Phone People: Basic Plan

Plan Reviewed: Economy

Pros

• $9.99 monthly fee
• No activation fee

Cons

• 7 day free trial
• Message alerts cost $3.00 a month
• $29 charge to get an 800 number
• No local numbers
• No additional extensions
• No internet fax or conference call feature

Conclusion
Phone People's Economy plan gives you the essential parts of a PBX service at a low cost. The Economy plan is a good deal as long as you do not need a local number, additional extensions, the ability to do internet faxes, or the ability to do conference calls. While it may seem like a long list many people using a PBX service might not need any of these features. Outside of the lacking features there are a few more problems. The most significant is that it costs $30 to get an 800 number. The average cost of an 800 number is well below $20, so $30 is somewhat high. The other problem is that you can have message alerts but to get the service you have to pay $3 a month. Message alerts are virtually always included free with PBX service plans. The last issue is that the free trial is only 7 days long leaving you only a small amount of time to truly try out the service.

Phone People's Economy plan is decent if you can overlook the problems that it has. The monthly fee is $9.99 a month and additional minutes are 5.9¢ a minute. You do not have to pay an activation fee. You get 5 extensions and 100 minutes, which is what you should expect with a low cost web hosting service. In the end, Phone People's Economy plan has a lot of problems and does not do anything to stand out from the rest of the PBX service plans available. We recommend that you look at another service provider.

Phone People: Mid-Level Plan

Plan Reviewed: Standard

Pros

• 25 extensions included
• No activation fee
• Cost for additional minutes is 3.9¢
• Low cost to transfer a number

Cons

• No internet fax
• 7 day free trial

Conclusion
Phone People's Standard Plan is a well-priced plan that lacks a few features. The Standard plan provides a significant number of extensions for a low price. Our market standard plan would provide 10 extensions for a monthly price of $29.99. The Phone People standard plan offers 25 for the same cost. The number of included minutes is also reasonable for the cost. At 3.9¢ per minute, the price of additional minutes is great when compared to most other service providers.

There are several things Phone People's service is missing. First of all it lacks the internet fax feature, which gives you the ability to receive or send faxes through email. The service also lacks a call transfer feature and a dial by name directory.

Phone People: Corporate Plan

Plan Reviewed: Pro

Pros

• 7 day free trial
• 2500 included minutes
• 2.9¢ for additional minutes
• 100 extensions

Cons

• No internet fax or conference call feature available
• $29 charge to get an 800 number
• No local numbers available

Conclusion
Phone People's Pro plan is a good high end PBX service that comes with 2,500 included minutes and 100 extensions. The Pro plan also provides you with cheap additional minutes at 2.9¢ a minute. The 7 day free trial is a good way to try out the system and see how you like it. There are a few problems you might encounter, such as the lack of an internet fax feature. Another issue Phone People's service has is that it does not have a conference calling feature. The Pro plan also costs $99.99 a month, which is high when compared to some other PBX service. If you want an 800 number you have to pay a one time fee of $29. Phone People's service does not provide plans with local numbers, so if you want your service to use a local number you should look at other PBX service providers.