Item: GoTo Connect
Rating: 10
Author: Charles Patterson TSCM

Overall Satisfaction with GoToConnect (formerly Jive)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We are a very small business and have phones at 2 locations. I manage other GoToConnect users for other companies as well. Some with multiple locations throughout the U.S. The most significant feature is being able to easily manage call flow for incoming calls. The GoToConnect Dial Plans are phenomenal.

Pros and Cons

Pros

The GoToConnect dial plans for incoming calls. This allows extreme flexibility. I used to program digital PBX systems and only dreamed of the flexibility offered by the GoToConnect drag and drop dial plans.
All features are easily accessible in the admin web portal, and there is no additional cost for most features that other providers charge for, such as call queues and conference rooms.
SMS messages - This still needs some work, but in this age, many people assume they can text you back at whatever number you called from, not realizing you may have called from the office phone. Now when I get a text mistakenly sent to my office number I can still respond.

Cons

Keep working on developing SMS capability.
Keep working on the GoToConnect mobile app. It has improved greatly over the years but still needs improvement.
Need different or flexible ring tones.
Get all the admin portals standardized. It's still a bit confusing.
Add better admin restrictions. There are many situations where someone may need certain admin capability but not others. To have only super admin and admin is not good enough.
Everyone with admin capability can activate call monitoring and listen in on others' calls which makes this a less secure platform. I cannot recommend GoToConnect for customers with serious privacy needs. They need to have a way to limit certain destructive or dangerous features yet allow other admin type access.
International calling, at least a year ago, was not very reliable. I hope that has improved.

Return on Investment

Lower cost for abundance of features.

Usability

I have to make extra effort to ensure users understand the features. Some get it easily, others take more effort.

Alternatives Considered

Nextiva, 8x8 Virtual Office and RingCentral

No one else has the ease of programming and included features that GoToConnect has.

Support Rating

Users who have called support say that the initial support is not very helpful, and they are always going over the basic troubleshooting. Once they get someone knowledgeable they are happy.

Likelihood to Recommend

Well suited: Businesses with multiple locations that need to talk with each other and connect calls amongst each other. Businesses where employees care about getting voicemail as email, calls transferred to cell phones, and web portal access. If the employees don't care or do not need an active "phone life" then it may not help them. Companies that want phone numbers in other areas or who want to keep their numbers when they move. Regular phone companies and cable companies are restricted from moving phone numbers to other central office areas. Once a number is ported into GoToConnect VoIP, it has portability and can be sent to any location. Any company where most employees are constantly on the phone. It becomes very cost-effective. Less appropriate: A company with just one or two phone lines and perhaps lots of extensions - and do not need any above features. Not cost-effective. A company that can't figure out how to transfer phone calls among extensions.

GoTo Connect Feature Ratings

Comments

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Best programming features and call routing available