How To Call Ukraine From The U.s Vonage Blog

Vonage Business is a popular VoIP service for businesses of all sizes. They've been serving businesses for over 20 years. Like most business VoIP systems, Vonage provides a lot of standard features — like phone calls, messages, auto-attendant, CRM integrations, and more. However, it does have some limitations that Vonage alternatives easily overcome.

As a company that serves both consumers and small businesses, Vonage's focus is often split between these two groups. This makes it hard to deliver a phenomenal product for businesses. Also, Vonage pricing has lots of hidden fees that make the service far more expensive than expected.

There are plenty of Vonage alternatives that have the functionality your business needs. In this post, we'll explore five for you to consider.

5 Best Vonage Alternatives

If you run a business, small or large, then you will need to decide on a VoIP provider that is best for your company. But where do you turn to first? Other legacy VoIP service providers like RingCentral are just as clunky, while popular options like Google Voice aren't suited for business use.

The answer could be one of these five modern Vonage alternatives that are built for business use.

1. OpenPhone

OpenPhone is a VoIP provider that's built for businesses (big and small) as well as solopreneurs. It's incredibly easy to use, as it's designed with productivity and speed in mind. No matter where you are in the world, you can use OpenPhone to answer calls, send messages, and seamlessly collaborate with your team. Whether you need to make long-distance or local calls, all you need is an internet connection to make it happen.

OpenPhone and Vonage have many similar features, but there are some key differences that set OpenPhone apart. See the table below to learn how they compare.

	OpenPhone	Vonage Business
Pricing (monthly, per user)	$10 per user	$19.99 per line
Minutes included	Unlimited	$0.03/min outbound
Text messaging (SMS)	✓	✓
Group messaging	✓	X
Picture messaging (MMS)	✓	X
Voicemail to text	✓	$4.99/mo per extension
Call recording	✓	✓
Auto-replies	✓	X
Business address book	✓	✓
Auto-attendant	✓	✓
Extensions	✓	$14.99/mo per extension
CRM Integrations	Coming soon	✓

Comparing OpenPhone to Vonage Business?

Beyond the features and affordable (and upfront) pricing listed in the comparison, OpenPhone also includes:

• Toll-free numbers
• U.S., Canada, and international calling
• Crystal-clear call quality
• Business hour settings
• Automatic responses to texts, missed calls, and voicemails
• iOS and Android mobile apps
• Browser-based and desktop apps
• Shared phone numbers for customer support
• Multiple phone numbers tied to one account
• Call forwarding and call routing
• Integrations with tools like Slack and Zapier

More importantly, we have a service customers rave about. We're constantly implementing customer feedback into the product. (Check out our changelog to see what we're up to!) Here's what one business has to say about switching to OpenPhone:

"Vonage packed a lot of unnecessary features that most of the time didn't work. I missed a lot of calls that didn't come through to my phone. For all the aggravation, Vonage was not worth its hefty price tag — not to mention finding hidden fees on every billing cycle.

OpenPhone is so easy to use! Call quality and receiving calls and voicemails have been fantastic. I love that I can set business hours so my phone isn't ringing after hours (something I couldn't do easily with Vonage). I like how straightforward the app is. Lastly, the price and customer support of the OpenPhone team is unmatched. I haven't looked back since." — Melissa Hughes, Principal/Owner at Halogen Design Lab

How To Switch and Port Your Number from Vonage

Want to port your number from Vonage to OpenPhone? Here's how easy it is to keep an existing number:

1. Create an OpenPhone account.
2. Fill out this one-minute porting form.

That's it! We'll take care of the rest for you.

2. JustCall

JustCall is a modern Vonage alternative that's specifically for businesses that want to build a call center. It supports international calls in up to 70 countries, and members of your team can share each of your phone numbers. JustCall's lowest-tier plan starts at $20 per user per month. But it doesn't support unlimited calling — so you'll also have to pay per minute, even in the United States. JustCall includes features that Vonage lacks or locks behind their most expensive plan, such as:

• MMS messaging
• Call tracking, recording, and monitoring
• CRM, Salesforce, and help desk integrations
• SMS automation

3. Telzio

Telzio is a cloud phone system that's built for small business use. With this Vonage alternative, you can bring on board as many users as you want. Its plans start at $50 per month and are based on the number of minutes and text messages you need rather than the number of users. This might not be an ideal pay structure for companies with large or inconsistent volumes — unlimited call and text plans are worry-free and easier to budget for. Telzio's features do not include MMS but do include:

• Conference calls
• Call recording
• 911 emergency service and 411 directory service

4. Nextiva

Nextiva is a Vonage alternative that many enterprises use, but small businesses can also use it to access voice (and video) calls without excessive fees. Unfortunately, its most affordable rates are only available with one-year contracts and for teams of 20 or more. Nextiva offers 24/7 customer support and features like:

• Unlimited video conferencing
• Salesforce, HubSpot, and Zendesk integrations
• Outlook and Google Contacts integrations

5. Ooma

Ooma is a legacy VoIP service provider like Vonage, which means its interface isn't ultra-modern either. But it does offer a number of key business calling features without requiring an upgrade to its pro plan. Unfortunately, Ooma lacks any integrations or analytics, but it does offer features like:

• Voicemail transcriptions
• Conference calls
• An overhead paging system

The Drawbacks of Vonage Business

Vonage may be a well-known cloud communications service, but there are four major drawbacks that can make it difficult for small business owners to get the most out of their phone communications.

No Support For Group and Picture Messaging (MMS)

If you use your business phone to text clients, you'll quickly run into a major limitation with Vonage. There's no support for group messaging and picture messaging. So if you ever expect to send or receive group messaging, look for a service that supports group texting. And if you want to be able to send or receive images on your business phone number, look for an alternative with MMS support.

Fees, Fees, and More Fees

Vonage pricing starts at $19.99 per line per month for its standard plan plus 3 cents per minute for outbound calls. It's lowest rate ($14.99 per line per month) is only available if you have 20 or more team members, but even then, you also have to pay an additional fee for user extensions for each phone number. Want voicemail transcriptions? It'll cost $4.99 per month per extension.

Many popular features require add-on costs with most Vonage plans, and even with a costly Advanced plan, call recording is still an on-demand feature.

Compare this to other softphones that offer the same features and have a starting price of $10 and no hidden fees. 🙌

Vonage's per line pricing can seem great, but it has drawbacks. For example, if you sign up for the Premium plan starting at $29.99 per month, it may seem affordable, but you still need to pay $14.99 per extension if you want your team members to use it. So for a team of five, the cost will be:

• $29.99 base price
• $74.95 for five extensions ($14.99 times 5)
• Total cost of $104.94 per month for a team of five ($29.99 plus $74.95)
• And add an extra 3 cents per minute for any outbound calls made by your team

Clunky User Experience

Like other legacy VoIP services, Vonage was founded over 20 years ago and has kept the user interface and aesthetic of early 2000s web products. A recent study showed that 55% of employees would rather use their own phone than a desk phone. Those employees use products like WhatsApp, Messenger, and Instagram for their personal communications. 📱 They'll want to use a simple and slick service on their mobile devices and computers.

This is where Vonage alternatives like OpenPhone shine. When you switch, you and your team can access a simple and beautiful application from your mobile phone, tablet, or computer.

Poor Customer Support

Many long-term Vonage customers share a common complaint. The customer service isn't all that good. Vonage Business users reported on multiple forums that the support team is slow to resolve critical problems, costing them time and money. These aren't the sort of issues that you'd want to face long term, especially if your phone service is critical to your business operations.

OpenPhone: The Best Vonage Alternative

If you're thinking of making a switch from Vonage Business, then OpenPhone is your best bet. OpenPhone is a feature-rich platform without hidden fees that offers a sleek user interface and affordable pricing — more so than any other option on this list.

Ready to make the switch? Sign up for a free trial of OpenPhone. It takes less than a minute to get started!

How To Call Ukraine From The U.s Vonage Blog

Source: https://www.openphone.co/blog/best-vonage-alternatives/

Posted by: goblerespense.blogspot.com

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