Is Ooma the answer to your BIG phone bills?

PHOENIX - Looking to save money when it comes to your home phone? Well I may have found a solution.

It's called Ooma and it cost me $200 plus free shipping from Amazon.com . It is meant to replace your home phone and you can keep your existing phone number. You'll have 911 services too.

The Ooma connects to your high-speed Internet and all you pay for is the cost of the Ooma box. There is no monthly fee, but you will have to pay taxes. To figure how much that will be just go to Ooma's website and type in your zip code. My taxes for zip code 85008 would be only $3.47 and they will charge your credit card every month. If you add it up that's just under $42 for the year for phone service with voice mail, caller ID and call waiting. And it includes all U.S. long distance calls.

If you want to keep your existing phone home phone number you will pay a onetime porting fee of $39.99 and it will take up to 4 weeks for them to transfer the number. But you don't have to transfer your existing number if you do not want to. Ooma will assign a new number and then you can start using it right away.

The call quality was perfect, you can't even tell you are not using a landline. No delays or anything.

To set up the box was really easy and took about 20 minutes. You simply connect the Ooma directly to your high speed Internet access. Of course depending on who your provider is and if you have a router, the setup will vary, but either way it is simple. Then you plug your telephone cord from your wall phone into Ooma and your existing phone into the Ooma and you are ready to make phone calls.

I totally give the Ooma a thumbs up. I personally was frustrated with the amount of taxes I paid for a single phone line with no caller id or call waiting through a local telephone company. I was paying $11 for the line and $10 for taxes and fees. In one year I will recoup my investment of buying the Ooma. After that it is $3.47 a month and I can make all the calls I want and not have to worry about missing a call because I did not have call waiting.

Also I found out that woot.com has a deal for a refurbished Ooma for $139.95 plus $5 for shipping but woot.com is a daily deal site so it is only posted for one day.