We just cut our phone bill by 2/3!!

**lottaLove** · 11-02-2006, 03:45 PM

I have been looking for ways to cut back on non-essentials, like call waiting, etc., and even debated taking the full plunge and cancelling our land line altogether. Then I was talking to some people at work, and they told me about a local company that does voIP.

So I decided to take the plunge into the unknown world of voIP. For those of you who don't know, voIP stands for voice over IP, and is basically telephone through your internet service.

So now instead of paying 32.00/month for basic phone plus call waiting, we pay 12.00 per month for phone, call display, visual call waiting, voice mail, and 3cents/minute long distance. Plus, we can take our "phone" with us anywhere we go, and make local calls to home. So basically, I can take this little box, which is basically a router, hook it up to any high speed internet connection, plug in my telephone, and receive my home phone calls. Another neat thing is that I receive an email with a .midi file attachment whenever I receive a voicemail, so I can check my voicemails just by reading my email!

I even got to keep my old phone number, so I don't have to notify anyone of a change. We've been using the phone for 3 days now, and it's great! You can tell there is a difference, because you don't get the ambient noise that you do on a regular phone, so if the other person isn't talking to you, you cannot tell that they are there, because it is dead silence.

Sorry for the gushy post, I'm just so happy with our new phone service, and I can't believe we're saving that much money every month!

**FrugalMomof3** · 11-02-2006, 03:48 PM

That's awesome, we just did the 3 in 1 special with our local cable company so all in all we will save $30-$50 but dont ya love saving money?

Good thinking!

**Telephus44** · 11-02-2006, 04:02 PM

I know a lot of people who use VoIP and love it. We'd probably use it here, except we have DSL in a bundle package with the phone company. Since DH is a network engineer and knows more about the computer/telecom stuff than I do, he gets to make the decision (especially since he runs the mail server, the routers, his own internet radio station...etc.).

Who's your provider? Around here it's Vonage.

**Nada.Leona** · 11-02-2006, 06:57 PM

Hmmm, might have to look into that one myself!

**JustJoy** · 11-02-2006, 07:00 PM

I switched to Vonage a little over a year ago and LOVE the savings.

**PrairieRose** · 11-02-2006, 07:24 PM

We're considering doing that as well after the first of the year (we're socked into a contract until the end of March I think). Good to hear that you're loving it.

**ewokgirl** · 11-02-2006, 11:22 PM

Cool! We still have a regular landline. We have fiber-optic internet through our phone company, so we really can't switch at this time. My sister had Vonage when she lived here, and when she moved to Europe, she kept her internet phone number. It's awesome because I can call her in Europe for free!

**Scattymum** · 11-03-2006, 05:08 AM

we use skype which is the same sort of thing i think, if i call another skype user (anywhere in the world) its free, my SIL, and mum in england have it so i can call them for nothing and my friend in NZ has it too. I can call any landline or mobile or SMS international and the cost is way cheaper - its completely free to download ( i think the website is skype.com). Our phone bill used to be about 150 Euro a month and its gone down to 40 Euro and i actually make alot more calls now.

Its a great system - you do need a high speed internet though

**bumplett** · 11-03-2006, 08:59 AM

that's so neat! thanks for sharing! so - just out of curiousity, are you using the same telephone & it's just plugged into the pc? Or is it a seperate speacil phone?

**Scattymum** · 11-03-2006, 09:53 AM

you have to buy a Voip phone that has a USB connecter for the back of the pc - they are pretty cheap though ( you could also use headphones and a microphone but the quality isnt as good!

**kittyrose** · 11-04-2006, 04:33 AM

hubby wants to get the phone line with the cable company... but with my job, i work online and am required to have a landline phone, this wont do...
of course, i have cable and dsl (as a backup for my job)...
i make decent money doing this but when both my cable and my dsl goes out, i dont make any money...
if i stop working online, then i will probably do something like the voip... very cheap way to go...

to me, its practically free and i like tha!

**lottaLove** · 11-04-2006, 08:27 AM

I use my same phone. I have a special router that plugs into my cable modem, and the router has a regular phone jack that I plug my phone into.
Our provider is Vianet Internet Solutions, which is basically the same idea as Vonage, only it's a more local company to our province.