MagicJack free home phone + long distance

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I finally got a MagicJack and cancelled my regular phone service. My MagicJack works great and I can make free calls anywhere in Canada or the USA. Unbelievable that this costs only $20 per year. I am saving $70 a month, and I am going to be able to afford to get a gym membership instead.

Anyone else have a MagicJack or interested in free phone service? Anyone have positive or negative reviews?

Well, if I didnt have to leave the computer on, I'd go for a trial.

Though, Ive heard a lot of reviews in the negative about customer service or lack thereof( U.S.).

Anyone here know of an idea to make this work with the computer not continually "on?"

Ooma -- http://www.ooma.com/products -- and I love it. I initially spent about $250.00 for the device, and it does require my modem to be on in order for it to be up and running ...

... but then after that, there is only a fee of about $12.00 per year for some kind of federal tax.

Inside the house, I have a two-line phone where my regular land line is "1" and the Ooma line is "2", and then on top of all that, my Ooma number is registered in an area code 900 miles away (where I am from) so calls can be completely "free" (sans initial investment and annual $12.00 fee) from either end.

Note: It is possible to port an existing land-line number over to Ooma and then cancel the land-line service.

Overall, I have my modem/phone setup on a separate power strip so I can leave it on while all power to my computer is off.

I've used their customer service multiple times. You get a chat window like an IM, and you type to them like a normal IM conversation. It was available 24/7 with zero wait time. They were quite professional. Also, this method gives you a transcript of your conversation with them, and is easier for those of us who find it hard to talk on the phone. I was quite satisfied with their customer service, better than phone companies' service where you can only call during business hours and then wait on hold for the next available agent.

MagicJack sends all voice mails to your email address, where it's attached as a .wav file. This lets you store all important messages on your computer and even send them to others.

I use my computer 24/7 so there is no reason to ever turn it off.

Lee, looks good. Re-man for $199......Hmmmm.

Molly, good to here your positive review, sounds as though they've upped their reputation.

You can find scores of problems in other reviews, almost too many for comfort, but maybe that's over....(IDK).

One day I decided to go for Vonage and the reviews ended up biting me for not heeding them. Poor customer service in that you have a hard time
communicating ( Indian) . The Vonage modem would always need to be rebooted and it was unreliable for faxing, sometimes it would go, other times not.

Vonage had to go. I just got an email in January for a lost 4.6 million dollar class action lawsuit.

Just be a bit cautious if you might decide to consider. The premium service with voice mail and a bunch of additional stuff will be free for the first 90 days or so, and you might not need/want it to continue on after that. Also, the 911 service does work just like a land line and will result in a response being sent to the service address on file with Ooma ... and I discovered that the hard way one day when I inadvertently dialed 911 while trying to program some speed buttons for my elderly mother-in-law! The next thing I knew, my far-away number had cops knocking on my door here to find out about my 911 hang-up!

Also, I have found it best to connect the Ooma to my router connected to my modem rather than to make use of the Ooma's internal router as a source for my home-network router.