Let me start with my apologies. It’s obvious that we weren’t clear enough about the changes we are implementing at Ooma and what the impact may be on you. So I’m going to try and break down each case for you and what the relevant changes are that may impact you.
Ooma Hub/Scout Combination Products (Includes all Costco.com purchases)
- Current Ooma Core Users
a. No changes to your current feature set including voice mail.
b. No annual regulatory recovery fee will be charged. - Current Ooma Premier Users
a. No changes to your current feature set.
b. No annual regulatory recovery fee will be charged.
c. If you are paying monthly for Premier, your monthly price will change to $9.99 from $12.99.
d. If you wish to buy an additional year of Premier at $99.99, you have until 12/31/09. - Current Ooma Premier Trial Users
a. No changes to your current feature set.
b. No annual regulatory recovery fee will be charged.
c. If you want to purchase an annual Ooma Premier subscription, you can do so until 12/31/09 at $99.99, after that the price will go up by $20 to $119.99. - New or Unactivated Ooma Hub/Scout Combinations
a. No changes to your promised feature set, includes voicemail and a 60 day Premier Trial.
b. If you want to purchase an annual Ooma Premier subscription, you can do so until 12/31/09 at $99.99, after that the price will go up by $20 to $119.99
c. No regulatory recovery fee will be charged
Ooma Hub Only Product at Costco Stores
- Current Ooma Core Users
a. No changes to your current feature set including voice mail. - Current Ooma Premier Users
a. No changes to your current feature set. - Current Ooma Premier Trial Users
a. No changes to your current feature set.
b. The regulatory recovery fee applies per the original terms and conditions. - New or Unactivated Hub Only Prodcut
a. Basic voice mail is now included in Ooma Core.
b. Enhanced voice mail is available as a standalone option for $49.99 per year if you don’t want to purchase all the Premier features. Enhanced voicemail includes:
- One touch access to voicemail, call screening
- Remote access to messages through any web browser or telephone
- Voicemail notifications to your mobile phone
- Voicemail mp3 audio file attachment sent to your email
- Send-to-Voicemail
- Do Not Disturb
c. If you want to purchase an annual Ooma Premier subscription, you can do so at $99.99.
d. The annual regulatory recovery fee applies per the original terms and conditions
Ooma Telo Product
- Newly Purchased Telo’s
a. Includes US domestic calling, a free phone number, call waiting, caller ID and 911 service. Basic voice mail now included in the base service of the unit.
b. Telo’s come with a free 60 day trial of Ooma Premier, which costs $9.99/mo or $119.99/yr.
c. Enhanced voicemail is available as a standalone option for $49.99/yr if you don’t want to purchase all the Premier features. Enhanced voicemail includes:- One-touch access to voicemail, Call screening
- Remote access to messages through any web browser or telephone
- Voicemail notifications to your mobile phone
- Voicemail mp3 audio file attachments sent to your email
- Send-to-Voicemail
- Do Not Disturb
d. Telo’s come with an annual regulatory recovery fee of $11.75 beginning the second year of service.
- Previous Ooma Hub Owners
a. Previous Ooma hub owners (Core or Premier), can move their accounts, phone numbers, and features to the new Telo service including voicemail, and will not be subject to the annual regulatory recovery fee.
b. The used Ooma Hub may be resold but will require a $59.99 reactivation fee to assign a new number and owner. When activated, the new account will be subject to the $11.75 annual regulatory recovery fee.
Some of you have asked what the regulatory recovery fee is for, so let me explain why we have implemented it. If you have ever looked at your mobile or landline phone bill, you regularly see fees and taxes applied that are typically 15-20% of the monthly bill. In other words, these fees can be quite significant. Here at Ooma we, like every other phone service provider in the US, have to charge a fee to cover taxes, regulatory recovery fees, and other costs related to our providing phone service to your local service address but to our knowledge our charge is significantly lower than what others typically charge. We’ve tried to maintain this cost as low as possible and it is less than $1 per month. While this is not a huge cost to provide you phone service, we realize we did not ask any of our current customers to bear this fee at the time they initiated service, so we’re not asking out current subscriber base to pay this regulatory recovery fee.
Thank you,
Rich Buchanan
(27 votes, average: 3.44 out of 5)
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I bought my ooma sytem about 8 months ago, and from day one I loved it. The voice quality is excellent and I thought the price upfront (although a little steep at first) made sense and looked like a bargain in the end. I started advocating to all my family and friends about how good and advantagious the system would be to all of them. Let’s face it, we all bought the system because we saw it as a cheaper alternative to the other options available elsewhere.
I understand that these “new” changes do NOT affect me, but I believe I can no longer recommend this product to my friends and family as I did before.
With the new T.O.S., and the new “charges”, additional “fees” and reduction in overall services offered, ooma is no longer the clear advantagious choice out there.
One thing I noticed for example, all other phone companies out there DO NOT charge for calls made to Puerto Rico, as it is considered U.S. Territory, but you do, for about 5 cents a minute. Not bad I thought, since I figured you have to make some money somehow in order to stay in business.
Which bring me to the next point……………..Why cut on VOICEMAIL???? Voicemail is as basic as the phone line itself.
To be honest, people can probably purchase one of those multiple handsets which already include voicemail. But that’s not the point. The point is that when you reduce services, and increase fees, and STILL maintain the tag line “UNLIMITED FREE CALLING” it feels like you are lying and now are entering into the “greed” mode, which not only your current customers can see, but also the potential customers that you need to attract in order to stay in business as well.
**Could you maybe reduce the “UNLIMITED” minutes from 5,000 back to 3,000 or 4,000 and offer voicemail instead to the new accounts in order to offset expenses?**
**Could you make it advantagious for someone to purchase “PREMIER” yearly vice monthly? (i.e $11.95/mo versus $120/yr)**
Just some ideas.
I would really like for you to carefully review how you continue to market the company from this point forward. All of the people in this blog agree that your product is a very good one, so no problems there. But don’t forget that the reason we bought into it was for our advantage. You take that away from us and we will just simply stop using your product and move on.
I would almost guarantee that if your pricing structure becomes reasonable, we would support it since we do not want to see you fail. I would realy like to return telling my family and friends about the great product that you offer.
Dear OOMA,
I am NOT currently a customer, I just want to make a comment. I think your
commercials are great. They are VERY entertaining. I especially liked the one
I heard this morning about ” Uma the actress and a restraining order.”
I am a longtime trucker, laid off for close to a year. My wife works at Walmart. I am a ” kept man.”
John Spencer
Rich,
You did a good job above of breaking down each case for Hub/Scout “grandfathering” but I’m not sure you clearly covered my case.
One of your current customers (since June) recently unactivated his Hub/Scout and transferred his service to a new Telo. If I buy his unactivated Hub/Scout and pay you $59.99 to activate it, will it be grandfathered as an “Unactivated Ooma Hub/Scout” under your category 4 above?
If it makes any difference — I’m already a happy a Hub/Scout owner and if I buy this used one, I plan to give it as a gift to a family member that wouldn’t need Premier service but would need the grandfathered basic features.
Bill
Rich,
Thanks. I received a call from an Ooma rep responding to my above (Nov 24) question. He explained that used re-activated, Hub/Scouts would also be grandfathered with all the same features as new or unactivated Hub/Scouts except for one thing – accounts created for used re-activated Hub/Scouts will be subject to the $11.75 annual regulatory recovery fee and accounts created for new or unactivated Hub/Scouts owners would not be subject to it.
Bill
Hello,
What does that mean for me. I just bought the new Telo device from Costco. I am planning on getting premier service for the features etc.., but I thought I had a trial period……so if I purchase the premier this year 09 with very little time left to try out everything….. it feels like I am getting pressured to make an instant decision. And what price do I have going forward…..and does premier still have all the same features as before?
Have had Ooma for six months…put in my credit card and paid $40 per month (same as old tele. bills) so now I consider my phone calling free…
Also…was having problems with the hook-up (my fault), and the service from Ooma was outstanding! I highly recommend your product and your service!
I have had nothing but problems with the Ooma hub and Telo devices from day one. I cannot use the Telo handset after charging unless I unplug the battery and replug it. People cannot hear me on the other end, but I can hear them.
The battery does not last long. The telo’s port for home networking other phones is DEAD. Support is even worse. Now Ooma will raise the price no doubt and they STILL have not upgraded to be able to use a 2nd device.
I don’t think their ads and cute commercials said anything about their devices NOT working. The only thing I can use that is stable is the Ooma Telo with a regular phone using the phone port on the Telo, but for the price I paid it stinks.
I plan on returning it because customer support is in the Phillipines and they always lie or hang up. Useless.
Greetings!!
Is the term “regulatory recovery fee” an all emcompassing term for federal, state, and local fees/taxes?
Happy Holidays!!
I just tried to renew my Premier subscription early with the sales office, but the sales person said her system would not let her process a renewal early. My current subscription expires in February. That seems to be at odds with what is stated in 2(d) above for current Hub/Scout customers.
As of today, 12/15/2009, Ooma CSR’s are still saying regulatory recovery fees will apply to any Hub/Scout owners who activate after 10/31/09. I have two Ooma CSR’s tell me this, one on the phone, one by email. Who should we believe, this blog or CSR’s?
I bought a second Ooma unit to take to Europe. I bought it in spring 2009, but have not activated the unit. It is in Spain and I will be there in March. Now I am confused about the whole Ooma system. I figure as long as I have broadband internet available in Spain I should technically be able to hook up the Ooma unit in Spain. So what are what costs if any if I will incure if Iam able to activate it in Spain? If it will not function in Spain I will bring it home to activate here.
I’ve had Ooma since June and can’t say anything bad about them until I ran across this letter which goes against the email i recieved in October.
When I usually hear the word grandfathered that would indicate to me that you are be grandfathered at the old price. But in this case all it’s doing is waiving the 11.75 regulatory fee and nothing more. You would think that the people that bought the original product and helped spread the word about how good it is would actually be grandfathered in at the $99 premier price also. It’s still a great product, but you have to lay down a couple hundred $$’s of the hardware and then to get all the features you now have to pay 119 after December 31st. Guess it’s not the way I would treat my loyal customers that helped me get a start in this business.
Sorry one last rant – Then to add insult to injury – of all times of the year to pick for this price to expire you have to pick December 31st right after everyone has spent money on holiday gifts. (Are you trying to make year end sales numbers??)
The math dosen’t add up here to me – I get an email telling me I’m safe at the $99 price only until i stumble across this letter but I don’t get an email about the december 31st date or we pay more. (Funny they can send an email about the grandfathered price (Better put Non-Granfathered price), but not about their mistake and that we will all be raised to $119).
Have had Ooma for almost an year now, generally satisfied with the service.
However, given that I belong to one of the early adopters (If I should use that as a phrase), I feel like being penalised for actually getting an Ooma hub that is not slick.
Accepted that product development will bring in new features and devices over a period of time, however, the company should acknowledge that we were the first to embrace when it is very nascent. Should not charge us additional money to buy a hub or reactivation fee to the extent of USD59.99. Why not delight the customers by giving them option to upgrade to a new device for a small amount like USD 25.00…that would be great. Looks like Ooma is following the path of cell phone companies (..once you are in, we practically do not care much..we need new customers)..Sad but that is how I feel
I’m afraid that I have to agree with Leah’s experience with tech support…sort of. I’ve had to call them a few times for various issues on the 3 ooma hubs that I own. Unfortunately 4 of the 5 encounters ended in the representative being rude, unhelpful, and yes, either lying or disconnecting the call. The 1 of 5 was very patient and helpful. Very inconsistent. However, the email support has been very consistent…consistently horrible. I’ve had several email exchanges with support reps who either don’t understand what I’m trying to communicate or just don’t care to listen. Ultimately, I just give up and take the loss (of service, features, or in one case, paying for a port and never getting it done). I can’t imagine that if this is the direction that Ooma is heading that it will be able to compete in the growing VOIP telecommunications market, so I’d suggest getting the most out of it as you can while they’re still around.
I bought Ooma a couple of months ago and had been preaching to everyone I knew about it. I can’t say that I’ll do that anymore with the changes in the terms of service. The delivery of the message was poor (typical corporate spin) and you’ve lost the confidence and trust of many of your customers with the latest changes as (per the blog responses).
I have had my OOMA Hub and Scout since Oct 2009. I LOVE the product and have recommended it to everyone I know. The support has been great, and when I could not get my Scout to work properly they replaced it. It is now all working smoothly.
I am however still confused about the Premier pricing. I have paid my $99.00 (which will take effect after my 6 month trial is over). When I go to renew again, will I be grandfathered in to the $99.00 price, or will everyone then have to pay $120.00/year for Premier services? My initial understanding was that it would stay at $99.00, but now I am not sure. I do worry that this “free” phone service (which now costs $99.00/year) will continue to increase in price, thereby eliminating all the savings I thought I would recoup from the initial investment.
I hope someone from OOMA will clarify this for me as I am sure I am not the only confused customer.
Thanks!
I bought the Ooma hub at costco almost a year ago and it worked great except for a couple outages at the beginning. It is truly free calling and supposedly unlimited until I saw the 5000 min a month cap recently. I talked to support and they claim it shouldn’t be a problem if you are the average customer. They don’t want it to be used as a business and will think so if you go over a certain number which is the 5000.
Listen folks, if you talk over the much minutes, it means you are using the phone over 2.5hrs every single day. Unless you can prove to them that you are just a talkative person
I purchased Ooma Telo from Best Buy a few months ago. I been an Ooma customer since then. I’m happy with the service since all I need is just a dial-tone. Not interested in Premier service. Recently I saw a tax and fees of $3.47 in my credit card. I spoke to support and they explained to me about the new Terms and Conditions. It’s a small amount but I don’t like it. The reason I purchased the item is for no re-occuring payments ever. I understand that the company has to have a sustainable business model and pass the cost its’ customers. Nothing good is for free.
Is anyone living in this world? Anywhere? Don’t you know that everyone/companies pay taxes? After their start, with much sussces, what did the Tax man say? Wow! there’s a cow to milk. So OOma company is paying its taxes, so should we.
I do not need a second line as I have a cell. I don’t need a fancy black list, fot this I have caller Id and I can screen them out. Conclusion I do not sign up for premier. Keep it simple, enough to call for pizza when I want! All complain, deciding to boo, Stop crying, save on this system, cut down on your cell bill and you will have for a x large pizza, ok and a beer. Enjoy Ooma