As summer looms, we thought it would be an appropriate time to offer a few recommendations to find savings in your Etilities.

• Switch from monthly plans to annual plans.  Many service providers offer annual payment plans which are economically advantageous over their monthly plans.  If you have a service that you aren’t planning on changing anytime soon, considering the annual payment plan may be beneficial.  In the case of Vonage (Etilities Forum) for instance, the annual pre-pay plan can save clients $59 per year.  If you are a satisfied Vonage customer, you should seriously consider it.
• Going on vacation?  It is not uncommon for individuals or families to go on vacation for several weeks at a time away from home.  What few people know is that many cables companies offer a vacation plan.  Cox Communications (Etilities Forum) for examples allows you to essentially de-activate your TV, Internet and Phone without returning your modem or worrying about termination or re-activation fees.  Instead, for a low $10 a month fee, you can simply leave your house for several months and reactivate all your services back to normal upon your return.  Some of the providers offer packages of up to 4 months which can save hundreds of dollars over the summer.
• Sign-Up for the Assistant.  By signing-up for the Etilities.Com assistant and completing your profile, we will continuously monitor the industry and evaluate savings opportunities.  If you have unique needs or specific questions about your Etilities, you may also e-mail directly at assistant@etilities.com.

Enjoy your Summer!
©2008-2009, Gallop Services, Inc. All rights reserved.

A spokesperson from Comcast (Etilities Forum) has recently confirmed that the company’s television subscribers will see rate increases in February 2009. Although the average increase will only be 3.2%, compared to 4% in previous years, any bump at all will be felt more this year as the economic situation in the US tightens wallets nationwide.

We’ve included a brief summary of the announced increases below.  However, your actual cost may differ depending on local taxes, promotional values, and other factors.  As always, check with your local Comcast representative to confirm.

The rate increase, when combined with the slowed economy, could drive subscribers to seek out new alternatives, including Hulu (Etilities Forum), Joost (Etilities Forum), and even the venerable (and versatile) Netflix (Etilities Forum). While the rate change is not slated to affect Comcast’s Internet or phone plan rates, it could trigger bundle consumers to scale back monthly payments by considering VoIP phone services like Vonage (Etilities Forum).

©2008-2009, Gallop Services, Inc. All rights reserved.

Which technology services made a significant, positive impact on you as an individual in 2008? Which most impacted the market as you see it? We performed an in-depth evaluation of the services we covered this year and combined it with your feedback to compile a list of the cream of the crop.

Vonage: VoIP has taken the market by storm. Switching to Vonage (Etilities Forum) can result in amazing monthly cost savings, and the provider shines amidst the competition thanks its features, price and reliability.

Netflix: Implementing the first mainstream DVD-by-mail model was impressive enough, but Netflix (Etilities Forum) did not rest on its deserved laurels.  It is constantly working on new ways to deliver content to your TV set – as well as the other screens in your home.  It has formed an impressive number of partnerships this year to to improve their video-on-demand offerings.

Read the rest of this entry »
©2008-2009, Gallop Services, Inc. All rights reserved.

(Image courtesy of dslreports.com)

When Comcast (Etilities Forum) announced a 250GB per month cap on broadband usage, our analysis was twofold: First, most customers will never get close to the cap, and will therefore not be impacted by the limit in the foreseeable future.  Second, Comcast should provide a tool to monitor the entire home’s use of its broadband connection, rather than just on each individual PC.

It now appears that Comcast has stepped up to the plate and prepared a tool that will assist their customers with monitoring and controlling their home’s broadband usage.

According to Comcast insiders, customers will gain access to a web-based monitoring tool sometime in January.  This methodology will avoid the primary pitfall of PC-based monitoring tools: not every network-dependent device is a PC.  Many homes have voice-over-IP systems (like Vonage and Skype), gaming platforms (XBOX360, Playstation 3, Wii), and countless new streaming devices including Roku, Apple TV, and even the venerable TiVO.

Each of these growing number of devices rely on a broadband connection to enhance the consumer’s experiences with their services.  Bandwidth monitors that only report on a single device would complicate users’ ability to determine how much of their 250GB is used by a movie rental or video game.

Only time will tell whether broadband providers will increase their caps to keep pace with the growing reliance on broadband Internet.  However, a means to monitor usage at the account level is a good sign that Comcast sees the forest from the trees.  We’re anxious to see how long it takes for other providers to follow suit. Gallop will continue monitoring the changing landscape of the market to see how technology developments affect bandwidth caps placed on consumers.

©2008-2009, Gallop Services, Inc. All rights reserved.

We’ve gotten so accustomed to technology providers announcing new features that too often we fail to pay attention.  Every once in a while, however, they come out with one that piques our interest.

Not long ago, Vonage (Etilities Forum) announced the release of the add-on feature called Vonage Visual Voicemail®.  This service translates voicemails into text and sends them to your e-mail or phone via SMS.  As part of a marketing effort, Vonage offered 10 free visual voicemails to its clients, so we got to experience the service firsthand.

The transcription is good, and when the software isn’t sure of a word, it places it in parentheses and adds a question mark.  It appears that the service is English only at this point, and Vonage has not announced plans to expand it to other languages.  The convenience to be able to handle messages quickly without needing audio is certainly useful for busy individuals who aren’t always available to check their voicemail immediately.  I, for one, have already used it more than once for both personal and professional time-sensitive issues.

Overall, this capability is a welcome addition to the already feature-rich Vonage service.  Though we find the cost to be high at $.25 per visual voicemail, the technology does serve to highlight the further integration of traditional phone with the internet and digital content.

©2008-2009, Gallop Services, Inc. All rights reserved.

It would appear that AT&T (Etilities Forum) has decided to join most other cable providers in implementing monthly caps on internet usage.  Starting in Reno and expanding to other places shortly thereafter, AT&T will place caps ranging from 20GB to 150GB, depending on the speed of the plan purchased.  As with most providers, many customers using the internet for basic web and e-mail purposes will not be impacted.  But those who may be using their connectivity to take advantage of the flurry of data available, whether they are streaming or downloading movies from Netflix (Etilities Forum) or iTunes (Etilities Forum), using Vonage (Etilities Forum) or other VoIP phone providers, video conferencing, or online gaming, could hit their cap fairly easily.  

As we have examined before, most cable and internet providers have begun implementing bandwidth caps on availability with the exception of Verizon (Etilities Forum) which has said it does not plan to place limits.  This standardization of how services are offered continues to show the trend towards commoditization of bandwidth, as well as the need for service providers to create or otherwise provide tools allowing whole-home bandwidth monitoring.

©2008-2009, Gallop Services, Inc. All rights reserved.

You may have read reports that China has been snooping on Skype (Etilities Forum) text messages to monitor the use of dangerous words like ‘democracy’. Now, since there there is no sizable difference between snooping on text messages and accessing phone conversations in the Voice Over IP (VOIP) world given that it’s all TCP/IP data, perhaps you are wondering: should this affect my decision to go with VOIP providers like Skype  or Vonage (Etilities Forum) or to stick to more traditional phone providers like Verizon (Etilities Forum), Comcast (Etilities Forum) and others?

Well, even if we put aside the fact that Verizon, Comcast etc. are all graduallly transitioning to VOIP as well (even if it’s indistinguishable to you and to the bills you pay), what you need to take away from this is that this is making news for a reason: it almost never happens to VOIP. You see all governments snoop in on your communications. The US government has been doing it for years, and more so since the controversial Patriot Act was signed into law. It happens so much and so often that it’s just not news worthy anymore. It has become a de facto parameter of our modern world.

So really the fact that you are hearing about this should make you feel more secure about using VOIP, not less so. Now does that mean that you should favor VOIP over traditional phone services? Well that depends on your ethical views. The thing about wire tapping is that it allows the government to monitor and catch criminal and terrorist activity. But it also means that your privacy is constantly invaded. So promoting safer means of communications means that your conversations are more secure, but then again so are those of our enemies.

So next time you are re-evaluating your home IT setup, in addition to price and call quality you can also take this into account. Based on our research, VOIP is no less secure than traditional phone lines. In fact, it may protect your privacy better as it can more easily implement mechanisms like encryption and tunneling since it rides on the broadband pipe.

©2008-2009, Gallop Services, Inc. All rights reserved.