Landline Integration Use Model

[MikeekiM]

OK...So I have joined your ranks and am now a happy and satisfied Ooma user! I have to say that I am more than impressed with the service and plan on subscribing to premier... That said, I have a question on how landline integration works...

My understanding is that landline integration brings two benefits to the table:

(1) 911 calls are routed to landline
(2) During power or internet outage, landline dialtone is passed through to the handset (assuming the phone attached to the hub/scout is not dependent on power during a power outage)

Is that it? Is there no other benefit to landline integration?

The user manual talks about a landline provisioning process that turns off duplicate features, and turns on Busy Call Forwarding... What does this have to do with anything? I am sure I am missing something...

The user manual also says that there should be no phones hooked up without a scout or hub... If that's the case, what happens when someone calls my landline? Ooma doesn't pass the landline call through, does it? (I haven't been able to get that to work)....

I am a little confused, but admittedly a new user (but fairly technically saavy)...

Thanks in advance for any clarification you can provide here!

[WayneDsr]

If you have provisioned ooma to work WITH the landline all calls will come in through the landline and all local (no charge) calls will go out through the landline. All long distance calls will be routed through ooma.

Call forward on busy is used on your landline in order for ooma's virtual second line to work. If you are on a call using your landline and someone calls in, call forward on busy will route the call to your second line.

Yes, if your landline is provisioned (ooma WITH a landline) all calls coming in on your landline will ring on ooma.

Also, I believe at this time a few of ooma services do not work with landline provisioning. Not sure of what features do not work, but I believe the blacklist feature is one of them.

Personally, I use ooma WITHOUT a landline. I still have my landline active and have it connected separately to another wall jack, no connection to ooma. All my calls utilize ooma. As people learn my new ooma phone number fewer calls come in to my old landline (except telemarketers).
I could forward my old phone number to ooma, but I don't want to incur any extra charges, have the landline set up as a very basic service.

Hope this helps.
And, welcome to the ooma forums!

Wayne

[southsound]

<< bummer - Wayne types faster than I do. >>

First off, welcome to ooma!

I really don't see a lot of benefit to integrating the landline. Several of us HAVE landlines (usually for the financial benefit of being on some kind of DSL special) but do not use them in the "integrated mode". I have mine completely seperate - and use different phones / cordless bases for each type of line. Others (WayneDSR feel free to comment here) use their landline as a backup by plugging it into the hub's wall jack but WITHOUT provisioning. Just a simple basic landline. When the hub is down, the landline appears so you have to be careful to listen to the dialtone before making long distance calls - ooma tone means ooma is working and the call is free - normal dialtone means you are using your landline pricing model.

I personally don't use the scout because I feed the entire house with the hub's phone connection. Others use Premier and a second line and use the scout to feed line 2 on their 2-line phones. Some even "stack" the scout on top of the hub to make for less real estate taken up on their desk.

If you have teens in the home, you could use the scout to provide a private number to feed a "teens" cordless system. For those parents with only one line, this means not having to be an answering service for your kids - and actually being able to use the phone when you need to.
Lots of options herre.

The good news is that any of them can work well depending on your individual needs. Let us know if we can help with other ideas or wiring information.

[MikeekiM]

Thanks Wayne and SouthSound! That clears things up a great deal for me...

Another question... So if I provision my ooma to integrate with my landline, do I effectively get 3 lines?

Cuz the way I currently have it set up is like yours... I have my landline hooked up to my house alarm, as well as some products that require to "phone home" like my 3 DirecTV boxes... and I also have a single phone hooked up to it so that I can hear it ring and possibly make some simple phone calls with... So that's effectively "Line 1".

With ooma Premier I get another two lines (effectively)...for a total of 3 lines...

[WayneDsr]

Yes, 3 lines. Your landline. Your ooma number, your ooma virural number.

Wayne

EDIT: you must have Premier to get the virtual second line!

[WayneDsr]

Sorry I mis read. IF YOU PROVISION YOUR LINE YOU WILL ONLY HAVE 2 LINES.
Keep it like you have it now and you'll have 3 lines.

wayne

[MikeekiM]

First off, welcome to ooma!

Thanks!

I really don't see a lot of benefit to integrating the landline. Several of us HAVE landlines (usually for the financial benefit of being on some kind of DSL special) but do not use them in the "integrated mode". I have mine completely seperate - and use different phones / cordless bases for each type of line.

I completely have drawn the same conclusion... In fact, not only is there little benefit to landline integration, but I see a big negative that you effectively end up losing the ability to hold 3 independent conversations (see my messages above).

My plan is to have an answering machine hooked up to this phone with an announcement only greeting that basically announces that the line is unmonitored, and that if you are a friend, to call me on my cell phone or email me for my new phone number, but that telemarketers should take a hike (not in those exact words, but you catch my drift). The landline will still be hooked up to my alarm and DVRs...and will act as an emergency line out if my power or internet goes down...

Others (WayneDSR feel free to comment here) use their landline as a backup by plugging it into the hub's wall jack but WITHOUT provisioning. Just a simple basic landline. When the hub is down, the landline appears so you have to be careful to listen to the dialtone before making long distance calls - ooma tone means ooma is working and the call is free - normal dialtone means you are using your landline pricing model.

Yup... this is my plan... And I am going to reduce my service down to the minimum... No CID, and a metered service priced at $7.99/mo.

I personally don't use the scout because I feed the entire house with the hub's phone connection.

Tell me more! How do your have your wiring set up?

Others use Premier and a second line and use the scout to feed line 2 on their 2-line phones. Some even "stack" the scout on top of the hub to make for less real estate taken up on their desk.

This is EXACTLY how I have mine set up at the moment.

If you have teens in the home, you could use the scout to provide a private number to feed a "teens" cordless system. For those parents with only one line, this means not having to be an answering service for your kids - and actually being able to use the phone when you need to.
Lots of options herre.
[\quote]

Actually, I am planning on using the "stacked" scout as a home-office for my work calls...

Thanks to both of you for your help here!!! I was a serious doubter when I tentatively ordered my ooma... But I have to say...I've found religion!

[MikeekiM]

Sorry I mis read. IF YOU PROVISION YOUR LINE YOU WILL ONLY HAVE 2 LINES.
Keep it like you have it now and you'll have 3 lines.

wayne

Thanks Wayne! I am learning a little bit all the time! For me, this just confirms that I am not going to officially integrate my landline... I see no benefit, and actually a big disadvantage...

[southsound]

I personally don't use the scout because I feed the entire house with the hub's phone connection.

Tell me more! How do your have your wiring set up?

I feed the output of my hub (the Phone jack) to my distribution panel. I'm an old telco person so when we built our home I put a puchdown block in my wiring closet that connects all of the phone wiring. But there is a great article someone else discovered on powering your home via VOIP. It covers just about every situation. http://mi-telecom.org/distribute.html What it doesn't talk about is the ooma system with a scout. If you are going to use them stacked in your home office, just feed the output of the scout as a third line. You may have to rewire some of the jacks in your home to use the second and third pairs (white/orange orange/white and white/green/green white) since you have your existing landline on the white/blue blue/white pair. I would also consider keeping a corded phone available for the landline in case of a power outage or Internet outage. (My DSL went down for the first time yesterday. I had connection to Qwest but the ISP server would not connect. Took about 3 hours to get it to work after I called for service on my landline.)