Switching to Magic Jack the ups and downs

A little over a month ago I purchased Magic Jack for my home in an effort to cut back our monthly phone bill. You have to have a high speed Internet connection which we do so this service allows us to get rid of my previous carrier Vonage. With taxes vonage was costing me $30 a month for unlimited local and long distance. While it was a good deal I knew that with the purchase of magic jack which costs $40 for the jack, I would be able to save money on my monthly bill. With Magic Jack you don't have to pay for it monthly. Your initial cost is $40 for the jack and after the first year you have a yearly fee of $20. That is it! So I felt like I really didn't have anything to loose.

The positives:
no monthly bill
unlimited local and long distance

The negatives:
You can't choose your own phone number
You have to dial the area code for all calls including local

So far I have been happy with Magic Jack. I haven't really given the number out but have used it to make my long distance calls. We decided that we wanted to keep our regular number we have had for 6 years so we pay $10 a month for a land line with just local call service. So I didn't have to give everyone a new phone number to call me.

The hardest part for the whole transition is that with my residential line I don't have caller id/call waiting. This has been a rough transition for me as I love to know who is calling before I answer the phone. My magic jack line has caller id/call waiting so I probably should just consider giving everyone that number too. They don't have to use it but if my other line is busy they can.

So after taxes on my residential line I am now saving $15 a month on phone bills which equates to $180 a year. We are also happy that now when the power goes out we have a land line so we can still make phone calls. For those of you that can let go of your telephone number you could save $360 a year or more on phone service by switching to magic jack. It could be worth it for you!