This is a rant that evidentially some of the internet already knows about, but I had to share my first-hand experience of why Vonage sucks.
I’m a sales person by trade. My company re-sells internet ad inventory on big sites who may want a little help from someone who knows tons about the online ad gig (no, this site doesn’t make any money). Also being a tech geek, I was all over VoIP. How cool is it that no matter where in the world I am I can make calls from my laptop just as if I’m at my office?! And FREE long distance?! Sounds pretty great, huh?
There’s more. The sound quality was pretty great (sometimes, as you’ll see). The voicemail system is phenomenal – when someone leaves you a message it’ll email you and give you the option of listening to it over the net. In fact all of the features are very cutting-edge.
So here’s the deal breaker: it’s not reliable, and you never know if you’re being heard. If you are in sales you know just how vital the phone is as a tool. Sure, email is good, but people still give you way more attention over the phone, especially if they want what you are selling. I spent an entire day calling top potential customers leaving voice messages for the ones that didn’t answer (20+). Toward the end of the day of calls, I finally got a hold of a real person. She couldn’t understand a word I was saying. I called myself on my cell phone and sure enough, I sounded like R2D2 on Star Wars. Every hot prospect I left a message for that day was greeted by my encrypted droid voice.
So free long-distance and a bunch of cool features for “only $24.95/mo” cost me who knows what in lost sales opportunities. Frustrated, I immediately jacked up my T-mobile coverage and switched the number on all correspondence to my cell number which now serves as my office phone (just as well, out of the “office” lots anyway).
After paying for two more months just to be sure that no business calls were coming on that line, I went to cancel Vonage today. No annual contract so no sweat, right? Yeah right. I was put though the ringer with sales people who were clearly trained well for just this scenario. It seems that they put almost effort into the “rescuing” of their pissed-off customers as they do on their lame commercials. After finally telling them that there was no way in the world that they were going to keep me as a customer the guy says, “OK sir, then the disconnect fee of $39.99 will be charged to the card on file”. Guess I missed that in the fine print. I had to pay them $40 bucks to cancel their sub-standard service on a “no annual contract” deal because I left before being with them for 12 months. Sounds like an annual contract to me -they say no, “just terms and conditions”.
Here’s my summary: Vonage has some pretty cool features that should be standard on all phone services who want to compete against wireless companies. They fail, however, at reliably providing the very most basic function of a telephone. As if this weren’t bad enough, they screw the consumer out of another $40 if you try to leave the “no annual contract” program before being around for a year. Sure its only $40, but HATE companies that lie, cheat and trick the consumer. For that reason, Vonage sucks and I’d really recommend against using Vonage for business.
Vonage: I hope this little post costs you more that the $40 you tricked me out of, you cheap, shifty jerks!
