The Question:  Is VoIP (voice over Internet Protocol)  for me?  I need to reduce my phone bills.  My phone bills are eating my profits and VoIP looks interesting.  I have a small business with multiple phone lines.  Our business depends on making and receiving a lot of phone calls.  I work out of my home office some times and other times I'm on the road.  A couple of my employees travel as well.  The cell phone bills are huge and the landline phone bill gets bigger each month.  We do make some international calls.  What do you think?

Signed:  Small business owner. (Code: NoMaBell4me)

Our Response:

VoIP is rapidly becoming the primary or supplemental form of telephone communication in savvy businesses and homes today.  Providers such as Vonage, Covad, AT&T VoIP, Skype, Getpacket8, and dozens of others are expanding their businesses rapidly.  Choosing a service can be a challenge but well worth the effort.  Programs like Skype for Business are almost a no-brainer for businesses these days.

An individual can easily save several hundred dollars per year on a home service.  Companies can save even more depending on their calling patterns and existing billing plans.  I'm now totally VoIP for home and business and I'm saving a real amount of money.  My clients can't tell a difference but my accountant can.

A quick way to start is with a look at some of the major providers that advertise on the internet.  See who provides VoIP in your area.  Take a look at the various VoIP provider features and compare them to what your business needs.  Most VoIP providers offer as many features as a typical traditional landline phone plan and many offer more features.  For you road warriors, the VoIP system sends the message right to the email of your choice.  You can listed to your voice mail on your laptop on the road.  Take your phone adapter with you and you can call from anywhere you can get high speed internet access.

The VoIP plusses are significant savings and some really useful features.  The minuses potentially include the following: Voice quality can vary somewhat like a cell phone (that seems to be getting better).  Some VoIP plans do not support faxes and other data transmission devices.  If your high speed internet connection goes down, the phone goes down.  If the power goes off, the phone goes down (I personally installed an uninterruptible power supply on my cable internet router and phone adapter so I have 2 hours of coverage in a power outage).  You phone will be no more reliable than your high speed internet provider (mine is great but some are prone to outages).

If you have multiple lines in your business consider replacing all but one backup primary line that can keep you going in case of an outage.

You can transfer existing numbers to your VoIP so your callers don't even notice the change.  You can sit back and count your savings when you make a wise choice on changing to VoIP from providers such as Vonage, Covad, AT&T VoIP, Skype, and Getpacket8.  Cut down on landline and cell phone use and replace it with VoIP.