The decline and fall of Gizmo Español | Deutsch | Français | Italiano | Português

Until a couple of months ago I was a fairly happy customer of the Gizmo Project, a SIP based competitor to Skype. Back in February however they sent me a support email to tell me my Call-In number was out of order.

Date: Fri, 20 Feb 2009
Subject: Attn:Regarding Your UK Number From Gizmo5
From: Gizmo5

Dear Gizmo5 Customer:

Our provider for your number in the United Kingdom is experiencing technical problems with their numbers. They are working on this issue but have been unable to provide us with a time frame for when these numbers will be functional.

To remedy this situation we have 2 options for our customers:

1. Offer you a replacement number
2. If you would like to keep your number, we will extend your expiration date to cover the time it was down once the numbers are restored and functioning normally.

Please respond to this email to let us know of your decision. We are sorry for the inconvenience this may have caused and look forward to getting this resolved quickly.

Thank you for your business,
Gizmo 5 Support Staff

Since my Call-In number was the one I used for my business I wasn't that happy. I certainly didn't want a different number, this was the one on all of my business cards after all. So crossed my fingers, and just over a week later I got a follow up email.

Date: Sat, 28 Feb 2009 00:02:54 UT
Subject: UPDATE:Regarding Your UK Number From Gizmo5
From: Gizmo5

Dear Gizmo5 Customer:

Regarding the number outage that has occured in the UK, We have received notification from our provider that service to the numbers affected should return by Monday March 2nd. They stated that everything possible is done so that it does not happen again.

Thanks again for your patience and we apologize for the inconvenience this may have caused.

Regards,
Gizmo5 Support Staff

A long outage, but at least it was almost behind me? Suffice to say the 2nd of March rolled around without my service being restored. In fact Gizmo have never managed to restore my service...

...and quite frankly their level of customer service was abysmal. There was no advanced notice of any possible outage, and then notification that there was an outage was delayed after they did know about it. I learned later from colleagues that the number had gone out of service some time before the initial email I received from them about the problem. Repeated promises that it would be fixed soon, that it was already fixed when it wasn't. Weeks between answering support tickets, support tickets randomly disappearing from my list filled tickets without any reason...

The Call-In number in question has now 'expired' as the entire saga has ran past the end of my billing cycle, and I certainly wasn't going to throw good money after bad to renew a number I couldn't use. Claims that they'd,

...extend your expiration date to cover the time it was down

just didn't happen. Unfortunately availability of number portability in the UK, while normal practice for mobile numbers, is in it's infancy for landlines and relies on the complex interaction of a series of mutual handshake deals between various providers. There is no standard way to do things. So I've now got another dial-in number with a different provider. Fortunately since I'd gone with a standards based VoIP solution I could take my expensive shiny VoIP hardware along with me to my new provider. Heaven knows what I'd have done if I was relying on Skype...

I've had my business cards reprinted, and I'll now tell anyone who listens that they shouldn't trust the Gizmo Project with their business. A dead phone line doesn't give a great first impression to your customers.

The perils of provider lock-in Español | Deutsch | Français | Italiano | Português

I run a consulting and contracting company. I do some Perl, Objective-C, the odd bit of hardware, and write apps for the iPhone. My business cards all have the same phone number on them, which is a dial-in number attached to a VoIP account with the Gizmo Project.

Up until a week ago this worked fairly well. When I was on the move I either picked up calls from my laptop, or if I missed them, voice mail got forwarded to me via email. When I was at home I used a hardware SIP phone on my desktop, and voicemail still got emailed to me if I missed a call.

What's gone wrong? Well the number doesn't work anymore and, at least according to customer support, Gizmo doesn't have a clue as to when it might start working;

Our provider for your number in the United Kingdom is experiencing technical problems with their numbers. They are working on this issue but have been unable to provide us with a time frame for when these numbers will be functional.

To remedy this situation we have 2 options for our customers:

1. Offer you a replacement number
2. If you would like to keep your number, we will extend your expiration date to cover the time it was down once the numbers are restored and functioning normally.

Please respond to this email to let us know of your decision. We are sorry for the inconvenience this may have caused and look forward to getting this resolved quickly.

This is not the best customer service I've ever experienced. It wouldn't be quite so bad if the number just dropped straight to answer phone, but it doesn't even do that. Effectively, if you want to reach me by phone about my business, you have to already be doing business with me and have my mobile number. This isn't great, it's all about first impression after all.

After talking with a friend who does this sort of stuff for a living it looks like I'm pretty much stuck at this point, number portability for landlines is in its infancy in the UK. My guess? The provider has gone bust in the current recession and I'm not getting my number back.

Lesson learned. For something as important as a phone number, provider lock-in is a real problem.