What happens when Google voice starts charging – or you want to leave (with your number)?
Posted on 13 March 2009, at 4:25 pm, by Wayne Schulz
I have three questions about Google Voice that nobody’s asked yet.
Sure, there’s lots of fawning over the concept and twittering about “hurry up and convert my GrandCentral account to Google Voice”. Has anyone stopped to consider what they’re about to enter into by using Google Voice as their primary phone number?
Granted using Google Voice as your primary phone number isn’t a huge risk because Google Voice is acting more like a traffic copy than a phone company. Their voice service routes your calls and takes your messages. You still provide the actual phone service for making and receiving calls. However once you distribute your Google Voice number – it can be a royal pain to switch numbers.
The old GrandCentral billed itself as “one number for life” – and that’s a great goal. One that I’m very interested in testing now that you can receive SMS messages through the service. Let me ask you the three questions that nobody has thought to ask.
What happens if (1) Google starts charging, (2) has a prolonged outage or (3) I want to leave — and take my Google Voice phone number with me?
For the low low monthly price of — FREE — do you think you’re getting any SLA (service level agreement – basically a guarantee against extended outages)?
Nope
Should the economy slip farther into recession and ultimately depression, is Google barred from starting to charge for those phone calls?
Nope
What happens should you decide to leave — with your “one number for life”? Can you port your number out to another carrier?
Nope
See what I’m getting at here? Free is a great price. But nobody gives you anything for free.
Google wants to make money off advertising. If the advertising model doesn’t work will they move to a more traditional billing arrangement where subscribers pay by the minute? Will we all be stuck with yet another phone bill with more hidden monthly “cost recovery” fees?
Before you use Google Voice for your primary phone number – give some thought to the risks involved – even when everyone is so excited that nobody has though to start talking about them.
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March 13th, 2009 at 5:20 pm
You can port your Google number to another provider if you want so your third argument isn’t valid:
http://www.google.com/support/.....tx=sibling
March 14th, 2009 at 7:25 am
Good Questions, Wayne…always expect to get what you pay for. I never felt comfortable using Grand Central as my number one. For me, it’s always just been an extension of Craigslist…a number to use as a buffer to the world when I’ve got something posted for sale, online or otherwise. Why give out your real number when you don’t have to?