Great value with good traditional features, but antiquated technology and beware of hidden contracts terms...
February 09, 2019
Great value with good traditional features, but antiquated technology and beware of hidden contracts terms...
Score 2 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with 8x8 Virtual Office
8x8 Virtual Office (and general phone system) was chosen for my company (and one other I consult with) mainly due to the high value for a full-featured VoIP office phone system. The call recording is the primary feature we required along with being able to easily transfer calls outside the company and handled\s a large volume of incoming calls to our customer service representatives. The Virtual office features while theoretically seem useful/nice went largely unused by most of the employees either because they preferred to use the desk phone exclusively or were only using cell phones instead of desktop/laptops. The limitation of not being able to send/receive texts through the work number (only offering inter-office chat) seemed to discourage people from using it so they would just use their regular cell-phone number or iMessage instead. The voicemail-to-email features worked just fine, and desk phone service is stellar (never any issues) but the cellphone in-app calling would often have problems with voice quality or not ringing so I couldn't really get anyone to exclusively use the virtual office features/app.
- Offers reliable traditional phone service for desk users
- Voicemail system is flexible, allowing messages to get to the user even if they are not in the office easily and are easy to manage.
- Low introductory price, good place to start if you're new to VoIP
- Does not support texting, which is a problem in the modern work environment.
- Call recording/archiving features are seriously lacking, small storage and poor/slow management interface. No auto-archiving or backup, just lots of fees.
- Sales reps outright lie about 1-year contract terms and no ETF/cancellation fees to get you to sign up and then if you try to cancel after a year they hit you with huge undisclosed fees. Basically despite what any account manager will tell you are ALWAYS under contract, and you can only cancel on your anniversary month by giving 30-days notice (they force you to keep service for another month no matter what) to avoid being subject to a year's worth of service fees. Basically predatory contracts with undisclosed details on hyperlinks (so you never see them when you sign-up!!) that are only brought up if you try to cancel.
- Call routing is a bit tricky, and some features are not available in the admin/management portal. You will have to call tech-support to accomplish complex routing (eg. two or more auto-attendants). Should have more options for call flow and really needs a way for the admin to manage shared voicemail boxes and individuals greetings via the web portal instead of just the desk phone.
- Service was reliable just lacking on the mobile app side.
- Do not recommend because of deceptive contract terms, but as long as you're aware of them the price is not bad. Less expensive than competitors and has more features than similarly priced services.
- Low up-front cost so good for small businesses, and offers expandability and portability at a low price point. Long-term costs are higher than investing in your own equipment but doesn't require IT staff.
- RingCentral and Dialpad
8x8 is definitely the winner if you're comparing RingCentral solely based on cost, however it will fall short on mobile, and administrative features/metrics compared to RingCentral. I would say Dialpad is in the middle, a bit more expensive than 8x8 but less costly than RingCentral. The mobile app behaves well and does texting which is great! I would say that 8x8 actually handles call recording a bit better than Dialpad but not as well as RingCentral. If you don't have a huge number of mobile-only users and cost is your primary concern 8x8 looks really good comparatively, just don't as many bells and whistles as the other two.