Talk via the Internet with VoIP

Keep in touch and save money

By Mara Gulens

With her spouse heading off to India for a three-month film shoot, Ilze Matiss was concerned about how she would handle the lengthy separation.

“When my husband Andris left, we knew we would use e-mail and we hoped we would use Skype,” says the Toronto mother of two.

Despite a nine-and-a-half-hour time difference and a sometimes unreliable Internet connection on the other end, the Matiss family did manage to communicate almost daily — with the help of the free, Internet-based communication service called Skype and a microphone.

“It was better than using the phone because we knew that it didn’t cost us anything,” Matiss explains. “When our daughter got ill, it was extra reassuring that we could talk via the computer and that her dad could talk to her and hear that everything was okay.”

Until recently, holding a conversation over the Internet was rare. Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) was a communication tool reserved for computer geeks who were more thrilled with the fact that they could use it than with the quality of the chat itself.

But broadband Internet connections in homes and offices across the country — and new VoIP services offering improved voice quality and extra features — are changing all that.

So how does VoIP work?

Just as e-mailing messages is an alternative to sending letters via the postal service, using VoIP is a way of holding conversations over the Internet. Telephone calls are converted into packets of digital data, transmitted over the Internet and picked up on the other end on the Internet or even on a regular phone line.

There are two ways to communicate using VoIP: (1) via a computer with a microphone or headset and (2) by using a phone that is hooked up to your modem with an adapter.

There are also different types of services you can use. You can

• go with a free, peer-to-peer program, such as Skype or Google Talk, which requires users at both ends have the same downloadable software, a headset or a microphone
• sign up with one of a growing number of VoIP services offered by Vonage, Primus, Rogers and Bell, which place a special adapter box between the phone and hi-speed modem
• leave the back-end how-it-works issues to the pros and sign up for Bell Digital Voice

The latter service adds VoIP functionality to a regular phone line without requiring you to make any changes. “It has all of the future strengths and features without asking you to make any of the compromises,” says Ron Close, president of VoIP at Bell Canada.

Why you may want to VoIP

Since regular phones and mobiles seem to work fine, you might be wondering why you should consider switching to a digital telephone service. Indeed, VoIP comes in several flavours and it depends on which option you’re considering.

1. To Skype

To date hundreds of millions of people have downloaded the Skype program. Why? Well, if you’re using your computer to type, you may as well use it to talk.

“We incorporated Skype into our daily internal communications between our Montreal and Toronto offices,” says Edgars Apse, business development advisor for Speed Promotions. The calls are clear, uninterrupted and informal. People tend to focus on the call instead of doing other things on the computer, he says.

It also helps that Skype calls are free — when done through a computer.

2. To save money

VoIP offerings generally cost less than a standard land line. Primus, for example, offers savings on services ranging from a basic phone line to a fully featured phone line with free long distance anywhere in North America and most of Europe. The services include, at no extra charge, features such as call forwarding and voicemail, which have traditionally been added onto phone bills.

3. To keep track of calls and contacts

The real benefit of VoIP is the online call management, which allows you to listen to phone calls, forward voicemail attachments, manage contacts and keep a record of all incoming and outgoing calls. “These are very enhanced features . . . which are only available with IP technology,” says Close.

4. To pick an area code, any area code

When you open a VoIP account, you may be able to either keep your old phone number or choose an area code of your choice, which has no fixed location. In other words, if your child attends university in Vancouver, but you live in Toronto, have him or her take along an adapter with a 416 or 905 area code. You can chat as if you’re both in the same city. “There is no such thing as long distance anymore,” explains Joe Parent, vice-president of marketing and business development for Vonage Canada.

VoIP is also handy for offices in obscure locations that want to pretend they’re in the big city (or the other way around). And Vonage, for example, offers virtual numbers which (much like secondary e-mail addresses) have the area code of another city but ring in to your primary line. When you move or travel, you can take your VoIP adapter, complete with contacts and features, with you. “It doesn’t matter where in the world you are,” says Parent.

Unlike regular phones, but just like computers, VoIP phones do not function when the power goes out or the Internet is down, so a phone and power supply backup are recommended. Since VoIP phones do not have fixed addresses, users are also encouraged to register their locations in case of a 911 emergency.