There is something sinister afoot in the highly competitive world of phone conferencing. Some conference companies are selling a new toll free conference product for 2¢ per minute. Sounds great, doesn't it? But as they say, "things are not as they seem."
The catch is simply this: When you dial the toll free number to get into your conference, your call is routed over a VOIP (Voice over Internet protocol) network. So your call is immediately taken off the fiber optic network and placed on the Internet where an entirely different technology divides and reassembles your voice into packets. This is an emerging technology that still leaves a lot of be desired when it comes to quality. That's why you want to think twice about switching to a low cost toll free option. You might save a couple of cents per minute, but the question you have to ask yourself is, "Are the smalls savings worth it?" If conference calls are important to your business you want to make sure you have the highest quality service available, and as of now, that quality rests solely with the land lines you use with your regular phones. There are a lot of issues involved with VOIP, not the least of which involves power failures. If your electricity goes out at your office, you're knocked off the line. However, if you are using a regular phone line, you'll stay on your call.
