Cheap In-Home Business Phone Service

This is an answer to an email I received about setting up phone service for a small in-home business. Since I’m sure that other people have the same questions, here’s my answer:

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Most people working out of their home just add another home line, since it’s costs less than a business line.

A business VoIP line would be the cheapest traditional way to do it, because you could get a second fax line with it for just a few dollars more. And, if you hook it up in front of your computers, it would get access to the bandwidth first, which would keep your call quality good.

I personally use a MagicJack for my business line because I’m cheap, and the call quality is fine. I also have a toll free number ringing into my MagicJack, and that costs me around 3 cents per minute for incoming calls. Then, you can add a fax service, like rapidfax, for $10.00 per month, and you’re done.

Here’s what I pay:

• Magicjack: $1.67 per month. ($20 per year.)
• Rapidfax: $10.00 per month.
• Toll free number: $2.00 per month.
• Toll free service: 3 cents per minute.
• My total expense is around $16 per month….

Of course, since I do this for a living, I’ve played with a lot of the VoIP company’s products, and I’m not willing to pay for expensive phone service anymore, especially when I know that the call quality between VoIP companies any more is negligible. Almost every phone company that’s still offering traditional land line phone service is calling it “Digital” now, because it’s a VoIP product, but they don’t want to call it VoIP and alert the consumer to that fact, because that would lower it’s value/price.

If you want a regular land line service, enter your address and zipcode in the search form at http://www.calling-plans.com/local-telephone-service.htm and see what services it shows in your local area. Then compare that to the VoIP prices listed on the bottom of the page: http://www.calling-plans.com/local-telephone-service.htm

Then look at the prices shown above in my Magicjack/Rapidfax example and see how that compares.

Here is a link that will let you try Rapidfax for 30 days for free.

Here’s a link that will let you try Magicjack for 30 days.

If you like those 2 products, then email me back, and I’ll set up your toll free service and have it ring into your Magicjack account.

If you decide you really don’t want to try VoIP, then grab one of the local services offered through the form on http://www.calling-plans.com/local-telephone-service.htm, or your local Yellow pages, and then email me back and I’ll dig into traditional long distance service and toll free service options for you.