I have been a subscriber to BT's VOIP service for quite a while.  In
most respects the service has been OK (although the functionality is a
bit basic), but the service has been intermittent - several times a
week, there is no dial tone and you have to restart  the cisco ATA.
Even that doesn't always work.  There has been little useful tech
support available from BT.

They have now written to me saying the service is being 'upgraded', but
this involves allocating a new telephone number.  Since the main reason
for choosing BT in the first place  was precisely because I wanted a
stable supplier who would not suddenly disappear and force me to get a
new number, this seems an excellent time to switch supplier.  I'd
therefore be interested in recommendations.  The key criteria are:

1) Reliability - I'm looking for PSTN-style near-100% availablility for
both incoming and outgoing calls.
2) Geographic number.
3) Flexible voicemail and forwarding options, preferably with a good
Web interface.
4) Good call quality (the BT VOIP call quality has been very good).
5) Preferably the option to have more than one VOIP call
simultaneously.
6) tech support from people who know what they are talking about.
7) A stable supplier who hopefully won't disappear or insist on
changing the allocated number, over a timescale of several years.

Cost is a less important issue - this is not about making very low-cost
calls.  However, we do make quite a lot of long calls to UK mobiles, so
the cost-per-minute of mobile calls is a factor.

Suggestions please!

Richard

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

On 2006-07-26, microapl@microapl.demon.co.uk <microapl@microapl.demon.co.uk>
wrote:

> I have been a subscriber to BT's VOIP service for quite a while.  In
> most respects the service has been OK (although the functionality is a
> bit basic), but the service has been intermittent - several times a
> week, there is no dial tone and you have to restart  the cisco ATA.
> Even that doesn't always work.  There has been little useful tech
> support available from BT.
>
> They have now written to me saying the service is being 'upgraded', but
> this involves allocating a new telephone number.  Since the main reason
> for choosing BT in the first place  was precisely because I wanted a
> stable supplier who would not suddenly disappear and force me to get a
> new number, this seems an excellent time to switch supplier.  I'd
> therefore be interested in recommendations.  The key criteria are:
>
> 1) Reliability - I'm looking for PSTN-style near-100% availablility for
> both incoming and outgoing calls.
> 2) Geographic number.
> 3) Flexible voicemail and forwarding options, preferably with a good
> Web interface.
> 4) Good call quality (the BT VOIP call quality has been very good).
> 5) Preferably the option to have more than one VOIP call
> simultaneously.
> 6) tech support from people who know what they are talking about.
> 7) A stable supplier who hopefully won't disappear or insist on
> changing the allocated number, over a timescale of several years.
>
> Cost is a less important issue - this is not about making very low-cost
> calls.  However, we do make quite a lot of long calls to UK mobiles, so
> the cost-per-minute of mobile calls is a factor.
>
> Suggestions please!

You may already have looked at www.gradwell.com but if not it may be
worth your while to get in touch with them after reading about what they
have to offer.  Although I do not use them myself I believe you will be
dealing with a professional and knowledgeable company.  In this group I
cannot recollect any substantial comments which relect badly on their
reliability.

Brian.

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

"Brian" <bandj@o2.co.uk> wrote in message
news:ea7kj1$gdj$1$8302bc10@news.demon.co.uk

[snip]

> You may already have looked at www.gradwell.com but if
> not it may be
> worth your while to get in touch with them after reading
> about what they have to offer.  Although I do not use
> them myself I believe you will be dealing with a
> professional and knowledgeable company.  In this group I
> cannot recollect any substantial comments which relect
> badly on their reliability.

Gradwell are excellent and Peter Gradwell himself often posts here. For a
business solution I can recommend them.

Ivor

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]