metro areas.
MJ definitely IS junk. They even sent out an email after my friend gave me the MJ+ saying that they NOW had a better chip and to pay $30 to upgrade AND service for 6 months was included.
That's not the problem... I have never had good service with them UNLESS I was using a cable modem. DSL and lower (wireless dongle) doesn't work well... static, and codec problems on both ends, eg. no sound and then a quick sped up donald-duck like few secs until it caught up LOL.
As far as unlimited, HA!! Everybody who has EVER used MJ knows that they cut you off after 10 minutes and then when you TRY and call back you get a message "all circuits are busy now, please try you call again later!". We all know that all circuits aren't busy!
As far as junk fees, fees are only paid once per year or once per 5 years and there are no additional fees. I have never had trouble connecting to anybody.
The Straight Talk Home Phone device IS technically a cell phone for $15/mo and the carrier is Verizon wireless. Why ALL of their (VZ) services start out at $35 is beyond me, but perhaps they saw the light and went in with Straight Talk (TracFone) on this for hidden reasons yet to be unveiled.
While we've been able to talk on ST for over an hour without interruption to a few close friends we hadn't talked to in years, there are times when the voice quality dropped to what sounded like an mp3 file with a bit rate of <32 and it garbled a little.
I will be testing out the device some more soon.
Thank you for your reply... I received my OBi110.
The OBi110 is set up to block anonymous calls right out of the box ;) but I still have to figure out the * code to bypass the OBi110 to be able to place outbound calls from my landline connected phone.
Hitting # puts you directly to the PSTN (landline) dial tone bypassing the Obi.
FWIW, they don't support SMS text messages, that's a real non-starter for my wife. :P
Quote from: zorlac on February 03, 2014, 01:33:50 PM
FWIW, they don't support SMS text messages, that's a real non-starter for my wife. :P
If they did SMS I might have switched and paid the whole 2 years in advance. The interesting thing is they appear to have been toying with the idea. The proxy is sms.intelafone.com. They appear to be using Amazon AWS.
If you check out their suggestion page the SMS question has a tag on it "planning". Not a big deal to me but I would use it to contact my siblings across the state.
Quote from: giqcass on January 12, 2014, 06:59:58 AM
Has anyone got the outbound CID Spoofing to work? I have tried several times to verify my number but every attempt fails with my trial account.
It is working for me. make sure you entered the correct number. It should verify by calling you and asking for a two digit code.
Quote from: cluckercreek on February 04, 2014, 07:25:17 AM
If you check out their suggestion page the SMS question has a tag on it "planning". Not a big deal to me but I would use it to contact my siblings across the state.
I just forward my GV number to this number. This will still work after the change. This way you get texts and messages in you mail box just as before.
I like the quality much better than GV. I am also testing Callcentric. From them you can get a free inbound line. I have not tried the outbound except to other Callcentric numbers. It is very good quality and the setup is almost fool proof. So easy just need to remember the phone number and the password. I am testing now with two systems and four lines. Not sure what I will choose yet. Almost done with my free trial minutes on obivoice without any problems. I registered the number on both systems. Callcentric allows me to have unrestricted extensions on one account. This might tilt the vote for me. Perhaps I will use both :)
Quote from: mikeatwork on February 21, 2014, 03:50:11 PM
Quote from: giqcass on January 12, 2014, 06:59:58 AM
Has anyone got the outbound CID Spoofing to work? I have tried several times to verify my number but every attempt fails with my trial account.
It is working for me. make sure you entered the correct number. It should verify by calling you and asking for a two digit code.
The web portal was giving me the wrong code to enter. I contacted Ryan and he got back with me once but it didn't get fixed. He set the system up so that I would hear the code I entered read back to me. Even though the system was reading back the same number that was on the screen it still would not activate even with multiple attempts. He didn't get back with me after that. I believe that in some circumstances the system gets knocked out of sync when a verification attempt fails. I suspect that is why Ovivoice has the reset button in the "Spoof Outbound Caller ID" panel now. I was able to activate it by using a brute force strategy. Hopefully this bug is fixed.
courtesy of http://www.myvoipprovider.com/
SunRocket
SunRocket was founded in 2004 by some MCI executives that decided they wanted to compete directly with Vonage, CallVantage, Verizon VoiceWing -- all the big dogs in residential VoIP phone service.
And SunRocket was competing. SunRocket had 200,000 customers in 2007, in large part due to their exceptional promotional offer: 2 years of service for $199!
There were minor murmurs and tremors, though, signs that something was wrong: SunRocket affiliates stopped getting paid. Staff started getting laid off, here and there. Then the sales department went.
And then the service cut out.
SunRocket greeted all callers with a helpful message: "We are no longer taking customer support or sales calls. Goodbye."
Note: You can no longer hear this message in all its glory. Someone else bought the number.
And that was it for communication. Most customers only found out about SunRocket's demise when they picked up the phone - and heard nothing on the line.
SunRocket ... disappointed its customers. SunRocket's collapse also caused a wave of damage to the VoIP industry: 200,000 angry subscribers poured into the subscriber market.
Some switched back to cable and traditional PSTN providers, swearing off VoIP for life. Some subscribers inundated other VoIP providers and caused service overloads. Most lost money - some lost lots of money.
SunRocket's meltdown is the nadir of VoIP collapses. 200,000 households shoved into the cold.
@Newme
Welcome to the forum,
That was an interesting historical account of SunRocket. We can easily find many other examples of failed companies. Any nascent or established voip player can pull a SunRocket at any time. As detailed in your account even seasoned veterans can fail. Look around at the different voip players in the market today. Any one of these players could for different reasons pull a SunRocket despite charging more for the service. I have a Skype call out account which is charging me $30/year for unlimited (subject to fair use). Skype may have set a barometer price for voip service. A phone conversation via the Skype or sip protocol is irrelevant in the minds of most users. The ubiquitous nature of the telephone is what, in my opinion, is driving sip and all sip related paraphernalia such as ATAs and IP phones. To date it looks like Vestalink has earned the respect of their clients by demonstrating to my surprise a new level of customer support that I have yet to see elsewhere. Respect is a double edged sword. As soon as they show less humility and start being arrogant by giving us the take it or leave it attitude the sword will swing the other way. They have given their customers a sense that they have a say in how the company should evolve. Any reason for failure has been addressed directly and without hesitation. Many features have been added as a result of their customers requesting it. In general queries are promptly resolved. To their credit, the fact that they changed Obivoice to Vestalink to avoid conflict with obihai despite the fact that it seems they had rights to the name Obivoice shows the Zen like method of dealing with what ever issues that may arise.
As per PX Eliezer
( http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r29072906-Am-I-The-Only-One-Who-Is-Confused-~start=60 )
Feds report:
First used in 2012.
Application for Obivoice filed by Intelafone: January 18, 2014
Abandonment Date: March 3, 2014
http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/gate.exe?f=tess&state=4809:jzwp9u.1.1
(Do a "basic" search for Obivoice)
They have positioned themselves as a voip player open to form working relationships with both their customers and any commercial partner. How can anyone not like a company with that kind of spirit. Like I have mentioned before, the longevity of this company largely depends on the business model they have adopted and the revenue streams they are capable of sustaining. Time will tell. In the meantime every new customer they get is a vote of confidence for Vestalink.
I can attest to VestaLink's prompt customer service. I sense an ambition and willingness to stay for a longer run. VestaLink is growing by organically (winning each customer) and word of mouth. This is a positive thing in my opinion. But as with any person or entity, you never really know....
Just wanted to throw in my 2¢ worth on this provider. Ever since the announcement that GV was dropping support in May, I've been looking at alternatives. When Vestalink (then Obivoice) popped up on my radar, I checked it out and signed up for a trial account. Not willing to let it overwrite my OBi202's configuration, which I discovered after signing up it wanted to do, I more or less ignored the trial and kept researching. With their warning that promo pricing was only good through the end of March, a couple days ago I bit the bullet and signed up for the two-year 2000-minute plan; I checked with them before signing up and if the 2000 minutes doesn't meet our needs (family of 5) we can upgrade for the price difference (and if the service doesn't meet our needs at all, there's a 30-day guarantee).
My impressions are varied but mostly positive:
- They aren't able to port my GV number as they apparently don't have a presence in the city where my GV number is based. That's a bummer, because it means I have to forward the GV calls and spoof Caller ID in order to avoid having to change my number again (which I'm loath to do). That leads to another issue that I hadn't considered....
- GV forwarding works fine for the most part, but because I can't disable GV's voicemail I'm now stuck with no notification on the phone when someone has left a voicemail message. Of course, I get the notifications via email, but if I'm in a meeting or otherwise unavailable, there's no way for my wife to know that there's a message waiting for her. Really wish I'd known this ahead of time. So....
- Along with the above,
there's no way to configure the ring time before Vestalink's voicemail kicks in. If I could configure it to kick in earlier, I could avoid the GV voicemail you can control the ring time in the account settings, but only in 10-second increments. 20 seconds is still too long to avoid GV; 10 seconds works but doesn't give enough time to answer the phone. More granularity for fine-tuning would really help. I've added a feature request for it (http://intelafone.uservoice.com/forums/232787-feedback-forum/suggestions/5604724-allow-user-to-configure-time-before-voicemail-kick) but am not holding my breath. - Their support reply times have been very quick (sometimes within minutes; never more than a day -- and yes, I've asked quite a few questions), even if they haven't given me the answers I wanted.
- Call quality doesn't seem as crisp as with GV. Because incoming calls are forwarded through GV, I wonder if they're passing through GV, then through Vestalink and being compressed multiple times. I'm not techy enough to know the answer to that. I'm going to try to pay more attention to outbound call quality over the next couple of weeks to see if I notice a difference. It's not unusable by any means, but even my kids have mentioned it so it's definitely not my imagination.
UPDATE: Placed a few calls last night (outgoing, obviously) that didn't go through GV and the calls were nice and clear. Either it was a transient issue or else incoming calls through GV are being double-compressed. If you're not forwarding through GV, this probably won't be an issue for you. - Cost of international calls is comparable to or higher than with GV for the numbers we call (but is somewhat or even MUCH lower to some other numbers that we wouldn't be calling; for example, for some UK mobile numbers I checked, the rate was only half of GV's cost).
Of course, we can go back to the old way of initiating those calls via the computer, but that really detracts from the user experience. This is important to us as my wife calls family and friends in the UK frequently. I'm just beginning to look at adding a separate provider like Localphone where she'd just have to dial something like **2 to place the call through the secondary provider, but again I'm not techy enough to know all the ins and outs of that. If there was a way to automatically route international calls dialed directly through the appropriate provider, that would be killer and would solve this issue. This is much more my limitation that Vestalink's. After more research, I've found that it's trivial to automatically route international calls through a second provider like Localphone that offers significantly lower international rates than either GV or Vestalink ... as long as you disable the functionality that automatically loads configuration from a Vestalink URL every time the device is rebooted. (It took me some time to figure out why the DigitMap kept reverting when the device restarted, which of course is required for the new DigitMap to take effect.) - Speaking of international calls, Vestalink's phonebook is exceedingly basic. It doesn't have grouping, for example, and much worse from our perspective is that they assume that all numbers are US (okay, or Canada) numbers. It only supports 10-digit numbers and formats anything else as a US number. I've requested they support international numbers as well (http://intelafone.uservoice.com/forums/232787-feedback-forum/suggestions/5599263-support-non-us-numbers-in-the-phonebook), but again not holding my breath.
- Overall value for money seems very good (not as good as free with GV, but GV doesn't offer E911, for example) so I don't feel I've made a bad choice.
Hope this adds more than just noise to the conversation. :)
Brent
I would like to make a comment on previous comments by Brossow.
I mostly dial Europe and Mexico (both landlines and cellphones) and I checked. Their International call prices are quite a bit lower than Googlevoice. What am I missing?
Thanks
Quote from: joecandle on March 08, 2014, 09:28:55 AM
I would like to make a comment on previous comments by Brossow.
I mostly dial Europe and Mexico (both landlines and cellphones) and I checked. Their International call prices are quite a bit lower than Googlevoice. What am I missing?
Thanks
I only researched relative to the numbers we actually call. All of our international calls are to the UK, which costs 2¢/minute with GV for the numbers we call and for the numbers I checked in Vestalink's rate table those calls would be 3-4¢/minute. (Some of our calls would be the same at 2¢/minute but none lower than the GV cost.) Having said that, however, those same numbers are only 1¢/minute with Localphone and while a penny here and there may not seem like much, taken in total it means that calling via Localphone cuts our overall international calling costs in half even compared with GV's or Vestalink's already low rates.
Having said that, I checked GV's rates to UK mobile phones (10¢/minute) and compared with Vestalink's rates to the same numbers and found Vestalink was only half that price (5¢/minute). For us it's a moot point because we don't call UK mobile phones, but in that case Vestalink clearly beats GV. I was not trying to do a complete across-the-board-to-every-country comparison but only reporting based on our usage, and I'll update my post to clarify that. Now, again having said that, Localphone again beats both with their rate of only 2.3¢/minute to the same UK mobile numbers (less than half of Vestalink's rate and less than a quarter of GV's).
Hey all...
I was preparing to set up a Vestalink account to migrate my phone away from GV. I was also content with the notion of forwarding GV to Vesta, and spoofing my local # on the outbound Vesta side....but when I went to sign up, they tell me there "are no numbers in the area."
I didn't think that this would be an issue for someone willing to forward inbound/spoof outbound, but I see no way to register with them without getting a local DID number.
What am I missing??
Thanks, David
Quote from: OKPhoneGuy on March 08, 2014, 10:00:57 AM
Hey all...
I was preparing to set up a Vestalink account to migrate my phone away from GV. I was also content with the notion of forwarding GV to Vesta, and spoofing my local # on the outbound Vesta side....but when I went to sign up, they tell me there "are no numbers in the area."
I didn't think that this would be an issue for someone willing to forward inbound/spoof outbound, but I see no way to register with them without getting a local DID number.
What am I missing??
Thanks, David
Not sure I completely understand, but if you're going to forward from GV and spoof the Caller ID for outbound, having a local number shouldn't matter. The nearest Vestalink phone number I could get is in a town an hour or more away from me, but since my local GV number forwards to it and Caller ID gets spoofed for outbound calls, for all practical purposes I still have a local number. It wouldn't matter if my "real" number was down the road or across the country. If there's not a local number in your town (or even area code) just pick a different one and set up the GV forwarding/spoofing as you would with a local number.
Okay I think I was just being dense - who cares where the DID number originates - just pick a place and move on.
Doh on me :)
Quote from: joecandle on March 08, 2014, 09:28:55 AM
I would like to make a comment on previous comments by Brossow.
I mostly dial Europe and Mexico (both landlines and cellphones) and I checked. Their International call prices are quite a bit lower than Googlevoice. What am I missing?
Thanks
GV Rate to Cuba Guantanamo Bay 98¢
Vestalink Cuba Guantanamo Bay $1.90
I was a very satisfied Intelafone subscriber. Then they merged and created ObiTalk, then they changed their new name ObiTalk to a newer name, Vestalink. I was happy with Intelafone and the price is right, so in January 2014, I bought an Obi adapter and signed on with a VestaLink residential plan. It's been downhill ever since!
Sometimes my outgoing calls go through sometimes they don't. And twice, since January, my account has been dropped from their system, necessitating that I go to their website and create a new account, as if I've never been a customer before. My phone service is down while I wait for all of this to go through, and if it's a weekend, well I just don't have a home phone until they get back in the office.
I travel a lot and count on VestaLink to send incoming calls to voicemail where they show up on my smartphone, but my VestaLink service has been so spotty since the first of the year I feel like I have to call my Vestalink number every morning from my cell phone to make sure it's working and will receive incoming calls.
I'm really disappointed. They had a good thing going but it aint working now.
Quote from: Disgruntled on March 13, 2014, 01:31:05 PM
I was a very satisfied Intelafone subscriber. Then they merged and created ObiTalk, then they changed their new name ObiTalk to a newer name, Vestalink.
I think you meant Obivoice and not ObiTALK. ObiTALK is of course run by Obihai.
Do anyone know the phone number of vestalink or chat link. I tried emailing them on 5/6/2014 still I have not received any response yet. If in future if I am customer if they take this much to respond then we need to think.
Any help is appreciated.