Sipgate www.sipgate.co.uk Review

Okay, mixed feelings here... but cannot recommend them.



I own 7 sipgate accounts and till recently had nothing bad to say :



- Setup is incredibly easy

- voice clarity is excellent (provided you have spare bandwidth and depending, of course, on the codec you choose in your telephony device. ie, and poor quality calls is almost certainly NOT their fault)

- Cheap as chips with free DID number, even free if you don't make calls to conventional landlines or don't fund the account in any way.

- Allows multiple appearances (devices in different places)

- Allows flexible forwarding (always, on busy, after n rings, etc)

- Free voicemail + sending audio or notifications to your email.



However,



After forming my limited company, printing up business cards, letterheads, launching an expensive advertising campaign and buying GXP2020 devices at 100 UK pounds each (also from sipgate) I found that they had given my number away to another subscriber WITHOUT making ANY attempt to contact me or even being able to provide any explanation for this.



So, I woke up one morning and someone else was answering the number of my new Limited companies head office... after over 3 grand had been spent on establishing our presence.



Angry, oh yes!



This is unforgivable for a telco. Surely I have a right to recompense ... wouldnt you... well... here's the clincher!



Sipgate is NOT an ITSPA member... so they are completely unregulated and can do what the hell they like. And they do! A lot of people seem to have had costly problems with them and when they do it is always the same, Sipgate are simply NOT accountable - in fact, they don't seem to give a damn even when they clearly mess up.





If your spanky new number is important to you then go with an ITSPA registered voip provider. I cannot stress this enough. There are many in the UK, and their customer care is far better.



Sipgate is cheap, but there ARE others that are uk-based, regulated, free AND voluntarily regulated!



So sipgate. Cheap, yes, but NOT in a good way! YOU don't own the number, THEY do... so number transfers between providers are at their discretion, and if they disappear or decide to reallocate the number you're not covered at all!





Mine isn't the only horror story with non-ITSPA providers - Avoid at all costs!



-Brian