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Last Updated: Feb 18th, 2008 - 14:39:01 |
VoIP Plans Offered by Vendors
VoIP, shorthand for a new phone technology that makes calls cheaper than by landlines, has hurried providers into offering callers more for less.
The service, called Voice over Internet Protocol in its breathier form, uses an Internet connection to make phone calls. Calls travel at least part of their route on an Internet network rather than the more-expensive public switches that comprise the telephone infrastructure.
The growth of high-speed Internet connections is making it possible. About one in four U.S. homes now has a broadband connection, giving VoIP companies such as BroadVox, Vonage and the larger AT&T and Verizon the critical mass they need to market their services to millions of homes.
Most VoIP services - with names such as VoiceWing (from Verizon), CallVantage (AT&T) and Packet8 (from 8x8 Inc.), for example - give callers their choice of area code; free domestic calling; plus call waiting, caller ID and voice mail at no extra charge.
AT&T's VoIP plans range from $19.99 per month, in introductory packages, to $34.99 a month. BroadVox rate plans include $29.95-per-month unlimited local, regional and long-distance calls in United States and Canada. Compare these rates to your landline and long-distance calling bills and you'll see the savings.
With prices like these, VoIP is causing the biggest transformation in telecom in 100 years. VoIP calls are cheaper than traditional "switched calls" because service providers don't have to open a dedicated circuit as they must with landline calls. Instead of circuit-switching, VoIP sends the signals that make up a phone call in chunks of data.
Time Warner Cable can offer VoIP to customers who don't use broadband because its VoIP calls travel through its cable lines. Rolling out the new service in phases, as it did with its Road Runner service, Time Warner is offering VoIP in Clintonville, Dublin, Worthington, the West Side, Lancaster and Zanesville, said Mary Jo Greene, the company's vice president of public affairs. Gahanna, Grove City, Powell, Westerville, Athens and Delaware residents will be offered Time Warner's VoIP this year.
VoIP offers an alternative to traditional phone service in more ways than one.
AT&T's VoIP service is a way for that company to offer local service without renting parts of the telephone network from Verizon and the other Baby Bells. That allows AT&T to increase its customer base and offer services that don't include access fees.
The availability of VoIP could prompt millions of people to cancel their existing local telephone-service contracts.
Internet phone-service costs based on a sampling of calling plans:
• AT&T: Plans range from $19.99 per month, in introductory packages, to $34.99 a month.
• BroadVox: Five packages, including $29.95-per-month unlimited local, regional and long-distance calls in the United States and Canada; other packages range from $12.95 for 500 domestic "anywhere" minutes to $44.95 for a small-office/home-office program.
• Time Warner: $39.95 per month for its cable and broadband customers, $44.95 per month when paired with one other Time Warner product (either cable or broadband). Now available at $19.95 per month for three months as an introductory offer.
• Verizon: $34.95 a month for high-speed Net customers; or $39.95 a month for non-customers who have broadband connections.
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