Vonage Broadband Telephone Service Review

Lousy Customer Service

By: D Singal
September 6, 2009 @ 7:24 PM

I bought the adapter from Walmart. The box said that I was going to get a no-hassle refund from Vonage. I called Vonage and the sales lady got me to sign up over the phone and promised me that customer service would refund me the money and that there was no need for me to sign up online. When I went to customer service, she said that they could not issue me the refund and I had to do it online. This company is a scam and one end does not know what the other is doing. They then refused to cancel my account right away and insisted that I had to call the next day. I would never do business with a company like that.

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Vonage has VERY BAD custoemr service! Read my experience!

By: Sam
January 1, 2009 @ 10:02 AM

Vonage’s customer service representative are not EMPOWERED to act on the decisions that they arrive at.

I had called about a billing error. After 4 times, each time 45 minutes to an hour, I was told that they understood the error and I will be given a credit; however, since the credit was more than $200, they had to pass it to a different department to be issued. The credit was NEVER issued.

This has gone for more than FIVE months!! After this past conversation (now for the 5th time), when the representative gave me the same story, I insisted on talking to a supervisor, I was told that it wouldn’t do any good. She told that she was not EMPOWERED to do anything and I should give up on the credit. CONTRARY to the others who had PROMISED me the credit! This is just BAD BIZ!!

I have spent near 5 hours on the phone, and despite repeated promises by Vonage’s representatives, I have never received the credit that they promised me!

Vonage will not only be loosing me as an old customer (more than 5 years!) but as a share holder too. Before you become their customer, checkout OOMA.COM or magicjack.com. Both of these companies have Superior products at less cost than Vonage! Any company that in this day and age ignores its customers and its promises is doomed to go bankrupted!

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If I could give it a zero I would!!!!!

By: Melissa Chaput
September 29, 2008 @ 3:37 PM

Pros: it is cheap and you get what you pay for

Cons: Customer service is terrible, phone service is on again off again. The customer service line is useless. They leave you on hold for 30 minutes plus each time and do not solve your problems. Even if they are wrong they will charge you.

Summary: This company does not provide the service they promise. They don’t stand behind their product and when you try to cancel they will leave you on hold for an hour hang up on you and still charge you a disconnect fee of $39.99 that they do not disclose. Be sure to get written confirmation of your disconnection or they will not disconnect and will not refund your money.

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I'll never sign up

By: Fred
June 24, 2008 @ 10:25 AM

I read the terms of service, as recommended by Jane on Oct 29th, 2007 at 10:29 AM. I’ll never sign up. It is specifically, because of items 5.4 and 10.2. As far as item 5.4 is concerned, without the ADDITIONAL DEDICATED fax line (which seems to be the differentiation between the Premium Residential and Premium Small Business plans) I don’t see how Vonage could measure “normal use” of the Premium Unlimited Residential plan’s service against the advertised “Unlimited local and long distance calling in the US, Canada and Puerto Rico” of that plan. Without being able to measure this how do they find the justification to change a plan and make it the more expensive one. The other concern I have is that even with a fax machine on the same line which is used to talk, there is no violation of the described illegal, improper or inappropriate uses of service, as laid out in item 10.1.

For everyone experiencing billing issues on credit cards (this works for ANY vendor, it is a “best practice” for paying vendor’s you just don’t really know or ones you have a reason to not trust), apply for another credit card and use it as a dedicated account to pay only for that vendor’s service. Once they’ve established “good credit” with you, move them to your trusted vendor list. If you have to cancel service, cancel the account in the phone call just before the one you make to the vendor. Then, let them try to bill the cancelled account.

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Bad product without English speaking IT support

By: Robert
May 5, 2008 @ 2:31 PM

In retrospect it was funny but I was furious for the year I was going through the problems. I tried it with multiple problems from the start since the people setting me up were in Asia & I had one who hung up on me for talking too fast for her. Oh & it takes 30 minutes of being on hold to talk to someone. I spent many hours working my way up the chain to someone in India meanwhile having problems with my computer as they gave me code without knowing the NATO alph phonetic alphabet saying 157L as in Larry, when I would say L as in Lima she would say yes only to find out with the next person she had actually been saying M as in Merry. After 2 weeks of not having a phone I went back to the phone company at which time I finally got someone from Vonage in New York who said the problem could have been soved buying their $100 phone. When I tried to switch back they held my phone number for 6 weeks so we could not be switched over and blocked our number from calling or being called by Vonage customers for a year.

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The Vonage nightmare

By: Greg Frederickson
April 25, 2008 @ 9:38 PM

I have had Vonage since 4/2005, and the quality of the service is off and on, numerous problems including not being able to recieve faxes, dropped calls, calls going into my voicemail even though our phone never rang. When I subsribed I was told that I could keep my number, it didn’t happen.

Also the router box failed, and they would not provide me with a new one, so I had to go buy a new one, costs me $40. Now I am trying to cancel my account, after spending 20 minutes on the phone with “Gilbert”, he told me he could not cancel my account effective 4/30, I had to call that day. I warned him not to charge my credit card, we will see. Bottom line do not, repeat do not sign up for their service, you will regret it.

Greg

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Consumer fraud and deceptive practice

By: Emily Nghiem
March 31, 2008 @ 11:49 AM

Upon cancellation, Vonage automatically charged $97.00 disconnect fee, despite my insistence that I never agreed to that and was never informed. I asked my account to be noted I consider this consumer fraud and deceptive trade practice. After looking online, there are thousands of complaints against Vonage. I believe it is negligent to allow Vonage to continue operating and soliciting customers using illicit practices. I believe Vonage should refund all customers and either shut down or convert to a nonprofit charity that provides free phone service to people in need as restitution to the public for violating consumer protections.

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Cancellation problem

By: Nicole Blackmore
March 18, 2008 @ 11:07 AM

I had called to cancel my service in January, 1 week after setting it up, they transferred me to 4 different departments, each telling me they were the wrong one. Finally they said ok thank you have a nice day. Two months later my bank account wasn’t adding up, so I got my statement and sure enough, they didn’t cancel it!! So I called them today, and they want a $40 cancelation fee, even though they owe me $50, and if I don’t cancel within the 60 days, which is soon, I will be charged the $40 and the cost of the phone box and I won’t get a refund for what they wrongfully took from my account. SO before doing this, make sure you want it, when people say it’s too good to be true, it really is!!!

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Poor technical support - feature delivery

By: Michelle
January 24, 2008 @ 11:16 AM

Cannot receive inbound calls web dashboard glitch, no clear number to call then half hour wait times. Not ready for primetime not worth dollars per month.

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DON'T USE VONAGE THEY ARE A RIP OFF

By: Aurelia Matthews
January 21, 2008 @ 10:48 AM

I have had the service for 7 months. I never used the service because it was so difficult to use. The service didn’t work correctly or clearly. The customer service SUCKS. I called to cancel the service. It took me over 2 hours and 3 people to finally get the customer service person to try to locate a supervisor. They continued to offer me 2 free months of service, a lower per month fee etc. When I insisted on canceling my service they wanted to charge me $43, when I refused to pay the $43 they refused to cancel my service. When I insisted on speaking with a supervisor they put me on hold for over 30 minutes. The customer service person continued to tell me they cannot waive the $43 BECAUSE THE COMPUTER GENERATES THE CHARGE. Apparently, Vonage is run by computers and idiots.

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Terrible

By: Lucas
January 4, 2008 @ 1:35 PM

Service was probably 5 out of 10. Not good quality sound at all compared to analog or our new VOIP. Price was good but it was reflected in the quality. Often just didn’t work and had to reboot everything to get it going again. Interestingly, my wireless network constantly needed rebooted to work when we had service, even when the phone was working. Since cancellation it works flawlessly. Finally and most importantly, my new phone service called Vonage to have the number ported over. They checked on install day to have it ported. 11/17. I got auto billed on 11/21 (for 11/21-12/20) and 12/21 (for 12/21-1/20). I called on 12/24 when I noticed the second bill and that it was for future service. I asked for the credit refused to refund the money. Even though I had service with the same number through my new provider since 11/17, they insisted it was still active. The same number active on two providers doesn’t even make sense but they refused to do anything. I would have settled for them just giving me the 12/21 billing back, but they stonewalled and would only try to get me to resign up. I had my credit card company take care of it. I WILL NEVER GO BACK TO VONAGE AND WOULD ADVISE EVERYONE TO STAY AWAY. Look up who the owner of the Company is and you’ll find he’s a con artist. Honestly – look up “SEC Charges Vonage CEO Jeff Citron with fraud!” Your cell phone is more reliable.

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Horrible customer service.

By: Claude Maxwell
December 18, 2007 @ 11:35 AM

This company has the worst customer service that I have ever encountered. Hold time is absurd and then you get disconnected. If you do talk with someone they speak poor English…Save your money.

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Poor Quality

By: George Arenschield
December 11, 2007 @ 9:46 AM

I’ve had Vonage for 4 months now. I have had nothing but static, diminishing sound, echoes, etc. After many bouts with a very technically deficient help group, I’ve given up. Vonage is a total scam.

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Vonage sold the number they gave me to a telemarketer

By: Chris Bridges
December 6, 2007 @ 11:02 AM

I was a Vonage customer for a year when one day I recieved 60 – 80 messages on my voicemail. I assumed it was some mess up and contacted vonage support, to be told after spending 40 minutes waiting on hold, that I had to have it fixed. I was to call another phone company to tell them not to use the phone number vonage provided me a year ago. Vonage could not or would not resolve the problem. I have spent 2 hours on hold to talk to someone at vonage say how wonderful the service they provide is. I will never trust Vonage again to follow up on their service. If it works it is OK, but look out if you need help. They will ask you to take care of it.

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Bad customer service

By: Art Harp
November 20, 2007 @ 3:18 PM

I just inquired about service hookup and the delay between the time your regular telephone service is disconnected and you are online with Vonage. I got so many different answers for this person (I believe the company’s sales force is outsourced) that I thanked the sales person and hung up. A few minutes later I got a call and was told to basically get lost. How is that for great customer service? As I said, I do not think the call originated from North America. I will never pick this company ever!

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One year later the problems begin

By: Jane
October 29, 2007 @ 10:29 AM

Before I signed up for Vonage, I decided to make myself an informed consumer. I came to this site, among others, read reviews and educated myself accordingly. I saw many reviews about horrible customer service, but every time I figured dissatisfied customers would come and vent here, while happy customers would not bother too often.

For almost a year I had Vonage and was very satisfied– I thought my assessment had been right. Then, suddenly, I noticed some strange charges showing up on my credit card from Vonage. Upon further investigation I found that I had been switched, without notification, from a Premium Unlimited Residential Plan to a Small Business Premium Plan. WHAT?!

Apparently, Vonage reserves the right to investigate accounts with abnormal usage. Having 2 teenagers in the house, my phone sees a lot of usage. Apparently, having more than the average user’s amount of minutes qualifies you to have your rate plan changed, without notification, at Vonage’s whim.

Even better, when under this investigation they reserve the right to MONITOR (YES, LISTEN IN) on your phone calls with NO regulatory agency preventing them from doing so!

I am currently disputing the huge $80/mo. jump in my billing from THEIR decision to change my rate plan based on their assumption. Needless to say I am not a small business, and never use my phone line for business purposes (for a business I don’t even have!)

I am supposed to be waiting for a call from an account investigator and judging by the reviews I’ve re-read, this call will never come. This is a horrible experience and, yes, much like every review here it has NOTHING to do with the line service itself, but with the customer service/company.

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GREAT

By: Ed
October 22, 2007 @ 5:45 PM

Vonage has some minor problems but when you compare them with the cost savings it is a deal. The biggest problem I have had is the loss of phone service in a power outage and that can be fixed if it became too big of a problem with a UPS system.

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Look before you leap and read the terms!

By: Holly Troutt
October 17, 2007 @ 1:41 PM

Well, tried in vain to get Vonage to work. We spent hours and hours on line with their tech department and exhausted all efforts. It literally cost my business money. Not to mention the angry and frustrated clients that could not hear me. The line sounded like I was under water. We ported back to a land line with even more issues and that took months, with Vonage blaming the local phone company and them blaming Vonage. Upon cancelling they would not prorate the charges and of course they wanted a cancellation fee. A cancellation fee for services that never worked! As consumers we let them get away with this why? If we brought any other product, wouldn’t you expect it to work? Isn’t their an implied warranty somewhere? So….heads up to everyone out their contemplating their service. If I ran my advertising agency like this, I wouldn’t be in business any longer. Sure would like to expose their services in a much broader format, like network TV! People should see the real deal and shout from the rooftops. I’m angry and just not going to take it anymore. I know I will spread the word like a wildfire starting with this site.

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Vonage - cheats you on AMEX card offer

By: NOra Prentice
September 30, 2007 @ 12:23 PM

First of all, I get bad conenctions to Italy. so the quality is not consistent or reliable. secondly they offered me a $50 amex card for signing up and are now totally ignoring this offer. I send them emails of the confirmation and they do not reply. THE CUSTOMER SERVICE IS UNRELIABLE, INEFFICIENT AND JUST PLAN BAD. I will dipsute any charges with my credit card co. immediately and reconnecting my good old relaible hard line Verizon. Bad customer service and false offers should not be tolerated. I am also complaining to the Better Business Bureau.

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So far so good ...

By: Paul Perkins
August 31, 2007 @ 9:25 AM

Vonage has worked quite good for me … nothing more than a few minor “glitches”

To all the people who have gripped about the call centers and the people that work there … grow up, they re all somewhere in India or other spots all over the world …

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deceptive- advertising to Sunrocket customers

By: Alan George
August 29, 2007 @ 9:59 AM

I was a Sunrocket cutomer who was taken advantage of by Vonage. I went on line the day Sunrocket folded and signed up with vonage. Vonage was offering two months free, free equipment and free setup for Sunrocket customers. NOWHERE on the site

did it say that you had to call the 800 number to get this package. The next day I received a confirmation from Vonage where I was charged $ 48.09 The day after signing up it did appear on the web site and I called to get the package. I was on hold a total of about 4 hours being transferred to different people, each saying that I was not intitled to the package since I signed up on line even though it asked if I was a Sunrocket customer. I asked them to cancel my account and was told that someone would call me within 48-72 hours to confirm the cancellation. I Never received a call. I have called on numerous time since with the same song and dance. Everyone I talked to said that they did not have authority to issue me a cancellation, only management could. Again I was transferred with no results. To make a long story short. I was charged $ 48.09 , $ 30.62 and a disconnect fee of $ 96.28. I was able to get a confirmation number for cancellation only after calling and demanding a cancellation number. I got my credit card company involved in a charge dispute and finally today being on a 3-way call with the cc company and talking to an arrogant supervisor I was able to get the charges credited. It took at least 10 calls and lots of runaround. I had refused the equip and Vonage showed receipt of it unopened on 8/06/07. When the supervisor took the time to read the entries to my account he agreed that all charges should be credited. THERE CUSTOMER SERVICE STINKS. I would not recommend them to anyone.

I never had their service so I can’t speake about that. I was however very pleased with the Sunrocket service and am very please with the service I now have with Packet8.

I would highly recommend disputing your charges with your credit card company.

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STAY AWAY.....FAR AWAY...You'll be SORRY!!

By: Todd McLaughlin
August 26, 2007 @ 9:56 AM

Service doesn’t work…never did, never will work. If you speak Phillipino that’s a definite plus for you….all customer service calls go to the Phillipine Islands…HORRIBLE. DON’T be Suckered into this worthless company!!

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Very deceptive, stay away form this company.

By: Scott Miller
August 24, 2007 @ 10:04 AM

First I was caught up in the SunRocket mess, and decided to give Vonage a shot. Their service stunk and decided to cancel the service. Prior to canceling, I knew there was a money back guarantee and I checked all the confirmation emails I had to see what those terms were, but did not see anything listed in the email. None of the emails I had listed those terms. I went online to vonage.com to see if I could find any info there, and I went to the terms of service link (http://www.vonage.com/features_terms_service.php) and saw that the money back guarantee was for 60 days, and that if the equipment was returned with 14 days of the cancellation the disconnect fee is refunded. Since the new service I ordered went in yesterday (8-22) and I signed up for Vonage service on 7-19, I thought I was within the 60 day money back guarantee terms. Imagine my surprise when I was told my terms were only 30 days and that I would be charged $99.75 for disconnect fees and that the equipment was Ãâmine to keepÃâ. I remembered there were disconnect fees when I signed up, and that is why I sought out the information about the money back guarantee last week because I did not want to get hit with such an outrageous fee. I was not able to find anywhere on vonage.com terms for a 30 day money back guarantee. Had I known, I would have canceled the service when I checked the website and all my documentation only 5 days ago!! The actual terms of service that applied to me were not available for me to reference in order to make a knowledgeable consumer choice to cancel the service. I feel I did everything a reasonable person would have done to follow the rules and stay within the service agreement. I would not have waited 5 days to cancel if I saw that the terms of service were in fact only 30 days, but that information seemed to only be available to the customer service person, and not to me, the customer. The real killer is that I have this brand new equipment that they refuse to take back. What a pathetic waste. When I sent an email to customer service they told me that “all their records show that my deal was 30 days”. That’s fantastic. NONE OF MY RECORDS SHOW THIS, THAT’S WHY I REFERRED TO THEIR WEBSITE.

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Horrible!! Stay Away!!

By: HoustonRealtor
August 2, 2007 @ 10:08 PM

This is the most horrible experience I’ve had in some time!!!!

A friend referred me to Vonage. After touring their website, I decided to try the service. I proceeded to sign onto new service via the "refer a friend" on line. I came to a point where I needed some questions answered so I called the number posted on their site. I spoke with someone named "Rachael" who answered all my questions. I initiated the call telling her I was referred by a friend and was proceeding to sign up online. She asked for my email address and was able to find my referring friend through her system. She told me that she could take care of the referral and things could be processed through her. She indicated that we’d both get the "one month free" and "$50 American Express Gift Card".

After my service was set up with "Rachael", I went into my "account" online and set my "network availability number" to ring my cell number should the service be unavailable. After that, I received MANY various calls from people dialing a completely different number that was in no way associated to me.

After realizing that the problem must be with VONAGE, I called to speak with a "technician" who had me on the phone for no less than 30 minutes. After all this time, having repeat steps over and over again, he could not figure out what the problem was. I then asked to speak to a supervisor. I was told that all the supervisors were in "a very important meeting" and that other managers were "not available". It was at this point that I just asked him to cancel my service.

He told me he could not and that I needed to speak to someone in account services. He then transferred me to "account services". I then received a message that wait time was "15 minutes". After about 5 minutes, I hung up and tried calling again. I then spoke with an "account manager" named Lawrence, ID# 26166. He apologized for such a horrible experience thus far with Vonage and figured out what the problem was. Apparently, the "virtual number" that was assigned to my account until my equipment was delivered and service was hooked up, belonged to someone who had an ad in a newspaper for "escort services". I asked why they would assign an active number to anyone and Lawrence told me that "that must be an old ad as that was not an active number". Well, once Lawrence diagnosed the problem, he agreed to change my "virtual number". He added another "line" at "no charge to me". Problem solved, right? I thought so… I then asked Lawrence to confirm the "refer a friend" gift items that "Rachael" indicated would be delivered to me and my referring friend, i.e. one month free service as well as a $50 American Express Gift card. He checked my account and told me there was no indication of these gifts as the only way to receive them was to apply for new service via the Vonage, "refer a friend" web service. I explained to him my experience with "Rachael" and that she assured me that although she was taking my order via the phone, the "refer a friend" gifts would still apply. Lawrence then told me that "Rachael" made an error by telling me that but that he would check on it and see what he could do to make it right. Lawrence told me he’d call me back in a couple of days, no later than "Thursday, July 23", 2007. I waited until Friday, July 24th, 2007 for a call and never heard from Lawrence. To this day, I’ve never heard from "Lawrence". Friday, July 23, 2007, I called their customer service line and ask for Lawrence in New Jersey. The man I spoke with did not know Lawrence as he was "in India", however transferred me to the New Jersey office after I told him Lawrence was in New Jersey. Someone in the New Jersey office finally picked up the line. I asked to speak to Lawrence. After a wait of about 5 minutes, another person picked up the line. It wasn’t Lawrence. Her name was "Rose". I told her that I was waiting to speak with Lawrence. She told me there "was no way to find a specific person" as they "did not have extensions for all representatives". Being very frustrated at this point, I proceeded to tell her the lengthy story of my experience thus far. Talking to Rose was like talking to a robot. First of all, the connection was very bad, like a bad cell signal, so I had to strain to HEAR what she was saying, furthermore, she had a heavy accent which made understanding an even bigger chore. On top of that, it was a connection that required only one conversation at a time so if she was talking I had to wait until she finished to say anything and vice versa. Needless to say I was very stressed at this point. After explaining everything to Rose, she offered to investigate the "refer a friend" gifts however that would take a couple of days and she’d have to call me back. I told her I did not believe that as I was told the same thing by Lawrence. She offered me several discounts and incentives to stay with Vonage, i.e. 6 months at a discounted rate, dollar amount credit to my account. I can’t remember the dollar amount credit she initially offered me, it was something like $120. I told her that I was signed into my account and if she would add the credit to my account, and I could immediately see it, I’d consider staying on. She asked me to hold on "2 minutes" (which is what they all asked you to do, "hold 2 minutes"). She came back and told me she could only give me a credit of $60, not the $120 amount she’d just told me she would give me. At this point, things were getting comical to me. It was then that I told her I did not want to discuss any further credits or gifts to my account but without any further discussion I wanted to cancel. End of story! She got that and proceeded to cancel. She indicated to me that once they received the equipment back in the same manner it was shipped to me, they’d refund all fees incurred with them.

The last phase of the story was discussion about shipping the equipment back once I received it (which I hadn’t at the time of this conversation). I told her I would ship the package back as soon as it was delivered to me, as a matter of fact, I told her I would just refuse delivery and have it sent back to "sender". She indicated to me that I needed to accept delivery as I needed to include a "RA#" that she would provide via email, and if I didn’t include that upon shipping back, I would not receive my refund. I then told her that I did not want to incur any fee for shipping. She told me that I would have to as they would not pay or refund me for shipping. After fuming about that, as I was already $42.94 sign on fee, & $41.41 cancellation fee, invested into this company, it angered me to think I had to spend another red cent on anything to do with Vonage. I eventually concurred that I’d pay the shipping and wash my hands of Vonage once and for all!!

Well, the shipment arrived July 31, 2007. I had to pay $6 for postage to have it shipped. Gas to a shipping drop off box and $1 parking fee. I put it in the mail August 1, 2007. I’m now tracking delivery and awaiting my refund. So far, I’ve invested about 5 hours of my time, $7 out of pocket and much stress and frustration that affected about a week of my life.

Since my experience with Vonage, I’ve investigated the web reviews and was surprised to find NUMEROUS complaints with similar experiences. What a fool I was to look AFTER the fact. Not much like me to do that. I trusted a referral from a friend who was happy with Vonage and didn’t think any further. Mistake! Not only have I check reviews, but checked the BBB in their area of New Jersey and found 5193 complaints.

Needless to say, STAY AWAY FROM THIS COMPANY! Like one review I read, it’ll result in lots of stress and "tears"!!

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Disappointing in the end...

By: P Childs
June 29, 2007 @ 10:40 AM

When the vonage service works it is as good as any other out there. And the price is better than most, but when you have a problem their customer service is awful. It is hard to find solutions to problems on there web site without drilling down several pages and calling their customer support is like getting your teeth pulled. For that we are leaving vonage.

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Customer service among the worst

By: Donald Patrick
June 25, 2007 @ 9:00 PM

Vonage docked me 4 hours for a 1-hour call which resulted in overage charges for extra minutes. Their website link to request a credit doesn’t work, and email to Vonage yields form responses saying you have to use the website or call a customer service rep–along with a lot of happy talk about how much they want to help you and value you as a customer. Calling their toll-free number can be an excruciating ordeal–set aside an hour of time, and keep a crossword handy, as you’ll spend a lot of time on hold., You may end up dealing with several different people, none of whom may understand their own system–nor English. They tend to answer questions you didn’t ask, adding to one’s frustration. On credit request issues–Vonage doesn’t let you know they’ve denied the request; the credit simply is never posted, leaving one wondering if they even acted on the matter. I’d rank customer service at Vonage as one of the worst I’ve encountered–and I’m (almost) used to dealing with bad ones. If you want a phone company designed to run on automatic pilot, Vonage might be for you.

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The Worst

By: anonymous
June 13, 2007 @ 9:12 PM

Vonage is the worst product of the year. No customer support. Empty promises and lies. Choppy calls and VM does not work. Must reboot many times a week. Static. Very poor and inaccurate billing. Fax does not work. Don’t blame my ISP–which is fine. STAY AWAY FROM VONAGE !! ! ! !!!!

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Great support so far

By: Wayne Wilson
May 31, 2007 @ 9:33 AM

My unit was delivered on time (5/29/07). I followed instructions, was working except for the noise on the line. I spoke to techs. I was having a problem with power coming in from the phone company’s line. I corrected that by disconnecting the phone lines////problem solved. I am not waiting for my existing phone number to be transfered. I can call out but can’t receive calls. The quality is great. I live in Deland, Fl. If anyone e-mails me I can help in signing you up. I get free months and you get free months.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage representatives don't understand english

By: Syed Masood
May 26, 2007 @ 10:32 AM

They have the worst customer service I experienced. We have nine vonage lines for our business. I wanted to disconnect one business line. It became a nightmare to do so. Cancellation department has no direct line or any prompts for the cancellation. Next the reps dont understand english. You tell them something and they keep on repeating the lines on their side. I have been holding for last 45 minutes and still unable to cancel the line. They make it difficult to cancel the line.

Rating: 2 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Worst one yet! BIG RIPOFF!

By: Paul Pilgrim
May 23, 2007 @ 9:27 AM

Non-existent customer service, wasted 4 hours of my time trying to get an answer, nobody answers the phone, and there is no way to contact them otherwise.

They ripped me off for $65 for not even one minute of service. There is no way for me to even cancel the service, because there is no way to contact them. I had to cancel the CC just so they won’t try and rip me off any further.

TERRIBLE, worse customer service i have ever seen.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Long Time Vonage Customer - Great !

By: KenS
May 17, 2007 @ 10:43 AM

I have read most of these comments and while interesting reads, not at all representative of my experiences.

I have been a Vonage customer for 3+ years. First, I had Vonage as a 2nd line and my primary line was Verizon. I then relocated to another state and went Vonage for both lines. I LOVE IT!

The only problems I have ever had was when my technologically challenged brain got confused switching to a WiFi router, Vonage CS VERY patiently walked me through the process.

The only other problems were due to my cable provider. The beauty of that was I had already set up my account online at Vonage to automatically forward calls to my mobile phone in the event my service was interrupted for whatever reason. THAT is a free service.

The free long distance including a large portion of western Europe is a plus as well.

Sorry you folks had problems, I love my Vonage!

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Wonderful waste of money!

By: daneK
May 11, 2007 @ 9:27 AM

Subscribers beware!

All I know is that, I signed up for Vonage service and everything was great until 3 weeks later when the service stopped working. I called in to customer service and tech support and they did some troubleshooting with me until they decided that it would not be fixable. They told me to "BORRROW a friends laptop…" I never was able to find anyone to borrow one from to continue the troubleshooting with them. I finally just gave up on their service. They made some promise that they failed to keep. Needless to say I did not realize that you agree to a year contract with them when you sign up. :O YIKES! Also you give them free reign to charge your CREDIT CARD! :O YIKES! I tried to alert them of the problem with their customer service and they told me that I owed roughly $100 for cancelling my service. I asked them if they felt it was right to be charging for service they were not providing and they stated that I did not follow through with their recomendations. It is a little disheartening to know that our government allows businesses to treat consumers like this. To charge for services and not provide them should be illegal.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Do not go near Vonage!!!

By: Barbara Beattie
May 2, 2007 @ 4:38 AM

I have had a nightmare dealing with this company. I accepted a month free trial with the condition that they would credit all charges if I cancelled within the month. I cancelled as they could not provide my existing numbers as promised, did not even connect to them. That was in Dec. 2006. Jan 2007 I asked why yhey had not credited my card and was told that I did not call in time. I cancelled again and found my card being charged every month. Called again and was told that I did not stay on the line long enough to cancel, now I have spent 300 plus and I cannot stop their charges. Cancelled again and they are still charging my card. It is now May 2007 and I cannot get rid of them. My credit card co. said they have had many complaints and they are dealing with it now-STAY AWAY FROM VONAGE!!!!

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage Not Releasing Phone Numbers

By: P McDaniel
April 18, 2007 @ 5:35 PM

Where do I begin. Let’s see 5, yes that is five months ago, after frustrations over extremely slow service when retrieving voice messages online, I asked that my number be released so I could go with another provider. Well here it is five months later and Vonage’s excuse is that their third party provider (Focal) hasn’t released the phone number. Of course that took four hours of repeated calls to Vonage customer service today. No kidding, 4 hours out of my life talking to customer service reps in the Philippines. Some would get so frustrated that I wouldn’t give up asking for their Supervisor, they would just either hang up on me or leave me on hold for 20 minutes. Of course I was very determined, but where did it get me? No where. You might ask why I just didn’t get a new phone number with the company I’m going with. Well I have hundreds of dollar in business cards and other promotional items for my company, that it will now cost me in reprinting cost. My new provider says they have customers that have been waiting a year to have their phone numbers released (ported out) from Vonage.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Works Great!!!

By: Tim
April 18, 2007 @ 11:10 AM

Got Cable internet and Vonage phone service… Great!! Worked as soon as I opened box. Back-fed wiring to house and wala!!!! (please consult to wiring guids or electrician…)

Vonage does say most lines need 90Kbytes a sec PER LINE to have reliable & good connection.

When I had DSL I think that would have been borderline. Not sure. I have had a kick with this service and realize that EVERYTHING will be streamed over internet at some point.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage

By: Theresa
March 21, 2007 @ 1:23 AM

LOVE IT, LOVE IT, LOVE IT. ONLY ONE DROPPED CALL AFTER A MONTH. I CAN LIVE WITH THAT. I CAN’T BELIEVE THE FANTASTIC VALUE FOR THE MONEY!!!!!!!!

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage Service is a Disaster

By: Steve O.
March 13, 2007 @ 8:01 AM

After 6 weeks of Vonage, service not working at all, dialing incorrect numbers, and dropping calls. I decided to switch back to Verizon. Vonage is not worth the hassle. I spent hours with them on the phone, then when I called to cancel, the customer service rep told me I talked to the Help Desk in Europe, but the better techs are in Jersey. What is that???

I canceled my service and they are still charging me a cancellation fee of $39.99 because their service doesn’t work. I challenged the fee, and the only thing 3 different people have told me is that is their policy.

Save your sanity and your time. Paying higher rates for Verizon is worth it.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

No problems for three years

By: Happy user
November 23, 2006 @ 5:39 PM

I’ve had Vonage for almost 3 years now. The only problems I have ever had were because my cable internet is flaky. I think most of these complaints are unreasonable. I would attribute many of the problems with people that have no idea what they are doing or talking about. These problems so many have with transferring their number, is not Vonage, but the carrier you had the number with originally. Until they agree to “sell” your number to Vonage, Vonage cannot do the transfer, and the phone companies have no incentive to “sell” your number to Vonage. As far as the customer service, I really can’t comment on that, because I’ve never had a problem that warranted calling them. Little piece of advice for Unhappy who bought two accounts from Vonage…when they tell you not to click the “Submit” button more than once or to use the “Back” button in your browser…they do that for a reason. That’s because the server will do what you tell it, and post your data (for your order) twice, thereby opening two accounts for you.

Bottom line: I have seen very few legitimate complaints against Vonage service. If you have a brain and want to save some money…get Vonage. It is only a phone after all. It’s not your pace-maker, it’s not your house or car. It’s a phone. I’ll bet 90% of the people complaining have a cell phone anyhow. Did I mention it’s just a phone?

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

No problems for 2 years

By: W Hughes
November 11, 2006 @ 1:21 AM

I have had Vonage as my 2nd phone line & fax line for 2 years with no problems. I have called customer service and had reasonable service and response time. Set up was easy and worked right away. Started Vonage based on recommendation from another friend who has Vonage and cell line. That person continues his Vonage service as well. The only issue I have is their opt-out info sharing policy and process is a little convoluted. It was clear to me that I would be charged a cancellation fee if I started their service then canceled. Thus, some of the complaints posted seem unreasonable.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Blocked Calls

By: Mick
October 15, 2006 @ 6:58 AM

Ok. We thought Vonage was terrible when we actually had it, but now that we’ve dropped them, they’re still affecting our daily lives.
Here’s the scoop. Dropped Vonage, signed back up to Verizon. Now… anyone who has Vonage can’t call us! That’s right. Our number is blocked for current vonage users! Shouldn’t that be illegal? I think there’s a class action in the making.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Extremely Poor Customer Service

By: Dick Soos
June 25, 2006 @ 8:24 PM

When initially signing on with VONAGE i was instructed not to contact my previous carrier because that would cause delays in transferring the phone number. I followed the instructions and was told that the process would take no more than 20 days. I am outraged that after numerous calls and E-Mails, over 70 days has elapsed with no action and I am being billed by both VONAGE and my previous carrier. I am having difficulties cancelling the automatic billing and have a strong feeling that VONAGE can care less, they have their hooks in.

My advice is to sign on with a company that has local offices such as Time Warner, Sprint, Etc. All E-Mail I generate is answered from India or I think it is India and they have no local representatives to carry on an eye to eye conversation.
The actual service is clear and I have no qualms about the sound or connection speed. You cannot deal properly with someone on another continent who can probably care less.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Worthless!!!

By: Unhappy
May 21, 2006 @ 2:41 AM

I ordered 2 devices but later I decided to return 1, unopened in its own box. I’ve had poor connection issues that I had to call CS out of frustration. However, I went through a lot of headaches and further frustration in communicating with most of the Vonage CS before resolving the issues. After several months since I signed up with Vonage, I got the chance to look at my credit card statements and found out that they were charging me twice monthly so I called CS and as usual they were terrible. Anyway, they were charging me for 2 accounts, one of which I never knew existed. I did not even know the username and password for that account and when I asked them if there is no activity with the said account, they said it does not matter if there is no activity. I insisted I only have 1 account so they asked me if I would want to cancel the other account, I said yes then they automatically charged my credit card $39.99 for the cancellation fee with a word that they will try to request for credit for that cancelled account. I waited and called them several times but I knew I wasn’t going anywhere. After giving me a run-around, I got sick and tired of them, I cancelled my existing account and sure enough they charged me another $39.99 so much faster than a speeding bullet! I never heard from them anymore. They totally, wickedly ripped me off! Vonage is one king-sized NIGHTMARE! I switched to Sunrocket and so far I have no complaints yet…

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

do not get vonage

By: NO vonage
May 15, 2006 @ 11:22 AM

they have very very pooooor customer service.when you call them: expect atleast 20 min to get some one to talk to and then excpet to be transfered 2 or 3 more times.. and then call back naxt day, go thrugh the same thing to get an update. if you dont understand what the rep is saying, you have probably reached some one in India or Pakistan. good luck….

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Dont be a fool

By: I'm a fool
May 13, 2006 @ 6:01 PM

I read thru all the bad comments–they are all true. No exaggeration. To bad I did not do this before I signed up. Now I have a penalty to get away from them and an new serivce charge to sign back up with my old provider. Over 20 hours lost to resolve issues.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

The Worst Sevice I have ever used

By: Anonynous
May 13, 2006 @ 5:38 PM

Don’t sign up. don’t do it. They say they can transfer your number. It took over 90 days. It’s too late to cancel after 30 days without a penality. Like to talk with people in India who do not understand English and can not help you?–go with Wonage. Want to stay on hold for 40 minutes and then be disconnected–Vonage is the one !

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Do Not Sign UP !!!!!

By: Monesha
April 24, 2006 @ 11:13 AM

I signed up for vonage a month later my number was not transfered. I called to cancel it took 35 minutes to get someone on the line. They told me thay did not know when my number would be transfered. I had to pay for shipping to send the equippment back. POOOR SERVICE!!!!!

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Another customer lost?

By: MrMajik
April 23, 2006 @ 6:14 PM

For over a year I have been waiting to see if Vonage would still be around. They sure advertise a lot. I work in the IT field supporting computers and networks and understand this kind of thing is not as proven as the phone service my grandparents used.
With that said I read thru this forum and talked to two people who have Vonage to help me decide if it is now ok to use their service. I was ready to sign up with them but after reading the large number of posts here that warn against signing up with Vonage I am still in the undecided camp.
I wonder if dissatisfied customers seek out a forum to vent while satisified customers never think to post here.

Rating: 5 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Hideous. Business destroyer.

By: LC
April 22, 2006 @ 9:39 PM

Unreliable. A messenger with a broken leg. Dropped calls, garble, echo. Forget sending any multiple page faxes. INCONSISTENT AND UNRELIABLE.

Rating: 2 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Must add something

By: Lynn
April 22, 2006 @ 4:48 PM

I went back to all the reviews to Dec 2005, and noticed that the older subscribers have no complaints. I have no complaints with VOIP and have been with Packet8 for a year. I only tried Vonage for the cheaper rate. So it is not your ISP or your broadband speed, it is Vonage that is bad, most importantly in Customer Service vs Service. Without good CS you might as well not be in business.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Don't sign up

By: Lynn
April 22, 2006 @ 4:30 PM

I had to cancel my bank card to stop all the fees I was being charged. The latest over $100.00 to disconnect even though the device was returned in the first 30 days. Impossible to talk to ANYONE to cancel your account.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

quality for its value

By: Mia
April 21, 2006 @ 9:09 AM

the price is great, all the features great. But i was experiencing bad connection and cutting off. i couldnt have a normal conversation. I ordered additional fax line, they charged me but it never worked even when I called them and we tried to resolve the problem. I couldnt call some of my friends it would just say that the number is out of service but when I tried to call them from my cell it worked. THEY NEVER LET my previous phone company KNOW THAT I AM A VONAGE CUSTOMER SO I HAD TO PAY FOR BOTH. Even after calling them 4times!!!!!! And now they want to charge me over $100 because I dont want to be with them anymore. Their customer srvice really sucks. They have such a big mess there. I am still waiting to resolve this issue. I would never get it again. I would rather pay more and get a good service from regular phone companies.

Rating: 2 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

nope never again

By: Chantel
April 20, 2006 @ 9:01 AM

i saw advertisements 4 vonage on tv and thought low monthly bills great.Well its a fluke i never got my service to work.When i called called customer service wouldnt help me it would mess up my roadrunner.And because im not gonna pay for a service that i cant use i have to pay 150.00 extra because i diconnected with them.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Had Vonage for 2 years

By: Brian
April 15, 2006 @ 2:37 PM

I have had this service for 2 years and have had virtually no problems. I moved and just took it with me. Once I got the new High speed internet installed at the new house plugged in and it still works great. I will never go back to traditional phone line, unless I needed it for being diasabled as 1 reviewer mentioned.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

One year later, it's great!

By: Chris
April 11, 2006 @ 10:02 AM

It’s now been just shy of a year since I installed Vonage. The installation instructions were trivial to anyone with a basic background in networking, and I was up in 15 minutes. I had some initial quality of service problems, but tracked it down to someone leeching off of my bandwidth. Once that was resolved, the service has been outstanding and you can’t beat the price.

It’s not for everyone… if I was disabled and absolutely dependent on a phone for my health, it wouldn’t make any sense to go to Vonage. The same holds true for business calls … after all, if the power goes out, so does your telephone service.

But for standard home usage, it’s been a complete win for me.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage Is Awful

By: Crystal
April 10, 2006 @ 5:53 PM

We have been on hold with Vonage customer service department for over 3 hours today; getting disconnected 3 times. I have been on hold for the account management 800-860-5491 for over 15 minues. We have been trying to cancel service since the end of March, we got the service in February. We have not been able to maintain a dial tone and when we did get a chance to place a call, there was a terrible echo or the person we were calling couldn’t hear us. Please do not fall for Vonage. Customer service and trouble shooting was the worst!

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

A total rip-off!

By: Lavonne
April 6, 2006 @ 7:11 AM

I wanted a family member in another city to be able to call me anytime on my dime not theirs. I asked every question I could think of to insure Vonage could provide me with a phone number local to that person. At the point of sign up they said yes which turned out to be no. They now have the gall to tell me I have to pay more money to end the service as well as loose the up front cost to boot! It only took me a few days to discover they could not provide what they originally said yet I’m out over $100. This company is awful and I hope what goes around comes around.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage--the worst purchase

By: Anonymous0
April 1, 2006 @ 11:51 PM

Purchasing vonage was the worst decision I have made in a long time. I should have got on the web and read about all the poor service. IT IS ALL TRUE.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

oh, god, no !

By: Help
March 20, 2006 @ 5:32 PM

Don’t use Vonage. Choppy incomng messages, dropped calls, buzz on th eline and the WORST Customer Sevice. You pay a termination chage to get away from them and then have to pay the new service charge to return to your old carrier.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage has its place

By: Twogood2bt
March 18, 2006 @ 8:01 AM

I have been a Vonage customer for 8 months – setup was fine, call quality and fax lines were variable. The real issue came up when both the fax and phone line were useless (would not work) when I had a home wireless network connection for a 2nd pc hooked up. Beware – your bandwith from your carrier will always be the same – the more “stuff-phone lines/pc’s” you have hooked up, something will be sacrificed.

I run a home based business – if you have few calls to make, go with Vonage for the cost. But if your income and means are dependant upon your VOIP – beware. Pay more with another hard-line carrier. My fax is being switched over to a hard-line since it is not working with Voange anymore

Rating: 5 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage, DON'T DO IT The worst

By: Omar
March 17, 2006 @ 2:57 PM

I had Vonage about six month. nothing but problem. The service sucks, the customer service sucks, It take more 50 minutes to speak to costomer service in INDIA and then they can’t fix the problem. I have call more them two monthts to resove simple issue “can’t dail int calls” and they could help me. I had a superviser on the line who said let me call you back and never did. I am cancelling my service and have dispute their charges and fees. DON’T DO IT

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage doesn't deserve a score of 1

By: Bewildered
March 15, 2006 @ 7:57 AM

I’ll try to keep it short. First I called to find out more about their service. Spoke to someone in India (very obvious). They were speaking English, but they didn’t understand the words they were using. I was told that their service wouldn’t work for me because I have two phone lines going to each phone jack in the house. Two weeks later I received sales call from Vonage. Relayed what I was told. They said that it would work, and for $11.45 they would send me a router with very simple instructions (he said I needed two routers – one for each line). Was told that the service would be transferred and active once I hooked up the router(s) and responded to the email to give them authorization to cancel service with existing provider. Received routers. Was out of town for a couple weeks. Noticed I was receiving emails from Vonage notifying me of voicemails received. Called “customer service” (ha). Spoke to India. Woman was trying to read from book to tell me how it was possible that some calls were getting through to my active service, and some were getting through to Vonage. Made no sense. Was transferred a couple times over the next hour. Was told that if Vonage customer was calling it would go to their service (even though I hadn’t authorized it). The only way I could retrieve those voice mails was to log onto their website. Had to read their service agreement and agree to it in order to get those voice mails. After reading service agreement, I decided not to use them. Called “customer service” (ha). Was told they were charging me $40 plus tax to cancel service (that I never transferred), and that it would be refunded after I sent the routers back to Ohio (was told that I only needed one router now), but that I had to pay shipping. I told them not to charge me $40. They said that was the agreement (even though the agreement wasn’t emailed until after I talked to the sales person). I am now disputing the charge with my credit card company.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Customer Sevice????(non-existant)

By: Joshua
March 10, 2006 @ 11:15 AM

Vonage could possibly have to worst customer service of ANY company I have ever dealt with. It is 100% obvious that there motivation is to frustrate the customer so much so that eventually we give up and let them keep the money that they did not earn. Our service has never worked and when I sent them nack all of their equipment, they not only did not give me a credit for hardward that never worked, they charged me 139.97 extra! I wish I could treat my customers the way Vonage treats theirs!

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage is a terrible company

By: Erick Loss
March 9, 2006 @ 11:53 AM

I am a systems integrator. I work with data, phone, TV and security systems everyday. I set up systems for colleges and hotels. I tried Vonage for our new office phone system. I could not get it to ring through consistently. Calls were not completed, some were dropped. For one week I had no phones at all. Customers would write e-mail or call my cell phone to ask if we were still in business. They would get messages saying that my number was disconnected or that it was not valid.

I spent over 11 hours on-line or on hold trying to get help, most of it on hold. When I called to cancel service I told them that I needed to keep the number and it would take a few days for the phone company to connect me again. They cut me off right then. I had no phone service. Qwest could not reconnect me with that number unless it was active. I had to spend 3 hours trying to get Vonage to activate the number again. Then they gave me a temporary number for 3 days, which no one knew to call, before I got my old number and same crappy service back. When I was finally connected to a land line again they gave me a $12.50 credit for my troubles.

Vonage should be put out of business. They ruined mine for almost a month. They have a cruddy product, lousy service and tech support and terrible business practices.

If you have to choose between two cans and a string and Vonage, take the cans and string. You’ll be happier with the service.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Poor Service, Bad technology,

By: Frustrated
March 7, 2006 @ 11:47 PM

I “switched” to Vonage in November 2005. Wish I hadn’t. There are outages. The incoming voice message is choppy with no fix in sight after 5 calls and on hold for 20 to 30 mintues while being passed thru 3 departments. It’s been 3 months and they still haven’t ported my fax number at the agreed upon price for a second “Fax” line.–DO NOT BUY !

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

so far so good

By: James
March 5, 2006 @ 5:54 PM

I’ve had vonage for about 2 weeks now, been problem free… so far. I did have to call support once during installation – LOUSY. I’m not prejudiced at all, but whoever thinks Indians at Vonage support can speak English well, should be shot. I can understand my cat better when she talks to me. That said, my Vonage has been great so far.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Great Service, Great Price

By: Diane
February 23, 2006 @ 5:22 PM

We’ve had Vonage for about 6 months now as our only phone. We’ve only had outages when the cable went (2x) and twice when the Vonage modem needed to be reset (unplug and replug after 2 minutes). We have a big house in the woods and have run Vonage through our phone jacks. We’ve even used 911 twice and it worked perfectly. Last month, we added a second line for our renters to use. The only reason I didn’t give it a “10″ is because we can’t get our Real Player TV unit (an older one) to work with it and Vonage only supports Tivo. Otherwise, it’s a great value and we LOVE the service

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

DO NOT SUBSCRIBE TO VONAGE!!

By: Kim in Uta
February 23, 2006 @ 1:09 PM

If you are thinking about signing up for Vonage service. I WOULD NOT DO IT!!!
Here is my story as to why.
I signed up for Vonage to save money, considering it was half the cost of my local company including long distance. However, I have had nothing but problems with the phone service. The problems ranges form continually dropping calls to the people I was talking to not being able to hear me at all when I could hear them.
When I spoke with customer service about these issues each time they tried to blame it on my in house wiring. However, I proved them wrong each time by bypassing my internal home wiring and still had the same issues. They were unable to solve the problem so I started the process to switch back to my local line carrier. At this point Vonage would not release my line even though my new carrier had authorization for it. Not only that they charged me for the next month of service (when my account had already been closed) and they charged me a $40 cancellation fee.
After may unsuccessful tries to reach their billing department I finally got a person who told me I had to speak with someone in their âAdvanced Billing Departmentâ but of course they where currently not working even though it was 1 oâclock in the afternoon.
The service sucks, the customer service sucks, and if you want to cancel your service, good luck getting it done without major problems and fees.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

SHOCKED by poor customer service!!!

By: Melanie
February 21, 2006 @ 4:42 PM

I switched to Vonage on 1/31/06. I specifically asked the CS rep when I signed up if my phone number was portable, she assured me it was and she was going to email me a LOA letter to have my number moved from Verizon so the process could be started right away. I never received the email. I received the Linksys device which was fairly easy to hook up and waited for info on my number transfer. By today I was done waiting so I called CS to see what was going on. I spoke with a rep with a very heavy accent that made it very hard to understand anything he said. I finally understood that he was telling me my number was not portable. I said I was told that it was, and he told me I was mistaken, nobody told me that. Then he changed his story and said maybe my number was portable in January, but now in February it was not (?) He told me someone else with Vonage had my phone number now, which I don’t understand since I still have it through Verizon, I never canceled it with them or signed the LOA to do so??? Anyway, I then said fine, I want a local number in my area so my friends & family don’t have to call me long distance, and I was told I would be charged for it. I refused on the grounds I was misinformed in the beginning about my number portability and asked to speak with a supervisor. The rep refused!!! He said there was no cause for him to transfer me & he wouldn’t do it. I was outraged, and demanded that I speak with a supervisor immediately, he then asked me what my issue was so he could relay it to the supervisor when he transferred me. I told him I dispute the charge and I cannot understand you clearly because of your accent. He said if you can’t understand me then how can you answer me? WOW!! I work in CS at a medical center and I can tell you if I spoke to any customer/patient the way I was spoken to I would be fired on the spot!! I hung up & called back, got another guy who said he could help me until I explained I wanted to cancel my service. Then he said I had to call another number to get someone to do that. I called that number, got a woman who was civil at least who said she was not authorized to cancel my account and the department that could do that was routing their calls out because they had too high of a call volume to answer their calls!! I asked for documentation that I had called to cancel within the 30-day money back guarantee period, she said she could not give me anything like that without approval from a supervisor. I said fine do that and of course, no supervisor in the office!! She then said she would create a ticket and give me the ticket# as proof that I called, but, surprise, we were magically disconnected before she could give me that number. I’m going to try again later. Will keep you posted…

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

So far so good

By: Terry
February 20, 2006 @ 4:41 PM

I signed up for the 30 day free trial. Received the adaptor in 2 days. Called support when I had trouble. They were on the line in less than 5 minutes. Had me try some things and fixed the problem.
Sound quality is great.
I am concerned about so many bad reviews on service. But had I read AND followed the instructions, I could have had it working with no need to call them.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Good, depends on your broadband

By: Andy
February 13, 2006 @ 7:57 PM

We have used Vonage for several weeks. Initally, it was choppy, but I dropped the bandwith and it works great. I use a wireless network on my pc as well. You have to put the Vonage router directly out of your cable modem, then out to your wireless or pc. Otherwise, it’s a bit choppy.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Great service at a great price

By: Greg
February 8, 2006 @ 12:26 PM

If you know what you’re doing you should have no problems setting up Vonage. Also be aware you do NOT have to dial the area code for local calls. You did originally but no more. Remember you have to sign up for 911 service but it also works great. The only time you lose your phone service is if your cable or DSL service goes down but if you have a cell phone you can have your calls forwarded to your mobile phone if that should ever occur.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Complaint Filed With F.C.C.

By: James
February 7, 2006 @ 9:56 PM

I am a man with declining health.I will not live the average male lifespan.A phone line is not only a gab line but also a lifeline for people of disability and illness.I have always had problems with vonage from the beginning.I adjusted the bandwith they suggested at no avail.They then sent me a new modem.I HAD TO PAY to send back the old one or I would have to pay for the old one.I realized then something was not right as a legitimate company would have paid the return shipping.The new modem did not fix anything.Either I was choppy or they were choppy.And then one night my heart palpitations were lasting a bit longer than usual.I tried to call my son.You guessed it.He could not understand a thing I was saying.I then contacted Qwest to switch back.Qwest tried but vonage would not release my number.They said the request was made in the wrong name.I called vonage who denied it.Qwest tried a second time and again vonage refused to release my number.I then called vonage and ordered my non-service cancelled immediately.I asked where to send the modem and they said they did not want it and I have to pay for it.I said I did not want it either and that they took the old one back so why must I pay for it.Again the customer rep. said that they just don’t want it.They now want $118.00 foe cacelling there non- service and for the modem.They did not provide me service and could die without phone service so why should I pay?I am filling a complaint with the F.C.C.Let vonage explain this to the government.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Inadequate customer service

By: MB Web
February 7, 2006 @ 12:34 PM

I was told when I signed on with Vonage that I would not have to pay a disconnect fee until after they supplied me with a local phone number. The customer service agent said nobody noted this on my account. After patiently waiting 6 months, and not getting a local number, I called to disconnect service. I was told I’d either have to pay a disconnect fee or they would not disconnect me and continue charging me for service I was never going to use! I asked to be transferred to a supervisor, and the customer service agent said she couldn’t do that because that person was on vacation. I asked to be transferred to the supervisor’s supervisor, and was told she was incapable of doing that. I asked for a direct phone line to the person, and was told she could not give it out! How in the heck am I supposed to resolve a dispute if I can’t talk to the right person??? I wound up calling my credit card company and asking them to dishonor any requests from Vonage for any future charges. F-minus-minus-minus for bad customer service!

Rating: 2 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Was very much worth the switch

By: Chris
February 3, 2006 @ 9:00 AM

I switched over from POTS about six months ago. I didn’t port a number, and I bought the Vtech VoIP phone to work with Vonage. I have a background in basic networking. My broadband is supplied by Comcast.

The instructions were basic and simple, the setup was easy, and I was up and running within 15 minutes.

In the first month, I did have a problem with some bad quality of service, but I quickly tracked it down to a neighbor leaching off of my bandwidth and downloading large files. Once that little problem was solved, I’ve had zero complaints about Vonage. I do use the service that they provide where they forward calls to a secondary phone if you have a broadband outage.

My bill went from ~$60 to $17 a month. I’ve never had any problems with billing. I’ve only used customer service once, and I wasn’t pleased with how difficult it was to get someone to talk to you that actually knew something… that’s why I gave the service an 8/10.

Otherwise, Vonage is a complete win for me.

Rating: 8 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Not worth the switch

By: Lamar
February 3, 2006 @ 7:08 AM

I switched to Vonage to save money. It was the worst thing I could have ever done. Voice quality was garbled, outgoing and incoming calls were frequently dropped. It would take at least 4-5 tries to make an outgoing call. Incoming was just as bad. The caller had to dial several times to get through. The phone would ring and no one would be there. Several times I had no service. After calling for technical assistance 2-3 times, the problem was finally diagnosed and corrected only to happen again. Overall I would say my stint with Vonage was a nightmare. My family hated calling my home, It sounded like we were in a wind tunnel. I have now switched carriers, which was almost impossible because Vonage claimed my name didn’t match what they had on record, what a mess they are. Service at night was worse than in the day. I wouldn’t recommend Vonage to my worst enemy.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

I didn't even bother

By: Tom K
January 29, 2006 @ 2:56 PM

I bought equipment at Staples and planned to hook it up and sign up online. Before I did that though, I wanted to know if I could transfer my number later if I wanted to, rather than commit to it now, just in case the service was really bad. Their website implies that yes this is possible, but it was still a little vague. Figuring it was a 30 second question, I called their number and after 0′ing out, I was on hold for 10 minutes only to finally get someone that said they would have to take my name and number and have sales call me back. That was 2.5 hours ago and still no call. On there website, under the Contact Us link is a message that says that due to the high volume they can’t accept any email. High volume of confused new customers or rioting existing customers at the gate? One has to wonder. Given they’re a consumer level business, I think this level of customer service is unacceptable. I’m returning the equipment to Staples tomorrow. Maybe the service is good if you can ever get the answers you need, but I won’t find out,and they lost the customer.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Absolutely awful

By: Richard
January 28, 2006 @ 12:08 PM

Althogh they shipped two different set-ups, neither worked, and then they tried to bill me for disconnecting! As it is, I am out the cost of returning the non-working equipment. They promised to reimburse me – issued a credit and then took it back!

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Can't receive any help from them

By: Beverly
January 27, 2006 @ 7:12 AM

I received my Vonage system in early January and followed their installation to the letter – still no dial tone. Contacted their technical support and received run around after run around. Even spoke with someone who said they were a supervisor. I’ve sent over 10 requests for assistance and they don’t answer. I’ve tried to cancel – you can’t get through to that department – too busy.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Would avoid

By: Matthew
January 26, 2006 @ 12:34 PM

I had to discontinue use of Vonage, because all it managed to do was interrupt my internet service. I then had to call 4 times to get a Return Authorization so that I could return the product, and now they’re refusing to give me a refund. I have contacted the BBB and am considering legal options. Anybody similarly frustrated with their service, please feel free to e-mail me: Matt02135 @ yahoo.com

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

billing issues & still no service

By: Tonnie
January 6, 2006 @ 8:19 AM

I set up for Vonage online. Recieved no explanation for what to expect, nor how to set up service. We recieved a box in the mail with a router but no instructions for set up. Vonage started billing us..we called in for support on setting up the service, we could not recieve support because the agent could not speak clear english. They told us to call back. Vonage kept billing us. We call to cancel the service & are left on hold. We call to resolve the months of billing issues & recieve credit & we’re left on hold for 25 minutes…no response. Call in again & told we’re being transferred to the “management department” and that our issue would be clearly communicated…agent picks up doesn’t have any idea who we are & can’t really understand us over they’re own phone line. We restate our issue are left on hold for 10 more minutes & the agent comes back & says he’ll have to just send a ticket to the management department because they’re line isn’t working, he says that it has a “fast busy”. Says that the management team will get back to us with a decision on our account. I say what decision? and he disappears…the line doesn’t hang up & I’m not put on hold. That was after an hour on the phone with Vonage. Bottom line: stay away.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

On the fence...

By: MikeP
December 24, 2005 @ 12:11 PM

I have had Vonage for a week now. I had a very questionable start. However, once up and running the service seems to work well. The only problem I have noticed is that on some calls the volume seems to be a bit low, but not a major problem. As previous posts suggest, your internet connection and provider are important. I have had no problems with my provider in the past. My troubles stem from my wireless router/network and internet connectivity. In the end, I had to figure everything out for myself. Customer service is non-existent. Most of the time you can tell they are reading off a script and have no idea how to address your problem. Occaisionally you will get someone who speaks english and is somewhat helpful and knowledgeable. But, most of the time they are only interested in proving that the problem is not with Vonage’s adapter–instead of trying to resolve your issue. I finally got my network to work by tearing everything down and deleting my firewall. Then I started building everything back up starting with the Vonage box, then the router, then individual computers, then create the network, then add the firewall. What a pain in the ….
I sure hope the service holds up because I have a lot of time invested already. At this point, I have not decided if I will keep it after my free month. On the other hand, I have had problems with Verizon in my area and they are not making any updates to justify their ridiculously high charges. So, it can go either way!

Rating: 7 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

don't sign up for vonage!

By: Riv
December 15, 2005 @ 10:05 PM

Vonage service never worked. We spent days on customer service calls. A more incompetent comapny I have never seen. We switched to packet8 and have had no problems and customer service was very helpful. We are still in dispute with vonage over billing. Don’t sign up!

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Former employee

By: Tom
December 3, 2005 @ 7:21 AM

First, I have read that employees are told to say certain things at certain times, such as never let a customer talk to a supervisor. I never was told that. If there is a problem, you escalate it with a ticket if you cant handle it, or transfer the call to upper level. They realize how bad their customer service is, and I guess when I started they were trying to remedy this. Also, porting a number IS NOT GUARANTEED in 20 days, It is a 20 DAY MINIMUM. Once you send in the paperwork, vonage hands it off and it is OUT OF THEIR HANDS. A lot of people have features on their current phone lines, and for whatever reason, this holds up the process. BUT I KNOW THAT PHONE COMPANIES PURPOSELY MAKE PEOPLE WAIT WHO ARE LEAVING THEM OUT OF SPITE. Anyway, while trying to get my paycheck after leaving, I had my own experience. Seems they tried to say I never turned in my equipment and were holding my check. They finally “found” it and I should, SHOULD get my check soon, This is only after calling for 3 days! The first 2 days, when calling the front desk, all I got was a recording, and at times that was all garbled! Luckily I had a HR guys number and called directly into the place and he helped me. So it is not only customers that deal with this bs. Lastly, from what I was told, if you have up to $5.00 in international calls(I believe it is one call, or maybe multiple calls) that you dispute, VONAGE AUTOMATICALL GIVE YOU UNDISPUTED CREDIT FOR THEM ONCE EVERY SIX MONTHS. So once every six months, if you dispute some international calls(You have to do this through your dashboard when you sign in)you get this credit with no questions asked. Just my 2 cents.

Rating: 4 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage Customer Since 2003

By: JHCJr
November 25, 2005 @ 3:29 PM

I am bewildered by the negative comments here. I have used Vonage for years and found the service reliable and stable. OK, I have had three outages, but very short in duration… I used the “Network Availability” feature and missed NO calls.
I also use BroadVoice for international calling, and very pleased with it as well.
The call quality on BOTH is outstanding! I would never go back to POTS.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Dont complain GET Better internet

By: Aras
November 23, 2005 @ 12:56 PM

People complaining about VONAGE most of the times are wrong. The phone service would work if they had the good internet connection. Most of the complains about the audio issues comes because of the high packet loss and high latency on the internet lines. Everyone thinks taht cable or dsl are magic – people wake up – clean your pc’s and stop downloading like crazy if you want to have a highest quality audio. Have any of the complainers checked they internet connection quality? If you runing 10 pcs on one cable internet line you think that is right to blame VOIP provider… Don’t forget VONAGE doesnt provide the internet connection and that the VoIP is different than your PSTN line. If you have good internet then your voice quality will be much better than regular line.
Of course I’ll admit that there are no service thats 100% satisfying.

Rating: 8 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Not Good for Business

By: Sarah
November 22, 2005 @ 11:38 AM

about 1/10 of the time people can’t get through, not even to leave a message. Dropped calls are a huge problem too. Not to mention that downloading your messages takes too long when you have a business to run.
Most of the time the sound is clear, but sometimes it is difficult to understand the person on the line due to a seemingly low volume (too high a volume happens too)and some choppyness in the connection.
Currently looking elsewhere for phone service.

Rating: 5 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage - Slash Your Phone Bill

By: MikeD33
November 16, 2005 @ 9:47 PM

What is Vonage and How Does it Work?

Vonage is a simple and inexpensive way to make telephone calls over the internet.

How Does It Work? It’s called voice over internet protocol (”VOIP”). An analog signal (like the type used for
traditional phone lines) is converted into a digital signal and then transmitted over the internet.

Features: Voicemail, 3-way calling, caller ID with name, call forwarding.

Costs: Vonage offers two home packages: (1) The Basic 500 ($14.99), which gives you 500 anytime minutes in the U.S.,
Canada and Puerto Rico; and (2) The Premium Unlimited, ($24.99) which has no per-minute limits.
For businesses, there are the Small Business Basic ($39.99), and the Small Business Unlimited ($49.99).

Benefits: great sound quality, ease of installation, inexpensive international rates, and significant savings
over traditional phone service providers.

In summary, Vonage is a great way use emerging technology to slash your monthly phone expenses.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Is Great, but phone network problem

By: Ray Bailey
October 26, 2005 @ 11:04 AM

There are limits to analog phone connections you can make to the ATA box supplied by Vonage. I have installed a number of Vonage system for clients, and use it for both my home and technical consulting business. Vonage does work as advertised given you have the reliable bandwidth and the phone network wiring is clean.

There are limits to the number of analog phones you can connect to the Vonage/Linksys ATA box. When connecting the ATA to a house phone system you MUST disconnect the phone system wires from the external local phone company demarc. This includes lightening arresters and noise filters that may be external to the house. So it has to be disconnected from the external phone network inboard of the demarc box.

All phone wiring in the house has to have the wires connected in the proper polarity. If any of the jacks in the house are wired backward (green-red instead or red-green) it creates noise on the line which will affect the ATA box. The same applies to any non-standard wiring connections; crimped non-gel clips, unsoldered splices, or corroded connector blocks.

All phones connected should be newer digital phones that use external wall-plug adapters. Old analog phones with bell ringers, or phones using line power can cause problems.

The ATA supplies 25 volts at 5 watts. Just one of the old phones can consume the available wattage which triggers the ATA box into a reset on the phone line. Your phone will ring but when you pick up the phone it is dead because the ATA port is resetting itself and the call is disconnected. People at the other end may (or may not) hear it ring once then get disconnected.

As mentioned before, the best solution is to hook a central base station phone directly to the ATA box, then use independent wireless modules for the other phones in the house.

In some cases a PBX incoming line can be hooked directly to the ATA and the PBX output line hooked to the phone network. These type of systems have internal power supplies rated to handle a large network of phones.

Rating: 8 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Works great for me!

By: Matt
October 5, 2005 @ 2:14 PM

I’ve been using Vonage for about 6 months now. My wife is British/Canadian/American, and our phone bills pre-vonage (with the best calling plans) was around $60-$80 / month. Now we rarly break $30.

The problems that people are describing, involving the number transfer, are based on which ever service you are transfering the number from. I’m in Austin, and came from SBC – it took 5 weeks. The phone company knows they are losing your business, the longer they can delay in transfering the number, the more money they make off you. If it goes past 6 weeks – start bitching to you phone company, they’re the ones holding it up.

If you go with voip, I would recommed doing what I did, and get yourself a UPS. Even a small UPS (with only your cable modem, and phone adapter hooked up), should get you 2-4 hours of backup in case your power goes out.

Overall, I highly recommend Vonage – it’s saved me over $300 in the last 6 months.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Don't be scammed!

By: Suckered
October 2, 2005 @ 7:02 PM

Anyone that is trying to defend vonage is a cheapie and is in denial. The only reason anyone would speak well of Vonage is because they think it’s cool to pay half price for half the service. Once again, you get what you pay for. If you are okay with constant choppy calls then Vonage is for you! Yes, people actual do research this stuff before they knock it. It just plain sucks! There is no other way to put it.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Huge Scam!

By: Sucker
October 2, 2005 @ 6:56 PM

Once again, I had to learn the hard way that you get what you pay for! You will too if you sign up. Not once did I have a clean line compared to land line service. Customer service is pathetic. Complete waste of time and money. 911 service is not good either. Stick with a real phone service provider.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Nothing wrong with it

By: Kevin
August 21, 2005 @ 11:23 AM

To understand what Vonage is, you must read. People who are giving this bad reviews did not do their research before getting it.

First, of course customer service is not good. Name me a start up company that had customer service down in the first 5 years. There are none.

2nd. People complain about area code. Well, if you don’t want to change area codes and Vonage isn’t in your area code yet, either wait untilo they are or don’t get it. Don’t complain after the fact.

Hearing someone complain because they had to be in front of their router to troubleshoot is funny. You need to understand technology before you complain about things like that. Of course you need to be in front of it!

Finally, the review. Vonage, if you have a good internet connection, works just fine. I have tested mine while having 2 people in my house use the internet, and no problems with the calls. If you have bad cable modem service, don’t get Vonage. It’s not Vonage that doesn’t work or drop calls, it’s your ISP.

I have a strong connection, and I cannot, nor can my callers, tell the difference between my verizon line and my vonage line.

Follow the instructions. When it says to unplug your cable router for 10 minutes before installation, do it. Don’t take shortcuts and then blame Vonage. Cable modems store memory, and if you don’t clear it, it will NOT function properly with Vonage.

Really… if you test ur connection, then follow the instructions, you will be fine. All these negative reviews are either from technically challenged people, or from people who simply didn’t read Vonage’s terms of agreement, or didn’t follow the instructions, or didn’t bother to test their internet connection speeds.

Vonage works fine.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Too good to be true? OF COURSE!

By: Liz P.
August 14, 2005 @ 1:45 PM

It all started one month ago…. I subsribed to Vonage in April. When I called to sign up , I was told that I could not get a phone number with my own area code. I’m still not sure why. Still, I went along with it. I figure it’s worth it for only 25 dollars a month. Well, it’s fine for 2 months. Then one day, I pick up my phone and no dial tone. I went online to contact them, but all I got was a phone number to call. So, of course I go to a pay phone to call. This is how it went: I explain my situation and I’m at a pay phone calling. “Well, you need to be in front of your router in order to look at the lights and to ‘troubleshoot’”. I was told that I should buy a cell phone and call them back from my home!! Ridiculous right? So, I say forget it and I go get regular phone service like i should have to begin with, but that 25 dollars just seemed so appetizing. I get regular phone service, call Vonage to cancel I’m told that I wouldn’t be charged anything and I could keep the router if I chose to because I had already paid for it. Then days pass by and I notice a charge from Vonage of $41.19. They explained that the $14.19 was a cancellation fee, but if I returned the router the fee would be refunded. As furious as I was, I return the router. Still, I was not credited back the amount. I called them to inquire about it. The person tells me that I wasn’t , but she had fixed it. I look on my account history and ANOTHER $41.19 had been charged. I call back, I was told it was a ‘mistake’ and he finally fixed it. Now people tell me, is this any way to run a business?

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

15 months and doing great

By: David L
July 28, 2005 @ 5:00 PM

I can only say good things about Vonage. Calling support? The staying on hold is a bit slow as several have mentioned. I got Vonage in March 2004. I got the 14.99 plan and played with it – meaning that I kept my other service until June – then I disconnected the old service. Since I choose to keep my old service for a while, I did not PORT my number – I just got a new one – but, I liked the Privacy. So, when I booted the old one – I just went with the number Vonage assigned. Most of the time when I call Vonage – it is about 5 – 10 minutes before someone comes on the phone – I have never had the bad experiences that some are mentioning, here. I think they must not understand what they are doing. I got virtual numbers where our families live (mine and my wife) – Now, they dial locally to get us. I can take it with me to hotels that have High-speed connnections… I recently set it to ring my wife’s cell phone simultaneously – that way if she is home, or shopping, or with the kids… I still get her. Also, her mother can dial one number, which is local for her, and can get her on her cell, if she is not home. I get a voicemail emailed to me at work for every message left – we got “walk-around” phones with two receivers to overcome the household wiring issues – I never tried re-wiring my house – just skipped that. I have high speed cable at home (Cox) and only if Cox goes down have we lost service. In those cases my cell phone is the alternate number, so we don’t miss calls, ever. Yes, I would say that you have to take the time to inform yourself of the services that Vonage has to offer in order to appreciate it. If you take the time, as I did, it is not hard to see all the benefits in services. I switched it to the unlimited plan $ 24.99 about a year ago… I cannot say that I am dissapointed in any way. We had some choppy and echo when I first got the service in 2004 – but, this year – no problems. Especially when we bought the 2.4 ghz digital phone (with two receivers) – we had been using a 900 mhz analog – perhaps that could cause some of the choppiness? I can not say enough good things. It is worth your investment in time, to look into this and learn. But don’t be afraid to start – just plug it in – it will work fine – you can learn the featurs as you go, play with their web site and try the voicemail and “Blast me” “ring me” features as you go along… Keep your old service for a month, or two if you like – as I did – then pay the one time $10 fee to upgrade to unlimited calling when you are confident. I pay $40 for 3 numbers. This prob. has saved my families hundreds in long distance. If you already have high-speed internet – you will save money and love it. I am just so surprised to see anyone dissapointed. I truly think that their dissapointments must be related to their internet provider services. Otherwise, may be they just did not understand what they were getting. I am currently considering putting it in at work, where I am CFO of 5 companies in multiple Texas cities with 500 employees… Have not contacted Vonage about this – but, I have no quams with trusting our $20 million company with this service. Not one bit of concern. I Know it works! I know it is more affordable! It is only a matter of time until everyone loves it!

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Not bad so far.

By: RR
July 19, 2005 @ 7:57 AM

When you read all the comments..especially the people who are so upset…keep in mind that they give no technically usefull data (most all of them) that tells you why they are having a bad experience….(most of it is about the service help)

If people would list what type of internet service they are using..type of router…and what phone service provider they are transfering from…that would help to understand so many problems.

I’m using Comcast cable with a firewall router, and a 5.8 gig Panosonic (3 handsets) phone. I have very little problems if any. On occasion when one of 3 computers in the house are downloading files and sucking up alot of bandwidth…I get some minor distortions on the line. I simply reconnect my phone call and the problem is usually solved.

Hope my review is useful. Most of the negative comments about Vonage are about their lack of human service….and problems getting their phone # to transfer to Vonage. I think most of the problems with getting your # to transfer to Vonage is with your local phone provider.

Good luck

Rating: 8 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

don't go with vonage!

By: brnt&trina
July 18, 2005 @ 4:15 PM

vonage didn’t transfer our phone number from verizon for a few months but assigned us a “virtual” number for which you pay your monthly price for so we were paying 2 monthly bills only to end up having to terminate our verizon phone number and get our virtual number as our permanent number…turned out that our new permanent number was out of our area and our friends down the road had to make “long distance” calls to phone us.when we requested a local number, vonage wanted to charge us 10 clams to do so.in the end we decided to go back to verizon for yet another number…also took us about a month to finally get our vonage account cancelled.they said they would so called call us back to cancel the account..after a couple of weeks of waiting we demanded the account be cancelled immediately or we would take legal action! bottom line…never again with vonage! verizon offers voip now and they are a much more reliable entity!we are sorry we ever left them in the first place!

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Customer and Number Transfer BAD!!!

By: Chris
June 16, 2005 @ 6:01 PM

I signed on with Vonage in 11/2004. I wished to keep my current Verizon phone number for use with Vonage and signed up for the number transfer. My number transfer just went through this month (6/2005). I was required to pay Verizon $30 per month to retain the number until Vonage transferred it while I also was paying for Vonage service at $15 per month. My total loss was approximately $150.00 and Vonage agrees only to credit me their charges for, get this – 4 months, 28 days – for a total of about $60.00. And this response only came after a I filed an FCC action and gave them a final date for response prior to seeking legal counsel.
Admittedly the VOIP quality has been good but their customer service consists of being passed from one person to another and I have described the falsely misleading number transfer policies Vonage touts. Do yourself a favor and demand a pre-service agreement waiver from Vonage dictating the date of the number transfer or shop for another VOIP service provider.

Rating: 5 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

A must for overseas

By: Annie
June 13, 2005 @ 4:01 PM

If you travel or live in a foreign country Vonage (or similar service) is a MUST. We are currently stationed in Germany and thanks to this amazing technology at an affordable price our ENTIRE family can now call us from the US on their cell phones (with nationwide calling) for FREE. No extra charges. We can talk as long as we want from GERMANY and never have to face a 400 Euro phone bill again. Even travelers (especially business) will never want to go back!!!!

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

No problems for me

By: JWilliams
May 9, 2005 @ 2:34 PM

I’ve have Vonage for a few weeks now, no problems. As I was researching, I called to ask questions, they were very helpful and answered my wireless questions that I couldn’t answer with their website. It took the 2-3 weeks they said to change over my number from my carrier and I’m up and running. I run a wireless network, with an Airport Express, in my home and the Linksys router connected right up to it. It’s a great value paying $14.99 a month compared to the $40 or so I was paying before. I’m not sure where much of the negativity here is coming from, but so far Vonage has been a pleasant experience for me.

Rating: 8 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Customer Support Non-existent

By: gigaboy
May 6, 2005 @ 1:24 PM

Pros: Great Price and listed feature set
Cons: A vapor-ware company

Unfortunately, the only thing Vonage is interested in is building a subscriber base (hence the advertising in all on and off line media). I have now waited 13 weeks since my authorization letter was submitted for my existing phone number to be flipped. Out of at least 6 times I have called the support number, the only time I can talk to a live body is in the sales department. Emails are not returned. When I talk to the sales group and explain the problem, they promise escalation and a return phone call or email, and nothing happens. There is no mechanism on the web site in the account manager to even cancel the account.

Suprisingly, the corporate website for investor relations / administration / PR is an endless automated attendant with no live operator available. It even wants you to leave a voice mail. To top it off, phone quality from my existing landline to their corporate offices auto attendant was choppy and dropped several times; not a good testiment to the quality level.

It’s too bad that Vonage behaves just like every other phone company that’s been in existence in America to this point (with the notiable exception of Cincinnati Bell). It seems like a long-term scam in the making: get the subscribers and the money, then run before you get caught.

I would have been happy to provide all this information to Vonage senior management directly, but of course, its “leave a message and we’ll get back to you” – which they never do.

If I ran my business like this I’d be homeless. So, stick with a Baby Bell for the time being (the devil you know), rather than going with the devil you don’t know.

=====

It just gets worse!

After I finally was able to successfully get to someone to cancel my number transfer, I thought my dealings with Vonage were over. WRONG! My existing carrier SBC disconnected my landline a week later, and neither SBC, Vonage nor XO (the intermediary) knows who the carrier of record is or where the phone number is. Thus, there was no communication of the cancellation by Vonage to XO. So I’m left with a dead phone. I finally got to a service rep at Vonage who created yet another work request. I would love to tell all this to senior mgmt at Vonage, but of course it’s not a customer centric company. Their motto should be “If you’ve got money, we’re ready to run (away)!” I’m ready to sue them.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Poor business practices

By: Jeff Abbot
May 4, 2005 @ 2:48 PM

I had Vonage for over two years. For most of that time the voice quality was poor. I guess I should have cancelled my service long ago.

However, today I finally got around to it and had a bit of a laugh. They do not make it easy and I think it is indicative of their very poor business ethics.

To cancel you have to call and then push a whole lot of numbers. You are also never given a clear number to push for cancellation. When you do finally get someone on the phone you get the third degree as to why you want to cancel.

Then and here is the clincher you get put on hold for well over 5 minutes until someone from the “cancellation department” can verify your cancellation. This individual is undoubtedly a hardcore New York telesales hammer who stated his career selling used cars, moved on to being a broker (see the movie Boiler room) and when their firm was raided and shut down moved on to VONAGE. Be prepared for the “Is there anything I can do to prevent you from canceling” line – Uggg. Oh, and the “I will do it but it is going to make me cry” etc.

And then there is the issue of being billed for your VONAGE device and a disconnect fee? I will have to sort this out. I will leave you with a portion of the instructions given for returning your VONAGE device (it is worse than trying to get a rebate from Best Buy!

(they want the original packaging – after two years?)

[All returns must include the original manufacturer’s packaging,
manuals and cables or any applicable credit will be reduced.

Device(s) must be returned within 14 days of the issuance of the RA#.
If the device is not returned within this timeframe, your RA# will
expire and you may be charged the full price of the device or a
disconnect charge of $39.99 depending on the situation.}

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage Issues

By: Eric
May 2, 2005 @ 11:56 PM

I have been reading most of your posts and I have a few things to say. I think Vonage is angreat product when your cable installer connects things correctly. The problem in the vonage service is not Vonage itself, but the Cable comapny. I have been a Comcast cable installer for 7 years, and th problem lies in the signal. The cable modems require a -30db in order to work. The easies way to see if it is a cable issue is to typ in the address. This works for most cable modems. http://192.168.100.1 You will see an area that says signal. Click on that. What you are looking for is what we call upstream power. If the upstream power is 50db or higher is causes packet loss and slow internet connections. IDEAL is 35-40db. I typically only see that in new construction or newer cable wiring. Vonage is great, but if the signal is not correct, the protocal that VoIP operates on suffers due to significatly high upstream power, which is why Comcast has NOT launched their national VoIP service. I have been trained, but it has been put on hold, until they can fix the upstream issues. No mater what VoIP service, you will have the same issues, maybe not as much, but it will still happen. Cable installers hook the stuff up, and if they get “block sync” their job is done, so they think. 98% of them never check signal, which is why most techs fail the QC’s, or quality control reports that I do. Out here is Chicago, 3 fail QC’s and your fired. Comcast is tired of the garbage from terrible installers. Hopefully they can get things going good, and we can all have fast internet speeds and VoIP that works. any questions e-mail me. I operate my own company repairing and redoing Comacst crap work. If you need help, feel free to e-mail me. I work out of the Chicago area.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Affordable

By: KB
May 2, 2005 @ 5:16 PM

I just signed up with Vonage about a month ago and my home number was finally released a week ago from my home phone company. There definitely was a learning curve involved in getting it all to work with each other. The manual instructs to disable the DHCP for the phone. For my situation, I needed to enable it for the service to work. The concern is that when I called tech support, it seemed to be located in India rather than in the US. The support was scripted and I was put on hold several times by the representative. Further, I was redirected to tech support in the US to resolve my issues. The instructions were not very clear that the only phone that would work would be the one plugged directly into the adapter. Being somewhat naive to the digital world… The website does not really provide documentation on the adapter that I have (Linksys). Most of what is listed is for the Motorola adapter. This becomes an issue when the user would desires to have all the phones ring in the house as the website states the phone adapter must come in front of the router in the network setup. The Linksys does not provide an extra port to hook a cable into the router therefore, I my only option is to connect to router. Overall, I am satisfied with the service. I like the savings and the options I receive for the price I am paying. I cannot even tell that I am not using a traditional land line.

Rating: 6 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage: Good-bye Phone Companies

By: Lori
May 1, 2005 @ 7:15 AM

I don’t know where these negative reviews are coming from. (Maybe they work for the phone companies and know that their jobs are in jeopardy!) I’ve had Vonage for a month and haven’t had any problems. Bought a Linksys adapter from Sam’s Club, connected it to my router, and I was up and running in less than 10 minutes. My friend told me about Vonage. He’s had it for a while and hasn’t had any problems either. We love the $14.99 phone bill. My Verizon phone bill was $35 and long distance was extra.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Excellent Quality so far.

By: Eyebee
April 25, 2005 @ 7:35 PM

Got the package 3 days ago. Had to buy a router, as I din’t ahve one, and that went west after 2 days, but that was nothing to do with Vonage. New Router, kept dropping net conection, but after a firmware upgrade,everything was fine. Again not due to Vonage, but rather the D-Link router. As I got a UK Virtual number, my friends and family are now calling me – I spent 2 hours on the phone to a UK friend this afternoon, and I’ve not had one dropped call, or any problem whatsoever so far with the Voange service. I can’t comment on Tech Supp, as I’ve not had to call them. Excellent value for money, call quality is excellent even international.

Rating: 8 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Dont try it in the U.K.

By: bill marr
April 24, 2005 @ 3:52 PM

The Sunday Times ran an article on Vonage on their front page.Sounded good and are giving it a go. But from what I can make out ,the journalist did not fully try it out or he would have found out that the router they send you is incompatible with english products. With a lot of hassle we have managed to rig it up. They do not do a wireless version …we have a mass of cables and wires , hardly futuristic. Will come back shorly on the actual service …..we have our doubts….

Rating: 5 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Not worth my time or money to try

By: Sandy
April 20, 2005 @ 12:41 PM

At first we thought it was pretty good, obviously you’re going to get what you pay for, but we thought if it wasn’t too bad that we would live with it since it was cheaper. Then the problems started. (1) The people we talk to hear tones like you are pressing the buttons on the phone. (2) We couldn’t use automated telephone service because it wouldn’t acknowlege when you push the correct button on the phone. (3) In the middle of talking with someone, the phone cut off and started giving a busy signal. (4) When I answered a call, it was cut off as soon as I picked up and the person calling got a busy signal.
I thought it was great to be able to try the service for a month, but found out as soon as you decide to cancel their service, they will charge you $40+ cancellation fee.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

No Dial Tone / No Customer Service

By: Jesse
April 18, 2005 @ 9:21 PM

Vonage is easy to purchase and get set up, but if you have problems, and YOU WILL HAVE PROBLEMS, good luck getting help from the company. Our phones went dead for an entire day and the ‘Help’ on their website was worthless. I finally received an automated response the next day–that was it. The calls are NOT CLEAR, but acceptable. The features are nice and the price is reasonable, but I DO NOT RECOMMEND USING VONAGE, especially if you count on having a reliable phone service.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

A Nice Service For Small Businesses

By: Doug
April 10, 2005 @ 9:56 PM

I’ve had Vonage phone service for my work from home telephone sales job and it has worked out great. I anticipated having problems during installation due to my already having a wireless router. I powered everything off, hooked up the Vonage router inbetween the cable modem and wireless router, powered everything up and ran the installation CD which came with the Vonage router. After a few steps with the CD I was finished. I then picked up the phone which was plugged in to the router and was surprised to receive a dial tone. Right away I started making long distance calls.
Judging from what I read on the boards the majority of the problems people have with establishing service with Vonage is trying to get their telephone company to relinquish the phone number they’ve been using. I didn’t have to worry about this because the company I work for is located out of state although wiht Vonage I’m still able to have a number which is local to them.
I think the sound quality is not quite as good as traditional long distance companies but when weighing everything out I think Vonage is a superior choice.

Rating: 8 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Stay with the phone company

By: Bill
April 1, 2005 @ 6:45 PM

I had vonage for 2 months. Of that time I maybe was able to make 10 calls. Support is a joke and they will bleed you dry. It was worth it to pay the $40 to cancel my service just to get rid of vonage. I am so disgusted that at this point I do not plan on having any telephone for at least 6 months.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

very unhappy

By: EMMA
March 10, 2005 @ 10:05 AM

I have had this service for a month and I HATE IT!!! the calls cut in and out, it drops calls and you have to reboot the box. its a pain in the rear i regret ever getting it. we have sooooooo many house on hold with customer service an they are horrible they have yet to fix the problem they say they are sending you emails of thigns to try and they never do. they tried blaming it on our internet connection but we had that checked and it was great….i would NEVER recommenD vonage to ANYONE!!

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Too many problems

By: jches
March 7, 2005 @ 10:36 AM

What a headache dealing with this company! The first phone adapter wouldn’t work, calling tech support works 1 out of 10 times just to get through then no help. And don’t try sending in an e-mail support question, you give a detailed short description of the problem and you get an auto responce telling you to unplug and reboot the unit. What unit, I don’t have one, having returned it to the retailer, my question was WHEN WILL YOU SEND A NEW ONE!

Clueless, incompetant customer service, VOIP may be the wave of the future but I’m done with Vonage!

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Five is just a lucky number!

By: Good-Kind
March 4, 2005 @ 8:21 PM

Hey Guys and Gals, you are really funny… all these very similar coments of “it don’t work..” bla bla.. lead in the dead end!
OK, it don’t work – but if we got some organisation here we might be able to pin point something we could do about it! Amoung other things, additional information of where you’re located could do some real help: This whole thing has limited capacity and poor programing, ok no doubt. But because some can use it, it would be good to find out “where” and “why” it works and “where not and why not”
Often these “crap routers” have system setup and configuration problems due to failure in good OS updates. It would be no problem to look into the configuration and note the last time stamped system update or BIOS check – for example. “This” is crucial and pertinant information for a good case and utimate success! Don’t accept what you don’t get. This buisness is a rat race, money hungry manager types that oviously way over-look the necessary for a better buisness and probably a better world. If like them, I was only interested in money, I’d just run one of these companies and screw my customers with modern technology. All a result of poor planing!

Rating: 5 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Horrible service

By: John Smith
March 4, 2005 @ 12:30 PM

I am outraged I have had so many problems
people say they answer but can”t hear anyone.
Now they are telling me my phone has been disconnected and I am paid up never missed
a payment. Do not use this service.Plus cablevision’s
optimum online is messing around with the connection because they want you to be their customer and vonage and I am at their mercy.
Cable is a powerful super rich monopoly
who must own some politicians because they
are getting away with murder and the consumer
suffers.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Customer Service -- NOT

By: vonagesux
March 3, 2005 @ 10:21 PM

Their customer service is worthless. After navigating the endless phone tree you are usually disconnected. Consider yourself lucky!! If you get into the queue and wait for an hour to get through they will generally transfer you several times (without warning) then disconnect you. You can’t even get though to disconnect the damn service!! The obviously grew way too fast.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

the unfortunate customer

By: noVnage4me
February 28, 2005 @ 7:35 PM

i’ve had vonage for about 1 month and a half now. i still have to have a good quality call. as i type i am on hold for the last 60.03 minutes because i am trying to get a hold of them so that i can cancel my service. an Ahmad at the customer service picked up my call at minute 53.40 just to take my name, number and asked me what kind of internet connection i had. of course since their phone quality was not working after almost 2 mins. not even 2 mins in the conversation he put me back on hold saying a technical service guy would help me with it. with it? i did not know a technical guy was need for terminating my service. now im at minute 62.50 and still on hold. this is a record i’ve never been on hold for more than an hour. i guess i am just one of the unlucky vonage customers. no good signal, no good customer service. i do not recommend vonage at all based on my experience. good luck to the rest of you. total time is 67.13.

Rating: 2 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage Sucks

By: Rob
February 28, 2005 @ 3:34 AM

I have a cable modem. The Vonage network seems to be down a lot while the Internet connection to my PC is up and extremely fast or audio quality on Vonage is very choppy (dropped UDP packets). These guys suck. I wonder if CallVantage by AT&T is any better. Anybody ever heard of Packet 8? How are they?

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

nightmare company

By: Sue
February 26, 2005 @ 3:05 PM

sent letter of authorization on 12-30-04. Max of 20 business days to tranfer existing number. Number still hadn’t been transferred. Cancelled the service 2/26/05. Reps are very rude. Would wait up to 25 minutes to get though to a rep. Here’s the kicker, had one phone hooked up to the Vonage modem, calls were in the acct. billing history. Just received ANOTHER ATT bill and all calls on Vonage log were billed through ATT. Have reported them to BBB, stay away from this company!!

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

A total nightmare

By: Mr Paralle
February 26, 2005 @ 9:48 AM

No phone company has ever messed me around as badly as Vonage. I wasted three weekends trying to configure this inert piece of plastic they call a Router, and never got close to a dial tone. Their customer support is a sick joke: I never waited less than an hour to talk to a human, and none of the supposed techies knew anymore about the subject than I did. Email queries for help received an automated reply and nothing more. I went out on the Vonage forums where, I was told, Vonage’s top tech guys often lurk looking for emergency cases to help out. Bupkis! Now Vonage has the nerve to charge me for a “disconnection fee” when I was never connected to anything in the first place. Vonage truly sucks.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Not working for 3 months

By: Pissed Off
February 24, 2005 @ 6:20 PM

I am a small business and when i moved i needed to keep my same number. Vonage was great and at a fare price but i switch the Linksys box and now my business line is always off and the tech support is @#%$%%%2 fill it the blank but the reality is they are never answnering the phone and telling me i did not call last night and spend 2 hours on the line trying to fix the line. Oh well i got what i paid for cheep phone service but the price i have paid in poor phone service has cost me my business alot of business. ONLY GET VONAGE SERVICE ON A PHONE LINE YOU DON’T DEPEND ON. YOU KNOW THE SECOND LINE IF IT IS NOT WORKING YOU DO’NT NEED IT.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Bye Bye Verizon

By: SPG
February 23, 2005 @ 5:54 AM

I have a business line and personal line for more than 1 month. Yes, I have had some minor problems. Tech support is fine if you call during “Off-Peak” times.

I had a problem with dial-up for my ReplayTV. They tried very hard to help. I think that it is because the modem in the unit is an old style modem. I am told that the V.92 modems work fine. So I sold my unit on Ebay, and purchased a new one. With lifetime activation fees and rebates, my net cost for a newer and better unit was under $140, about 2 months savings from my 2 accounts with Vonage.

I can’t imagine why other’s are giving bad scores. Perhaps they have “slow” internet connections.

VOIP is the future. Just ask anyone who works for any large computer company.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Badass!

By: Jay
February 22, 2005 @ 5:51 PM

I have had 2 Vonage lines for a month, and have had over 2500 minutes of out going long distance only in the first 2 weeks alone. I have had no voice quality problems, even with my slow cable internet service.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Quality and Tech Support sucks

By: suman
February 15, 2005 @ 6:29 PM

Good:
The price is great and so are the features.

Bad:
1) The sound is choppy and garbled and doesnt sound natural. Somewhat like a robot speaking.
2) There is a hissing background noise that just wont go away.
3) Tech support is non existent. if you have a problem, you are stuck man! they wont pick up the phone when you call. Only the new service line is picked up right away

Rating: 3 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage sucks

By: JoAnne
February 11, 2005 @ 3:30 PM

I cancelled my account in less than a month. The whole thing is just an expense I could have gone without. I got attracted to the low rates to call the Philippines but of course I cannot connect to the Philippines with Vonage. What a waste of the sign-up fee and the termination fee. I need to ship my equipment now to get some money back. If you’re thinking about it because of the low rates to call the other countries don’t bother, it DOES NOT WORK! You can call landline to Philippines but there’s a lot of static, and you cannot connect to a mobile phone! Sucks!

Rating: 2 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage service

By: Joe
February 11, 2005 @ 12:59 PM

Do not waste your money on this bull ***** service. No customers service what so ever. I can t believe this company is still in business. All they are good at is ripping off the consumer. Everything they say is BULL *****! Even when you try to cancel the service they stall you to charge you more money

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

2 months and cancelled

By: YoshixB
February 7, 2005 @ 12:30 PM

After giving Vonage two months to try and win me over, I am cancelling my service and running back to SBC. And it’s not even the constant system problems that I am running from, it is the complete and utter lack of customer service that has turned me off.

Since December, if I am being generous, our service has worked 30% of the time. The other 70% of incoming calles went right to vmail (if we were lucky) or callers have been greated with “this number is not currently accepting calls” or a fast busy tone. One tech we talked to was actually quite helpful, another could merely suggest an additional back up number. When I asked him how he could justify my spending $25/month on Vonage only to have to pay cell phone charges to receive Vonage calls 70% of the time he had no answer.

Two months of calling customer service resulted in average on hold times of 1.5 hours. In one instance I called at work, left my speaker phone on, went to a meeting, returned 2.5 hours later and was still on hold.

I finally got a response to my email messages after I sent an irrate message to Vonage’s PR department. Then the “Executive Response Team” contacted me. They left me a voicemail, I called back and got their voicemail. Today, three days later, I have left four more voicemails and have yet to be called back.

There is no other way to put it — the service is awful. It is perhaps the worst combination of reliablity and customer attention I have ever encountered. The cost to my wife and I in frustration and lost time will clearly never be recouped.

She actually works for one of their main suppliers, and yet we still cannot justify keeping the service. The world of business is littered with the bodies of companies who treated consumers like this.

I would highly recommend staying away.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

So far so good

By: Ron Visco
February 5, 2005 @ 4:44 PM

Install was a bit long for me cause had trouble with instructs. I like extra features that not only cost with old service, but there are taxes with each.
Lost ISP once since, but found calls went to Cell as programed.
VM is good, but relatives must come up tp speed if have not heard before. Like to hear on PC.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Poor support

By: softerlogic
January 26, 2005 @ 3:21 AM

Vonage VOIP in the UK is quite a new product. However, that is no excuse for rather long waits on the line. Incidently if you want to see more reviews of vonage just for the UK service then try http://vonage-forum.bizd.co.uk as it may have more of a UK focus.

Rating: 8 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Wouldn't trade it for the world

By: MTAshberry
January 15, 2005 @ 7:57 AM

We signed up for Vonage service on January 2, 2005 and on Jnauary 11, 2005 I received my router from Vonage. On January 12, 2005, my POTS number (with SBC) switched over to Vonage. My SBC bill was $60.00 a month and my new Vonage bill is $14.99. Setup was extremely easy. They send a CD and you just follow the instructions. My only problem was that I followed the pictures as to where to plug in the cables and the phone cable was plugged in the wrong port. The picture had it going in port 2 and it was suppose to go in port 1. No dial tone so I called Vonage. The only negative was that it took about 20 hours and a second call back to talk to someone. However, when I did, they found the problem right away and as soon as I changed the phone line to port 1, I had a dial tone and was in business. No one we have called or that has called us so far has noticed any difference in quality of calls. I have all the services I had with SBC for a lot less money. Now you call call out with 7, 10, or 11 digits. Works great. Would do it again in a minute.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

observation

By: bruce
January 9, 2005 @ 9:34 PM

just reading the reviews, it became obvious that the reveiws turned south (pages 7-10) in the fall of ‘04. Pretty good prior to that. Sounds like growing pains.

Rating: 5 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage: Not ready for prime time

By: Robert
January 2, 2005 @ 8:31 PM

I loose dial tone and have to keep power cycling the modem about 15 times a day. So have a backup line if you need a reliable way to get calls. As others have said, the fax line is useless.

Customer service told me the problem is with my ISP so I downloaded Ping Plotter and proved the problem is in their network. They are probably oversubscribed and not up to handle the load.

Look at AT&T or soon Southwestern Bell will have VoIP for those of you in Texas.

Good Luck!

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Sucks to be on SBC or Verizon!!

By: William
December 30, 2004 @ 10:55 PM

I’ve read all the other postings about number portability and calls to customer service. I’ve not experienced any of the above. Issues that I’ve had have been solved by customer service, but then I don’t rant and rave like other reviewers, and I seem to get my way. The number portability issues can be seen as the Telco’s dragging their feet preventing the loss of the number, so I don’t see why Vonage sucks because you fail to plan on an extended transfer, or better yet, DON’T TRANSFER THE NUMBER. Certain complaints just seem to be out of Vonage’s control. Now the service: My FAX line works great! Inbound and outbound FAX transmissions work great! But I must admit, you must have the latest v.92 modem. My old system had a v.90 modem, it didn’t work, the new v.92 works great with WinFax. Dropping issues are minimal, maybe once every two months. If I have more, this is due to my ISP Adelphia cutting the line somewhere. Calls to international locations have great rates, better than prepaid and the call quality is great. Local calls have changed to allow for 7 digit calling within the same area codes, other area codes require the 10 digit numbers. The voicemail system works great, e-mail the voicemails to my main account, or just the notification! The best thing is that I can have my Vonage number and my Cellular number ring at the same time. All I have to do is answer one – say my Cell and the call is answered. Works great!! I’ve timed it to not go to Vonage Voicemail, but my Cellular number gets the voicemail. This works great unless Adelphia is down, then I have two places that have voicemail. Thinking of getting a virtual number in Canada and England, so that family don’t have a huge long distance bill!! How cool is that??!!!!!!

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Dont' even think about it!

By: Eric
December 30, 2004 @ 6:24 PM

I asked for a simple number transfer, four months later, still nothing. Each time I called I had received a ticket number and no follow thru with “Customer support”. If you don’t mind staying on hold for an hour each time, than this is the phone company for you. They make Bell south look like a jewel.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Fails in all areas for business!

By: Unhappy
December 29, 2004 @ 10:48 AM

We have been using Vonage for the past several months for our business for our toll free number, business local number and business fax number. I’m currently on hold with tech support as we speak probably the 10th time this week and it’s only Wednesday. We are now getting -0- faxes…losing money every day. Fax is one way we get our orders. We have no faxes coming in now and Vonage tech support is unable to help with the problem. We know it is a Vonage issue as we have tried our three separate fax machines and none work. I will also call out on the business phone line and get dropped multiple times a day. Our caller id will disappear for no reason at different times during the week. Voice messages will be delayed at times or not received at all. We are trying to switch over to another company right now. We cannot get away from Vonage quick enough. Please don’t try Vonage to save money we are actually losing money now because of its unreliability. And every time we call tech support we are on hold for over 1 hour easy!!! Yes, I’m still on hold as I finish typing this.

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When it works, great

By: C
December 26, 2004 @ 12:58 AM

The basic service itself is pretty great when it works. But I can confirm that Vonage’s customer service is the worst I have ever experienced. Some features of my service don’t work, but I’ve never yet succeeded in reaching anyone. Emails go unanswered, and the support line usually tells me there are too many calls and to try some other time.

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They can not port numbers

By: Dave B.
December 23, 2004 @ 6:39 PM

Vonage don’t actually own their own numbers or are FCC registered as a Competative Local Exchange carrier. They exist on the surplus bandwidth of CLECs such as Paetec. It is the CLEC that handles the number port and then passes the traffic in Vonage’s
VoIP network

This two things: (i) Vonage has to rely on a third party to do the LNP porting and therefore Vomage reps can not handle LNP issues. (ii) traditional phone companies dislike non FCC registered Vonage and therefore drag their feet or screw things up.

This is probably why many people are having LNP issues and some like myself have given up .

Since your revious phone company did not put your old number back in the pool, they wiill give it back if you re-establish service with them (like in case with Verizon)

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No tech support

By: Mike M
December 2, 2004 @ 12:22 PM

This may be the worst company I have ever dealt with. They do not return calls or emails. They are charging me $39.00 to cancel I would gladly pay 10X that amount to get away from them. I have spent at least 2 weeks on the phone trying to resolve all the problems. They are understaffed for all the issues they are having.

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Vonage is worse than it sounds!

By: John
November 30, 2004 @ 5:19 PM

Vonage system is wacked out, and there’s no one home at their customer service. On the rate occasion one’s call to tech support doesn’t get dropped off the cue, you hold for extended periods of time listening to mediocre jazz music only to get even poorer support.

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no customer service

By: fred
November 26, 2004 @ 1:04 PM

I worked their. Our motto was Dont get even, make them a customer! If you had a problem we would just send you the same we are looking into it email. If we did anything at all! If you call you will wait up to an hour and nothing will get done. You will NEVER be called back. If you live in Pennsilvania or N Carolina forget it! Telcove is terrible!

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Please do not use Vonage

By: Susan
November 15, 2004 @ 11:37 AM

..unless you enjoy paying hidden fees, rude customer support, unavailable customer support, unreliable phone service, completely unreasonable service agreements.

Vonage will not last long.

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Vonage -- it really sucks

By: Anonymous
November 15, 2004 @ 11:33 AM

Vonage sucks.

Be prepared to pay a fee every time you want to change anything (Upgrade service? Ca-ching. Downgrade server? Ca-ching, Add service? Ca-ching. Cancel service? ca-ching (termination fee), ca-ching (pay for the following full month of service), ca-ching (unlock device fee, if you want to keep “your” voip device).

Call billing department? Don’t bother. you’ll wait forever and your call will just get dropped.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

wasted 3 months for nothing!

By: D Murphy
November 12, 2004 @ 7:17 AM

Never transferred my number! LOA was sent 8-21-2004 and as of 11-2-2004 still no transfer. Long, long waits on phone to talk to someone and nobody had an answer as to why they couldn’t switch me or, worse yet, when it would eventually happen! They did take 2.8 seconds to cancel me but say I’m only eligible for a 1 month refund although I’ve been charged for 4 motnhs of service. ALSOTHEY HAD THE NERVE TO BILL MY CC $43.59 (CANCELLATION FEE) ON 11-2 WHEN I CANCELLED. LUCKILY THEIR COMPANY IS NEXT DOOR TO ME IN EDISON, NJ AND I CAN EASILY GET THEM IN SMALL CLAIMS COURT, I ALSO WISELY USED AMEX TO PAY AND THEY WILL ALSO GO AFTER THEM. I ORDERED ATT CALL ADVANTAGE AND THEY HAD ME HOOKED UP AND TRANSFERRED WITHIN 7 DAYS!!! anyone interested in a class action suit aginst their business practices can email me at dmurphy347@comcast.net

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don't do it....

By: Skip
November 9, 2004 @ 10:47 AM

Please, I beg of you, do not get involved with Vonage. I must have spent 4 hours waiting on hold to reach customer service, billing, and number transfer. The only person I was able to speak to after 2 months was someone in the cancelation department! Get this, there is a $40 chage for canceling the service hidden in the contract!! While the device itself works, everything about Vonage is underhanded. All I can say is don’t do it….

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

still waiting

By: Holly
November 9, 2004 @ 6:35 AM

I have been paying my vonage bill for 90 days now and I am still waiting for my number to get transferred over. Calling customer service is a hassle, you wait a long time and no one is available to help on the weekends; emails just tell me to call. I think it has great potential, but they are obviously unprepared to handle the business they are receiving. I am definitely frustrated with Vonage and if it isn’t changed over in the next week (like they last promised), I will cancel and wait for a bigger name to provide the service in my area.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage phone transfer

By: patricia
October 21, 2004 @ 4:53 AM

I requested a transfer of my phone line to Vonage back in July, and I am still waiting. They promise 20 business days, but they seem unbale to keep up with the transaction load.

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They Suck

By: Steve
October 8, 2004 @ 8:41 PM

Its All about the MONEY

* took 3 Months to get my number switched
* No refund as they promosied
* Bad Service
* Poor Sound quality
* Drop Calls

You name it They have the problem And when you have had enough they charge you to leave them with a promise to return the fee to you
They wan’t The original Box and all Doc’s with the unit I never got a Original box I got a Plain white box and photocopy instructions .

They denied the RMA
What do they have to lose your leaving them
http://www.vonagesucks.com they own it that will tell you somthing

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Auto Pilot attempting to run Vonage

By: SteveM
September 23, 2004 @ 1:06 PM

When it’s up and working, it’s great, but a series of issues, including my number which was suposed to have been ported since 5/10/04 (now 9/23/04 and still not complete), has put a really bad taste in my mouth. EVERY time you try, and I emphasize “try” to call them, your on hold forever, transferred to somewhere else, then get messages that they’re just too busy and their automated system just hangs up on you and tells you to try to contact them again! They want their money, but they could care less if you have a phone! Get your act together Vonage! You’re sinking your ship! I’ve emailed, and they don’t even read the issues you’re having, asking either the same question whre the information was placed in the email originally, or giving canned answers, which in no way apply to your issue. I’ve had numerous times were particular area codes can’t be dialed, and even after they’ve corrected it (3rd time now in the last 1-2 months), they don’t let you know what was wrong, or what they’re going to do to prevent it. After hours on the phone during the initial bugs to work through, I did find out that my internet connection speed was “too quick” and was causing problems. In their favor, they did make a few tweaks on the phone adapter, and it’s worked fairly well… WHEN IT WORKS! It would be fantastic, if they’d just get ANY customer service, and correct issues in a TIMELY fashion! and LEARN TO READ!

Rating: 2 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Keeping your Old Number

By: Tracy
September 22, 2004 @ 7:06 PM

I was told the transfer of my old number from SBC to Vonage would take 20 business days. We are going on 41 business days and no transfer. I have been paying two phone bills for two months. I have had my phone number for 13 years and want to keep it. Ready to fire Vonage but I’m still on hold. 17 minutes now.

Rating: 2 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

vONAGE IS HOLDING ME HOSTAGE

By: christine
September 19, 2004 @ 9:19 AM

I was a happy Vonage customer untill I attempted to cancel my service with them mid month July (I moved) to a place where I wont be responsible for telephone bills). I attempted to call their toll free number….and waited…and waited…and waited…. I emailed them 3 or four times asking to cancel my service. It is now mid month September, they are still charging my credit card. I have emailed and at this point, as in right now, I been sitting on the phone with their customer service for about a good 10 minutes….
The service was fine when I had it, but canceling shouldn’t be a 2 and a half month affair….. Awful

Rating: 2 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Didn't follow through

By: Debra
September 17, 2004 @ 7:49 PM

I got a phone call solicitation one day from VONAGE offering a great package of telephone and broadband service for what sounded like a great deal with thirty days to check it out with no obligation. As I was speaking with the “sales pitchers” I checked out their website and they seemed legitimate, so I agreed to give it a try. Went through the authorization process with “the Supervisor” and I was promised I would receive some type of box to hook onto my system within 7-10 days. Two weeks later, nothing. No box, no calls, nothing. I called the VONAGE customer service line and felt like I was dealing with a company that had placed it’s head deep within its anal passages. I was told I couldn’t have that “deal” unless I could get “Dave” to approve it. Who the heck Dave is, I still do not know. I am glad they did not follow through with their original offer, as I am afraid I would have not been able to write this nice of a letter about them! I wished them well and told them good luck with their company.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Worst Customer Service Ever

By: Raleigh
September 17, 2004 @ 1:06 PM

I don’t know how the service works, since I never was properly set-up (although I was charged for service). When I called I was told that they did not know what the problem was and they would call me back. Two days later when I called back, their line was down. I used the web site to submit my question. This was not answered either. I called back and asked for a supervisor. They do not exist. I was put on hold for 20-30 minutes and then told that someone would call me back. They never did. I canceled my order and was charged $41.00 for the cancellation of a service that never worked in the first place.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Great Service over the past year

By: Clay
August 31, 2004 @ 6:23 AM

I have been using Vonage at my home for over a year now and love it.. I am a single guy using only my cell and the vonage service, the only problem i have ever had is when i am downloading large files and trying to make a call… Hmm you can expect that :) other than that have used it on both cable and dsl and it works great no problems….

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Been Excellent So Far!!

By: Todd
July 22, 2004 @ 2:25 PM

It felt so good to finally be rid of a service that charges you for EVERY LITTLE THING (Bellsouth)! The calling quality has been excellent even to the country of Panama. It went down noticably one time with a three way call between here, Maryland, and Panama but all other calls where continually of a high quality. The website “dashboard” is also very handy.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Superb for Expatriate Use

By: John
July 15, 2004 @ 9:37 AM

I am an American living overseas, and have absorbed phone bills totalling hundreds of dollars each month (my wife likes to talk to family and friends back home a lot). During my summer home leave I orderred the service; I’ve recently brought it back to Poland and connected it to my broadband router. Its awesome. Set up took about 3 minutes from openning box to live use. Quality is excellent. I haven’t had a problem, and accordingly cannot comment on Cust Service complaints others seem to have made in this thread. The flexibility that this technology provides is tremendous- I was afraid I would have to be stationed at a PC to use internet telephone- wrong… my cordless phone connects and I am free to roam while on the phone. I had a pleasant surprise seeing that the ATA (analog telephone adapter) is 110/220V ready, so I do not need a transformer (only a plug adapter to change from US flat to European round). Another pleasant surprise are features like caller ID (my phone shows who’s calling), voice mail (built-in answering service), and e-mail notice of messages left (so messages don’t need to sit too long). Technically, I can take it with me… I’ve unplugged it and used it at another location (a friend’s house). Best of all, we have a NYC (212) area code, and people who may had been adverse to calling us overseas can call us at any time. I see significant cash savings, as well as better international relations (we’re in-touch with everyone now). Highly recommended.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Quality of connection

By: Todd
June 24, 2004 @ 8:41 PM

I’ve had Vonage since Jan 04, after reading the reviews I had to chime in. Echo’s- had them like others…all you need to do is turn down the volume in your phones earpiece. Remeber..this connection is digital and a lot cleaner (louder) than analog. Calls being dropped etc., almost always the fault of your ISP. The Vonage service is totally dependent on the quality of your ISP….and yes your cable service will vary due to light or heavy traffic in your area. I recently had my cable company redo all of the cable wiring from the pole outside to the modem. All of the problems have gone bye bye. Point is, don’t blame vonage for what really is your ISP problems. Lastly if the your ISP or the network is down you can have your calls automatically routed to any other phone…including your cell.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

No customer service

By: Richard
May 20, 2004 @ 8:34 AM

Worst customer service experiences I have ever had. My service worked “sometimes” in the beginning, and was great to have despite voice quality problems, but there were many times it didn’t work at all. The tech service is a joke…each time a new tech (start over), with no follow through or saving details of problems.

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Had Vonage but switched to Packet8

By: Jules
May 6, 2004 @ 8:52 PM

I had Vonage’s service and it has been good being rid of Ma Bell, but I just couldn’t see spending $35 for unlimited US calling. It just wasn’t that great of a savings, but then a friend told me about Packet8. They offer a similiar service for $20 a month. I found a lot of useful information at http://www.gateshare.com and even was able to save $21 off the sign-up fee by using coupon code “Gateshare” when I got the Packet 8 service. For me, it was money vs features.

Rating: 3 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

cannot get service

By: J Cummins
May 5, 2004 @ 6:21 AM

Phone lline connects but othe party cannot hear sender. Four days later still no resolution. Called every day, spending up to 2 hours trying to resolve. Every day different technician says there is no record of service calls.

Rating: 2 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Great, but took patience

By: Mark
April 8, 2004 @ 1:19 PM

I first got Vonage with my DSL service. It was awful, there was a delay on every call. I was told that with DSL it doesn’t work very good. I then changed to cable modem and it works great. I have had one dropped call in the last month. Their customer service has also improved, when I first got it I would be on hold forever, now only a few minutes

Rating: 8 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

It's Not Worth The Hassle

By: Monique
March 22, 2004 @ 12:53 AM

I did not have any luck with my Vonage service. Voices were delayed and my calls would drop of my any time I used the internet. I would pick up my receiver and have no dial tone. When I would try to get assistance from one of their techs there was a long wait. The techs solution was always to adjust the bandwidth…this never worked. My friend is having the same problem with her service. I am much happier paying the additional money and subscribing to my local service providers unlimited long distance calling plan.

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Continually dropped calls

By: mlouderb
March 18, 2004 @ 6:12 AM

This technology has the potential to be good, but, make sure you check your cable/dsl connection before signing up. Turns out that my cable company connection was not good enough, and after countless hours on the phone with tech support, dropped calls, and poor connections (at one point babysitter could not make a call as the service had stopped working) vonage figured this out. I wasted two weeks with this service and in the end switched to my cable companies VoIP service which just won a JD Power award for quality & service! OK here is the kicker that really got me – after all was said and done I was PROMISED a full refund and coverage of equipment return – did not happen, Watch out!

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Good soounding board.

By: Alan Daub
February 26, 2004 @ 5:29 PM

I would like to know when I will receive a number? I signed up on 2/5 and understood that I would receive an initial number until they cut over my existing number, within one week. Please advise. Alan Daub, Bellevue Wa.

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Echo in the Line

By: Jerry Cline
February 18, 2004 @ 8:26 PM

I wouldnt quite recomment vonage until the bugs are worked out . I have had it going for about 3 weeks and my experience is that when someone calls me and I talk you can hear an echo on my voice. When I place the call the echo in my voice is not present. I called Vonage and they said that it has to do with my wiring in my house. I did wire into my house system but even coming straight out of the Motorola device into the phone the same thing happened. I also changed to a different tele. cord and made no diff. Got to get back to them again for the third time. As far as getting help from them the time on Muzac has been minimal. The tech. said that they have added manpower so hope it stays the same.

Rating: 8 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage VoIP

By: Rick Miska
February 18, 2004 @ 2:21 PM

I love vonage, I was one of there first customerâs the technology is innovative. I work form a home office 90% of the time I cannot even imagine how much money vonage has saved me. I good resource for vonage is the Vonage forum http://www.vonage-forum.com

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Bad Support and charging problems...

By: Shan
February 16, 2004 @ 3:16 PM

I had a very bad case where the vonage charged for calls that were not placed. This was the second time in 2 months.

I made an international call and since I couldnot hear the other end, I placed the phone. Obviously, the call was never terminated and I was charged for 240 minutes. (4 hrs). I guess nobody wants to make such a long international call. After few minutes I hung up the phone I made another call.

I am trying to talk to the customer service to refund my money and I am not getting any help. All they tell me is submit a credit request through the Web.

This is a nuisance and I am thinking of switching to a more reliable service.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

I'll try it a little longer

By: Bill Robinson
February 15, 2004 @ 8:07 PM

I have had this service for 3 weeks. The first modem they sent me was missing the screws that hold it together. I decided to go ahead and try it anyhow. It worked for the phone but the internet would not connect and I also had the occaisional no dial tone. After rebooting the dial tone would return.
I contacted vonage(20 minutes on hold) and they sent me a new modem. The “new” modem was dirty and obviously previously used. I hooked it up and it worked fine. For about 24 hours. Then the no dial tone feature set in again. I rebooted it and it started working, for another 24 hours. Then, no dial tone again. I called vonage (another 20 munites on hold) and they pinged my box and said the firm ware in my box was outdated. (I was not surprised since it was obviously a used piece of equipment and I told them so. The rep said that was unlikely since they check and test every box before it is shipped. If thats the case then how did the first one with the missing screws get past their inspection and they could have at least wiped the dirt off the second one.) They updated my firmware and the phone started working again. So far I have had consistent service except for a few times where the voice was a bit choppy. I had already discontinued my long distance service but fortunately I kept my local (Verizon) service intact. I will give it a couple weeks and see if I have anymore “no dial tone” instances. If after that all is well I will cancel Verizon.
I had yold my neighbor about the service and he has it also. he has had it for about 10 days. Today he had his first “no dial tone” experience. About 3 hours worth. This ain’t lookin to good folks.

Rating: 7 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

wish that i had done it sooner

By: chris
February 14, 2004 @ 7:39 PM

I figured out the savings as opposed to the Verizon Freedom package. I am now going to save over $450 a year from the switch!

The features, especially getting voicemails on your computer are superior. Glad I did it.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Great Service

By: Robert Miller
February 14, 2004 @ 1:35 PM

I have had Vonage now for just over a month. I am extremely impressed with the quality of the sound both receiving and sending. I have no idea what the others are talking about that decry the service. I have found technical support to be extremely helpful and have not had to wait long times for a representative to talk to me. All minor problems were very quickly taken care of. I am recommending vonage to as many of my friends that will sign up as I get a credit for each of them that signs up. I also don’t know where the figure of $45 for service comes from in the review. THe best plan is only $35.00 a month for unlimited service anwhere in the US and Canada. I also was able to transfer my old telephone number over to Vonage with no trouble at all (not wireless, regular phone) .. IT WORKS

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My Vonage Experience

By: Bill Thomas
February 10, 2004 @ 9:48 AM

Based on the reviews here I gave Vonage a try.

I’ll try to be as objective as possible here in reporting the experience.

1. Customer Service is non-existant. Be prepared to spend hours listening to the same Muzak loop over and over before you ever talk to a person.

2. Technical support is clueless. I had some setup problems with the Cisco adapter and my DLink router settings. The tech support rep had no idea what to tell me, other than to look on their web site. I did in fact find the info I needed, but it was buried on the vonage.com web site.

3. The vonage.com web site is one most painfully slow sites I’ve ever encountered.

4. Voice quality varies randomly. Sometimes is is clear and excellent. Other times you get an echo of your voice 1/2-second after you speak, which makes having a conversation impossible. Numberous times when I picked up the Vonage line it was dead. I reset all the hardware, etc., but it made no difference. I think Vonage’s routers are seriously overloaded and tend to have a high frequency of outages.

5. I had a high frequency of missed calls. I would discover voicemail from clients that was timestamped when I was in my office, but the Vonage line never range.

6. I cannot recommend Vonage for a SOHO or small business where voice communications are critical.

7. I’m now trying to cancel the service. Customer Service says “We are not authorized to cancel an account. You must call this other number.” The number they give you does not answer. It rings and rings and rings. I called Customer Service back; got a live rep after waiting 27 minutes on Muzak, and asked them to have the cancellation people call me. So far I haven’t heard from them.

Vonage.com is not even close to best in class at this point. It’s fine for those who like to be on the bleeding edge, and some of Vonage concepts are very cool (such as domestic and International virtual numbers), but if you need reliability and support, Vonage is not an option.

Bill Thomas
Senior IT Consultant

Rating: 3 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Fax line is not worth the aggravation

By: Pat Hand
February 9, 2004 @ 7:38 AM

+The residential is fine,and I’m pleased with phone service, but my $10/mo fax line sucks mud. I have been on ph (avg wait time 30 min) 7 or 8 times. I have slowed baud rate and dialed *99 before dialing and the sending fax only goes through 30% of the time. That is unacceptable!!!!! Receiving fax usually works, bot that is no help if I cannot send. If you need fax….DO NOT GET VONAGE!!!!!!

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Excellent Value, Cutting Edge

By: Bob McLed
February 8, 2004 @ 7:43 PM

This is a great service. There are other good reviews that tell more of the good and the bad, such as the one on http://www.longmeadcrossing.com and PC Magazine’s review.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Poor service

By: jairus
February 7, 2004 @ 10:45 AM

my phone adapter continually drops out and i either have no dial tone or cannot recieve incoming calls. tech support has lead me through every setting change possible and nothing seems to work. i probably get good service for about 5 minutes after i re boot. don’t waste your money. verizon may be more expensive, but at least it’s reliable.

Rating: 1 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Excellent Value, Cutting Edge

By: Henry
January 28, 2004 @ 7:30 AM

This is a great service. The features are terrific and you’ll really save quite a bit of money with it. You need to be slightly technically able to use this. I found out more about the downside of the service via another review–one in PC magazine and another on http://www.longmeadcrossing.com

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Slacking Customer Service

By: Reggie
January 24, 2004 @ 7:24 AM

I had Vonage about a year ago, and it was great in controlling my long-distance bill and the ease of use. I ended my service for another reason, but this January I decided to sign up again.

I would consider myself an expert in terms of technical know-how, and easily connected my end of the Vonage setup. Tech support confirmed that I “was connected” but their “server would not allow my ping to go through … and it’s a known issue … that should be fixed in minutes …”

After 15 minutes on hold the tech guy said it was escalated to their engineers who would call back within the next two hours, as they were having problems resolving it on their end.

After four days of my persistence (and not getting an engineer to call back) they said that sorry for the delay since they were too busy.

At that point I decided to return what I thought was an expensive black paperweight with no real use to me. I’ve been refunded every cent, but I think that Vonage grew too fast and forgot about the value of good customer service.

Rating: 2 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Great service no problems

By: Jim
January 23, 2004 @ 5:42 PM

I’ve had Vonage for approximately 4 months now and am very pleased with the service. I’ve quickly gotten used to dialing 10 digits and it doesn’t seem like a problem at all anymore. Very good voice quality, the three way calling has cut down on my conference call service payments so I’m a pretty happy camper.

Rating: 10 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Dercent but expensive

By: Romeo
January 22, 2004 @ 1:17 PM

It is a great way to save over your currnet phone bills.
But there is catch. every time you do a service change they will slap with hefty service charges.

I will not beleive that to process a new order to upgarde or degarde plan should caost 10 dollars.

If they give users flexibility to change their plan without any extra charges that would be a real goody..

Rating: 7 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Great

By: Raj
January 22, 2004 @ 1:12 PM

I wish Vonage can work with hardwrae companoes to create one single piece of hardware ( all in One – Wireless cable modem with ports for phone).

Rating: 8 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Decent

By: Keith
January 21, 2004 @ 12:11 PM

Calls are clear, great pricing. Only problem is that sometimes you pick up the receiver and no dial tone. It takes up to 5 minutes to reboot the VoIP box. This may just be a problem with my VoIP box, until it can prove reliable, I still have my local provider and if it works reliably for a couple months then I will switch my old number over to Vonage..

Rating: 7 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Great review

By: Patrick
January 20, 2004 @ 7:21 PM

I feel that i can now, confidently purchase this product.. Great read.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Great Service!

By: Anne
January 20, 2004 @ 8:50 AM

My husband and I have had Vonage for a few months now and I have to agree with the reviewer – it’s great! Our telephone bill is about $20 cheaper per month and we haven’t had any problems with the Vonage service. And the web voicemail is really cool.

Rating: 9 :: 0 out of 0 people found this user review helpful. Was this user review helpful? Yes | No

Vonage Broadband Telephone Service Review

The User Reviews

Average User Rating: 3.9

Lousy Customer Service

Vonage has VERY BAD custoemr service! Read my experience!

If I could give it a zero I would!!!!!

I'll never sign up

Bad product without English speaking IT support

The Vonage nightmare

Consumer fraud and deceptive practice

Cancellation problem

Poor technical support - feature delivery

DON'T USE VONAGE THEY ARE A RIP OFF

Terrible

Horrible customer service.

Poor Quality

Vonage sold the number they gave me to a telemarketer

Bad customer service

One year later the problems begin

GREAT

Look before you leap and read the terms!

Vonage - cheats you on AMEX card offer

So far so good ...

deceptive- advertising to Sunrocket customers

STAY AWAY.....FAR AWAY...You'll be SORRY!!

Very deceptive, stay away form this company.

Horrible!! Stay Away!!

Disappointing in the end...

Customer service among the worst

The Worst

Great support so far

Vonage representatives don't understand english

Worst one yet! BIG RIPOFF!

Long Time Vonage Customer - Great !

Wonderful waste of money!

Do not go near Vonage!!!

Vonage Not Releasing Phone Numbers

Works Great!!!

Vonage

Vonage Service is a Disaster

No problems for three years

No problems for 2 years

Blocked Calls

Extremely Poor Customer Service

Worthless!!!

do not get vonage

Dont be a fool

The Worst Sevice I have ever used

Do Not Sign UP !!!!!

Another customer lost?

Hideous. Business destroyer.

Must add something

Don't sign up

quality for its value

nope never again

Had Vonage for 2 years

One year later, it's great!

Vonage Is Awful

A total rip-off!

Vonage--the worst purchase

oh, god, no !

Vonage has its place

Vonage, DON'T DO IT The worst

Vonage doesn't deserve a score of 1

Customer Sevice????(non-existant)

Vonage is a terrible company

Poor Service, Bad technology,

so far so good

Great Service, Great Price

DO NOT SUBSCRIBE TO VONAGE!!

SHOCKED by poor customer service!!!

So far so good

Good, depends on your broadband

Great service at a great price

Complaint Filed With F.C.C.

Inadequate customer service

Was very much worth the switch

Not worth the switch

I didn't even bother

Absolutely awful