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Selkowitz Technology | Seattle’s small business network and telecom consultant

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Recently I recommended a client switch service from Verizon to Comcast Business Voice as doing so would drop their bill from nearly $400/mo to $250/mo. Verizon told them Comcast was VoIP and had subpar quality, which I found humorous.

The first irony is Verizon itself offers VoIP services, so one would figure VoIP wasn’t intrinsically bad. The issue is VoIP isn’t all the same, VoIP across the public internet (MagicJack, Packet8, Vonage) has given the technology a bad name. The fact is the internet was just never designed for voice traffic and many cheap providers cut corners.

Making VoIP work is all about control - ensuring the voice data gets through from one end to the other reliably and promptly. Comcast Business controls the voice traffic end to end over their private network, meaning it isn’t prone to the quality problems that plague other VoIP services. The way I look at it is Comcast Digital Voice is phone service (with unlimited long distance) over a digital circuit rather than the traditional analog copper circuit.

As for voice quality a study by Keynote found that Comcast phone actually had significantly better audio quality than PSTN phone service - and I’d agree with those findings. Traditional analog copper lines like those of Qwest and Verizon are low fidelity and can pick up noise from many sources. A digital delivery like Comcast is simply much clearer - like comparing CD (digital) to cassette (analog).

The other irony is the client spent over an hour waiting on hold to talk to Verizon business support - I’ve never spent more than a few minutes waiting to talk to Comcast Business support.

Given that Comcast Business lines with unlimited long distance costs about the same or less than a Qwest or Verizon line before long distance charges, its easy to see why they’re gaining market.

5 Responses to “Is Comcast Business Phone VoIP?”

1. John Says:
   January 18th, 2009 at 6:14 pm

   Sounds right, Comcast uses it’s own network, as opposed to say Vonage, that moves data via your internet connection moving data along with other interent traffic.

2. Ed Says:
   September 2nd, 2009 at 7:08 pm

   What phone system or multi-line phone would you recommended for a small 4-person office utilizing Comcast business phone with 2 lines?

3. Kevin Selkowitz Says:
   September 3rd, 2009 at 6:53 am

   I’m very fond of the Talkswitch 240vs for a small office like yours - it has a great feature set, easy to manage, a low entry price point, and is expandable.

   http://www.selkowitz.com/Talkswitch_Phone_System.php

4. jonathan morris Says:
   February 5th, 2010 at 9:48 pm

   Jonathan
   I disagree.
   Although Comcast owns its network unlike Vonage, the technology of a loop based cable modem service simply doesn’t guarantee you enough bandwidth.

   We have plenty of dental offices that signed up for the comcast / optimum phone service only to cancel a month or two later. In mostly residential area’s in Norhter NJ, cable modem service for phone just isn’t strong enough.

   Jonathan

5. Kevin Selkowitz Says:
   February 9th, 2010 at 10:22 pm

   That’s a fair point, the quality of carrier networks do vary by region. I see good results in the Seattle/Metro area.

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