Abstract: Ooma Office - Tried it for a month - liked some features, but in the end had to send it back because a) fax line issues, b) dialing out issues, and c) in bound calls not ringing the phone .. all somewhat critical for a phone system to handle. Disclaimer: Ooma did not work for us, but may be ok for your situation. Read more for 'our story' ..
It was supposed to save us money overall, not a lot but some .. and it was supposed to help accommodate future plans to perhaps upgrade to fiber optic internet here, sometime, maybe. But it didn't work out that way ..
The Ooma phone option was one recommended by the Axia.com (the fiber optic company 'coming soon') representatives as they promoted their new services to the Town of Magrath residences and businesses. Earlier this year I had switched my home phone line from Vonage to Ooma with little problem and I was overall quite happy with the service, features and price there. So, I suggested we try switching to Ooma at my day job workplace.
Pricing: The difference in price was not huge, but over time was supposed to save us money. With Ooma you have to buy the device upfront (currently $199 plus tax and shipping) and then pay $24.95/line/month thereafter. With our previous provider, our business phone lines were bundled with our internet connection, they provided (and installed) all the needed hardware and charge us $36.95/line/month. So by my calculations, we were to save 19/mo in first year and 36/mo in each subsequent year or an estimated $1000+ in savings over a 3 year period.
The Pitch: With my home Ooma line, I simply ordered the device online. It arrived in the mail a bit later, I installed it myself and set it up online with little problem or issue. However, with the office line, every thing is priced higher and we first had to deal with a persistent group of online telephone sales persons. Great news, the device is on sale but only till the end of the week. Oh, your special price might be extended for a day or so. Have you decided yet? How about now? Eventually we decided to proceed, so .. Yay. They take payment over the phone and finalize the order.
The Install: So the box arrived in the mail and we encountered our first problem. Their computer system did not recognize our address as 'valid'. Magrath uses an addressing system common in Utah but apparently a great mystery to our local utility companies (to be fair, I experience the same confusion with gas/elec companies). #problem-1# Their system didn't recognize 80 S 1st Street W or any number of variations on this. Several calls back a forth ensued #problem-2# Tech support suggested we enter a fake address to get past the online address check
The Ooma phone option was one recommended by the Axia.com (the fiber optic company 'coming soon') representatives as they promoted their new services to the Town of Magrath residences and businesses. Earlier this year I had switched my home phone line from Vonage to Ooma with little problem and I was overall quite happy with the service, features and price there. So, I suggested we try switching to Ooma at my day job workplace.
Pricing: The difference in price was not huge, but over time was supposed to save us money. With Ooma you have to buy the device upfront (currently $199 plus tax and shipping) and then pay $24.95/line/month thereafter. With our previous provider, our business phone lines were bundled with our internet connection, they provided (and installed) all the needed hardware and charge us $36.95/line/month. So by my calculations, we were to save 19/mo in first year and 36/mo in each subsequent year or an estimated $1000+ in savings over a 3 year period.
The Pitch: With my home Ooma line, I simply ordered the device online. It arrived in the mail a bit later, I installed it myself and set it up online with little problem or issue. However, with the office line, every thing is priced higher and we first had to deal with a persistent group of online telephone sales persons. Great news, the device is on sale but only till the end of the week. Oh, your special price might be extended for a day or so. Have you decided yet? How about now? Eventually we decided to proceed, so .. Yay. They take payment over the phone and finalize the order.
The Install: So the box arrived in the mail and we encountered our first problem. Their computer system did not recognize our address as 'valid'. Magrath uses an addressing system common in Utah but apparently a great mystery to our local utility companies (to be fair, I experience the same confusion with gas/elec companies). #problem-1# Their system didn't recognize 80 S 1st Street W or any number of variations on this. Several calls back a forth ensued #problem-2# Tech support suggested we enter a fake address to get past the online address check
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