Despite Possible Increased Phone Taxes VoIP Continues to Grow

There are several cities around the nation that are feeling the brunt of lost tax money due to the growth of IP phone systems. In recent reports the Mountain View, CA City Council voted Tuesday to have voters decide whether the city should extend its phone tax to Internet phone services.

Several cities’ phone tax revenue is in danger unless taxes are regulated to include increasingly popular broadband Internet phone services known as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP).

Mountain View city reports that a mid-size business using VoIP could see an estimated increase in their phone taxes from $100 a month to $600. However, there are still hundred of businesses that continue to profit from providing VoIP services to businesses and residences alike.

Comcast's growth on the VoIP front continues, with the company adding 230,000 VoIP customers on the quarter. The company ended the quarter with 47.7 million total voice, Internet and television customers, 8.1 million in voice. Comcast is now the country's largest broadband ISP, largest TV provider, and the country's third largest residential phone company.

Another company AudioCodes Ltd., a leading provider of Voice over IP (VoIP) technologies and Voice Network products, today announced revenues for the second quarter of 2010 were $36.5 million compared $30.4 million for the second quarter of 2009.

VoIP is a very lucrative market for service providers and very beneficial to users as well. IP phone systems provide increased efficiency in several forms of communication in addition less expensive operating costs.

The benefits of VoIP are prevalent among several entities, but only time will tell if governmental bodies will increase taxes on this form of communication.