Phone Power

I've been a PhonePower customer since 2009. In the beginning, support was fantastic and the service was high quality for a reasonable price. The cloned line feature allows you to have up to 2 lines/calls active at one time which is nice (your phone adapter must support it). However, it is now 2024.

Over the years the website slowed down and sections of it (like the invoice and payments page) began to fail. It is an old website but still gives you the ability to manage the service. I usually use the website to delete old voicemails. Okay, the site being old technology is a nit.

But let's move on to the BYOD. I selected a replacement device from the list of supported equipment (Grandstream replacing an old Linksys). During the provisioning process, the PhonePower setup process would only activate one of the 2 lines -- the clone line would not get setup correctly. I contacted support and got a live person -- awesome! And they knew what they were doing -- double awesome! However, it became apparent that the only way we were going to get both of my lines active was to do a manual configuration. And since every adapter is slightly different, the best they could do is provide me with a few basic settings. It was enough to get both lines working. But here's the catch: since it was manually configured, PhonePower won't provide support. That means that if you have problems with your adapter or your adapter stops working after PhonePower does periodic maintenance, you get zero help. I've tweaked the settings on the Grandstream several times, each time requesting help from PhonePower and sending in log information to help troubleshoot why my adapter stops taking and making calls after a PhonePower maintenance event -- no reply; no help. I have to restart my adapter to reconnect. So, support has gone downhill. I used to be able to get assistance, even with a manual configuration, but no more.

Then in 2024, got another surprise. My service just renewed. I mentioned earlier that the payment and invoice section of their site doesn't work (at least not consistently). So, my annual service that is about $100 for the service suddenly was over $230. To be fair, my prior years with fees was around $180. When I asked the billing department why my service went up over 33% in 2 years, they replied that it was due to Federal fees. Really? Federal fees went up 33%? Nope. I managed to get a copy of my invoice. The largest fees were not the Federal fees, rather it was a combination of things -- a huge recovery fee, a PhonePower added fee for administrative cost recovery, and an error in sales tax calculation. I compared it to my mobile phone bill -- it had all but the administrative cost recovery fees, but at a fraction of what PhonePower was passing through. The billing department's response was that VOIP vs Mobile isn't a good comparison since the rules are slightly different. Sorry, but it is a perfect comparison. The fees are out of whack on how they are allocated. Oh, and that administrative cost recovery fee from PhonePower -- that was added to help PhonePower cover its various filings, general account servicing, and record maintenance. Um, what? You are tacking on a service fee to cover the costs that are a typical cost of business and should be covered under the service plan!?!

So, to sum it up, support is a shadow of what it used to be, fees and taxes will more than double your quoted phone plan, they tack on extra charges to cover their typical expenses as though they were a co-op or a non-profit instead of a for profit business. I expect 2024 will be my last year with PhonePower.

This company is horrible!!!!! Do not use! First of all, their website is buggy. If you attempt to set up simultaneous ring, the website displays an error message. After getting tech support to set it up, it will work for a month, then stop working all of sudden. I just got tired of babysitting and fixing this issue. I rely on simultaneous ring for my business. This company does shoddy work at best. Also, I paid for 1 year of service all at once. After 5 months, I cancelled the service and they WILL NOT give me a refund for the remaining 7 months. I'm telling you, DO NOT BUY VOIP SERVICE from this company!

I used phone power for almost 10 years. When google voice and OBI had their spat in the mid teens, OBI recommended phonepower as an alternative, so I used them and liked them. Since then it is has gone DOWNHILL.

Most recently, my credit card was hacked and I found there was no way to update the info online at Phonepower. So when the card started failing for them, they simply cancelled me without even trying to call me. Now I need to try to rescue my phone number with a port while everyone who calls me fails.

Phonepower sucks. Stay away.

I was a phonepower customer for a few years from 2010 to 2013. The service was usually reliable and customer service was great. Fast Forward to 2022, as a returning customer, customer service has become incompetent and rude. Their website login does not work the second time you log in...you have to delete all cookies no matter what browser you use. Technical Support is dishonest and rude at best: self-contradictory and bold-faced lies...there really is no other accurate way to put it.

I am currently getting out of my contract because they evidently have changed hands, or have enough customers that they no longer care.

I have been using Phone Power as my VOIP for five years and have been happy with the service. My device stopped working on January 31st, 2021. Still showing soft call log online. I have repeatedly tried to contact both sales and support for the last week. No response. It appears the company is out of business.

It is very difficult to program the features of this provider. I doubt it has been changed for years. My phone service occasionally cuts out so that the other party can not hear me.
I was not billed for a second year but phonepower took the whole next year's cost off my previous card. The fees (their fees) and taxes doubled the price to $200 a year. This was quite a surprise.

Have been a user for at least 5 years. 2 years ago started to have connection problems. Lately, they have re-routed phone numbers that I call to a bad connection. Their instruction page doesn't match the real program. They did have a good 'block phone number' system which has recently been abolished. They do have a good list of incoming/outgoing calls, except that it can take a day or two for the call to show on the list. Frustrating. Looking for a new provider since I am really annoyed by the loss of the block call program.

I really enjoyed until recently. I have issue on getting voicemail forwarded to my email. I snapshot where I was stuck and email support for 2 to 3 times without any response. I received one response, so I sent them a snapshot on where I was putting my forwarding email and asking to show where it was supposed to be.

And guess what? No more response. Like all these companies, they have a good start and suddenly, they are turning to a very disappointing outlook...all the services are gone. And believe me, I contacted them 3 or 4 times for the past 8 years using them, it was quick and easy, and now, just a disaster.

They have to be one of the worst companies I have ever dealt with. Bought the system for my kids to have a phone that can be split. System didn't work most of the time, when it did work the call quality was horrendous. Worked with their support multiple times, all they do is blame the internet connection (Rogers cable, 250mb and runs perfectly).

Cancelled the service and settled up. About a year later they renewed the cancelled service and the collection calls started, I tried to work with them to resolve but they insisted on me paying $300 for a service I hadn't used. I refused and sent the cancellation proof. They didn't accept it. The collection calls have continued and they have even reported me to creditors. Don't care as my credit is great even with this.

Stay far away from these scam artists.

Was having reliability problems with my previous provider and decided to try Phone Power with my existing Obi202. The price was almost double what i was paying before, but they promised me the service and reliability made it worth it.

Started off by setting up my SIP credentials only to find that the reliability got much worse compared to my old provider. Phone Power recommends using their auto-provisioning feature instead of SIP, so I tried it out. Much better except for one thing: you can only have one line working on the Obi202 (which normally allows up to two lines).

The next thing I notice is that when you get an email regarding a voice mail, there's no way to delete that message unless you log into the site (which is slow as molasses). My previous provider offered a way to listen and delete messages directly from a link in the email.

Finally, I didn't notice until I signed up that there's no SMS texting feature or even the option to add it. You may not think this is important, but I can almost guarantee you that friends are sending you text messages from their phones -- assuming that they're reaching your mobile phone instead of your landline.

So overall I give it a thumbs up for reliability, but you miss out on a lot of features just to have your calls go through. Personally, the lack of an SMS texting option and the inability to use a second line on my Obi is a deal breaker for me, so I'll need to give it a thumbs down.