BETA Feature: SIP Accounts

[VOIPoTim]

You can now create SIP Accounts on the VOIPo network to use with SIP softphones and devices.

To route an Express number to a SIP account, simply put the sip username in the destination field.

Voicemail and voicemail ring count will work normally with this.

These SIP account are on our BYOD server and are enabled for you to accept incoming calls on VOIPo Express numbers only. We are not offering outbound calling with them at this time.

Information can be found under BETA - SIP Accounts in your vPanel.

Please let us know if you find any bugs.

[fisamo]

That's very interesting. I'll check it out and let you know what I find... So far, I've been routing incoming calls directly to my * system as inbound-route@my.dynamichost.com. I would guess that having an internal account to register with may help with filtering anonymous SIP requests... How (if at all) would this affect billing? Does sip forwarding count against the bucket of minutes? Are sip-forwarded calls (overage) charged at a different rate? Is there a billing advantage for in-network sip forwarding?

(I don't recall the resolution of the original question of how forwarding to sip destinations is billed.)

Thanks.

[fisamo]

VERY preliminary testing, will look into the feature more when I get home:

Before a SIP account is created, the message on vpanel is:

Currently there are no setup sip accounts setup.

Please remove the first "setup".

Entering an invalid SIP URL is caught, but instead of a nice error message, vpanel gives a cleared screen with the message "Exception Caught! Invalid SIP URL."

More testing later...

[VOIPoTim]

That's very interesting. I'll check it out and let you know what I find... So far, I've been routing incoming calls directly to my * system as inbound-route@my.dynamichost.com. I would guess that having an internal account to register with may help with filtering anonymous SIP requests... How (if at all) would this affect billing? Does sip forwarding count against the bucket of minutes? Are sip-forwarded calls (overage) charged at a different rate? Is there a billing advantage for in-network sip forwarding?

(I don't recall the resolution of the original question of how forwarding to sip destinations is billed.)

Thanks.

I don't want to get into it yet, but we're announcing new per-minute pricing for Express that factors SIP in in the very near future.

Currently there's no difference in pricing regardless of whether it's sent to SIP or PSTN.

[fisamo]

I don't want to get into it yet, but we're announcing new per-minute pricing for Express that factors SIP in in the very near future.

Currently there's no difference in pricing regardless of whether it's sent to SIP or PSTN.

Fair enough. I look forward to the news.

[VOIPoTim]

Has anyone else tried this out?

[gbh2o]

Has anyone else tried this out?

Sorry to be so slow on testing this feature, but was traveling.

I had no problems with it. Works as advertised, so far!

Edited to add: BTW, is there a chance that Express will get a "Device" monitoring capability like the one for Residential? Might be helpful for use with the sip targets.

[bwyatt]

These SIP account are on our BYOD server and are enabled for you to accept incoming calls on VOIPo Express numbers only. We are not offering outbound calling with them at this time.

Tim:

I posted a question in the unofficial BYOD board and now find mention of it here. I have an express account, but intend to purchase a residential account now that I've learned you're able to port my local number. However, I really want to be able to use a softphone when I travel. Does the residential account allow both inbound and outbound or is inbound the only option regardless of the type of account?

[VOIPoTim]

Tim:

I posted a question in the unofficial BYOD board and now find mention of it here. I have an express account, but intend to purchase a residential account now that I've learned you're able to port my local number. However, I really want to be able to use a softphone when I travel. Does the residential account allow both inbound and outbound or is inbound the only option regardless of the type of account?

The residential allows both and you can use a softphone.

[bwyatt]

The residential allows both and you can use a softphone.

Tim:

Thanks for your quick response.

Now that I'm getting the hang of the setup here, I'm wondering... I've got 6 phone lines I'd like to have you port. Can I do this through one residential account, or will it require 6 separate accounts? It's my understanding I will have to keep my express account in order to maintain my toll free number forwarding, and open a separate residential account to access an inbound and outbound softphone.