Help a Nerd Out! Ellen wrote to ask…
“I’m looking for advice on most reliable web-based telephone services. I live in the foothills of a mountain in Phoenix and find that my cell phone calls get dropped often, despite installing a signal booster.
My landline has a lot of interference, (which the phone company can’t seem to fix) and is also not reliable. I must be in a dead zone. I do occasional consulting and am looking to ramp it up. Most my calls are with individuals, but occasionally I have conference calls.
I cannot have calls drop if I want to retain any clients! 🙂
Phil G. I’m a big fan of Skype. Works really well for my needs as long as wireless or my cellular signal is strong.
Beth Z. Vonage offers some very cool options for small business and home, too.
Leave a comment if you have had luck with other VoIP services. Thanks, nerd community.
I don’t believe it qualifies as VoIP, but I LOVE Google Voice. If you have a strong Internet connection, I highly recommend it. There are a lot of things you can do with it and I love that my voicemails are transcribed and I have a visual history of them.
We switched over to Ooma in an area where our cell phone didn’t get a consistent signal. I saw a link to order it for $99.00, but had already purchased it. Maybe you can score s deal and good service, best of luck!
Just to switch things up a bit, do you have issues of your cell dropping calls when your cell phone is connected to your home network? We have very bad cell service at my house, but great service 1,000 feet down the street. Not very convenient when I get a call on my cell in the middle of the night. I found that if my cell is connected to my home network my calls do not drop and my coverage is 90% – 99% improved. Added bonus is that most cell phone plans do not charge for services when you are connected to WiFi 🙂
We have been using Nextiva VoIP in our offices for almost four years now — initially there were some quality issues, but nowadays we hardly ever have any noise issues or dropped calls. Plus, Nextiva has a virtual fax machine option, as well. And the cost is a fraction of what Verizon was charging us!
I recently began using whatsapp for calling, and not only texting, I found it offers a good quality. Your contact needs to have installed the app too.